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Virtual Memory !!
Hi I have 3 questions about Virtual memory.. in this artical they are
talking about window98!! Any heelp would be very much appreciate it.. 1) In this artical the author saying the ration between RAM and Virtual memory about 2:1???!! What does that mean?? if I have a RAM of size 2M for example.. the the virual memory should be 1M or 4M?? quote The amount of hard drive space you allocate for virtual memory is important. If you allocate too little, you will get "Out of Memory" errors. If you find that you need to keep increasing the size of the virtual memory, you probably are also finding that your system is sluggish and accesses the hard drive constantly. In that case, you should consider buying more RAM to keep the ratio between RAM and virtual memory about 2:1. Some applications enjoy having lots of virtual memory space but do not access it very much. In that case, large paging files work well /quote 2) Also here the author saying if you want to improve the performance then the minimum and maximum size of the VM file identical?? What does that mean? and why.. I could not understand what he is trying to say quote One trick that can improve the performance of virtual memory (especially when large amounts of virtual memory are needed) is to make the minimum and maximum sizes of the virtual memory file identical. This forces the operating system to allocate the entire paging file when you start the machine. That keeps the paging file from having to grow while programs are running, which improves performance. Many video applications recommend this technique to avoid pauses while reading or writing video information between hard disk and tape /quote 3) How can I control the VM in windowXP. Thanks alot |
#2
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esara wrote:
Hi I have 3 questions about Virtual memory.. in this artical they are talking about window98!! Any heelp would be very much appreciate it.. 1) In this artical the author saying the ration between RAM and Virtual memory about 2:1???!! What does that mean?? if I have a RAM of size 2M for example.. the the virual memory should be 1M or 4M?? quote The amount of hard drive space you allocate for virtual memory is important. If you allocate too little, you will get "Out of Memory" errors. If you find that you need to keep increasing the size of the virtual memory, you probably are also finding that your system is sluggish and accesses the hard drive constantly. In that case, you should consider buying more RAM to keep the ratio between RAM and virtual memory about 2:1. Some applications enjoy having lots of virtual memory space but do not access it very much. In that case, large paging files work well /quote To me, this information sounds way out of date. It used to be recommended that swap space should be about twice the size of the physical memory (thus virtual memory is three times the size, virtual memory = physical + swap). This was all well and good when 32MB of RAM cost the same as a new 7-Series BMW, but now its pointless. If your machine swaps, buy more RAM. Personally, I'd only allocate a maximum of disk space the same size as my physical RAM just as an emergency measure until I could get to the shops. |
#3
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"esara" wrote in message om... Hi I have 3 questions about Virtual memory.. in this artical they are talking about window98!! Any heelp would be very much appreciate it.. Well I think that article over-simplified the VM settings a bit. There is no magical number or magical formula. I have learned through years of experience that it is tough to get consumer grade Windows OS to use more than 512MB of memory, total (meaning physical RAM plus swap file). In fact, Windows 98 (&ME) will choke on 1GB of RAM, unless you tweak the registry a bit. Generally speaking, the more RAM installed, the smaller your swap file needs to be. Add enough RAM, and you might even be able to turn VM off. But then again, some really strange things can happen if your system runs out of memory. So it's not usually advisable to set your swap file really small or to turn off VM. You also have to consider hard drive space, especially if hard drive space is limited. For windows, it's best not to drop below 1GB of free hard drive space. If you are right AT 1GB of remaining hard drive space, cranking up the swap file to 1GB is not a good idea (for example). It's almost always a good idea to choose a rather "large" swap file and set the minimum and maximum sizes to the same number. For example, if you have 128MB of RAM on Windows 98, you might want to set minimum 512MB and maximum 512MB for a swap file. If you upgrade to 512MB of RAM, you migth be able to turn your swap file down to minimum/maximum of 256MB. So I don't know where they got the 2:1 ratio. Seems like someone just made that up out of thin air. In windows xp, the swap file is called a paging file. Start, control panel, system, advanced tab, performance settings, advanced tab, virtual memory. On a side note, it's always better to add more RAM than to depend too much on virtual memory. -Dave |
#4
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"esara" wrote in message
om... Hi I have 3 questions about Virtual memory.. in this artical they are talking about window98!! Any heelp would be very much appreciate it.. 1) In this artical the author saying the ration between RAM and Virtual memory about 2:1???!! What does that mean?? if I have a RAM of size 2M for example.. the the virual memory should be 1M or 4M?? Taking this literally, I would say 2 parts RAM to every 1 part VM. So that would mean 2MB of RAM is best paired w/ 1MB of VM (I'm not commenting on whether this is a good ratio, I have my own opinions, just explaining *his* thinking). quote The amount of hard drive space you allocate for virtual memory is important. If you allocate too little, you will get "Out of Memory" errors. If you find that you need to keep increasing the size of the virtual memory, you probably are also finding that your system is sluggish and accesses the hard drive constantly. In that case, you should consider buying more RAM to keep the ratio between RAM and virtual memory about 2:1. Some applications enjoy having lots of virtual memory space but do not access it very much. In that case, large paging files work well /quote 2) Also here the author saying if you want to improve the performance then the minimum and maximum size of the VM file identical?? What does that mean? and why.. I could not understand what he is trying to say By making them the same size, then once allocated, that's it. No more resizing will take place, thus no more performance hits from the resizing of that paging file, and far less likely to be fragmented. Frankly, overblown, the number of times the file is actually reallocated (expanded) is not that often, it's not as if this is happening constantly. quote One trick that can improve the performance of virtual memory (especially when large amounts of virtual memory are needed) is to make the minimum and maximum sizes of the virtual memory file identical. This forces the operating system to allocate the entire paging file when you start the machine. That keeps the paging file from having to grow while programs are running, which improves performance. Many video applications recommend this technique to avoid pauses while reading or writing video information between hard disk and tape /quote 3) How can I control the VM in windowXP. Best thing to do is get LOTS of RAM (1GB or more), then disable the paging file, which can be done from System Properties. (you can also change the max and min there). Please realize that this statement is going to draw the VM/paging file *experts* crazing, and we will shortly hear various cries as to why this is a bad idea, the usually litany. But as long as you have *sufficient* memory, you do not need a paging file! In fact, the best paging file is NO paging file. So if you're using XP and have gobs of RAM, and disable the paging file, all the paging file "futzing" magically goes PUFF! You can then completely forget about it, it's not worth spending two more seconds thought. Hmm, I think can hear them typing away already. HTH Jim Thanks alot |
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Thank you for responding.
So Jim this will be the same senario as in the past with PIV on 400Mhz. FBS and using PC-133 SDARAM. I bought a ASUS P4C800 Motherboard with INTEL 875P Chipset ( called Canterwood, i think). The manual says on 800 Mhz FBS configuration 266/333/400 Mhz DDR can be used. "Jim" wrote in message news:%lyfc.4905$Yf6.1943@fed1read07... "esara" wrote in message om... Hi I have 3 questions about Virtual memory.. in this artical they are talking about window98!! Any heelp would be very much appreciate it.. 1) In this artical the author saying the ration between RAM and Virtual memory about 2:1???!! What does that mean?? if I have a RAM of size 2M for example.. the the virual memory should be 1M or 4M?? Taking this literally, I would say 2 parts RAM to every 1 part VM. So that would mean 2MB of RAM is best paired w/ 1MB of VM (I'm not commenting on whether this is a good ratio, I have my own opinions, just explaining *his* thinking). quote The amount of hard drive space you allocate for virtual memory is important. If you allocate too little, you will get "Out of Memory" errors. If you find that you need to keep increasing the size of the virtual memory, you probably are also finding that your system is sluggish and accesses the hard drive constantly. In that case, you should consider buying more RAM to keep the ratio between RAM and virtual memory about 2:1. Some applications enjoy having lots of virtual memory space but do not access it very much. In that case, large paging files work well /quote 2) Also here the author saying if you want to improve the performance then the minimum and maximum size of the VM file identical?? What does that mean? and why.. I could not understand what he is trying to say By making them the same size, then once allocated, that's it. No more resizing will take place, thus no more performance hits from the resizing of that paging file, and far less likely to be fragmented. Frankly, overblown, the number of times the file is actually reallocated (expanded) is not that often, it's not as if this is happening constantly. quote One trick that can improve the performance of virtual memory (especially when large amounts of virtual memory are needed) is to make the minimum and maximum sizes of the virtual memory file identical. This forces the operating system to allocate the entire paging file when you start the machine. That keeps the paging file from having to grow while programs are running, which improves performance. Many video applications recommend this technique to avoid pauses while reading or writing video information between hard disk and tape /quote 3) How can I control the VM in windowXP. Best thing to do is get LOTS of RAM (1GB or more), then disable the paging file, which can be done from System Properties. (you can also change the max and min there). Please realize that this statement is going to draw the VM/paging file *experts* crazing, and we will shortly hear various cries as to why this is a bad idea, the usually litany. But as long as you have *sufficient* memory, you do not need a paging file! In fact, the best paging file is NO paging file. So if you're using XP and have gobs of RAM, and disable the paging file, all the paging file "futzing" magically goes PUFF! You can then completely forget about it, it's not worth spending two more seconds thought. Hmm, I think can hear them typing away already. HTH Jim Thanks alot |
#6
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"esara" wrote...
Hi I have 3 questions about Virtual memory.. in this artical they are talking about window98!! Any heelp would be very much appreciate it.. There are a LOT of opinions out there, and most of them are valid. Look through them and make a decision based on your needs. 1) In this artical the author saying the ration between RAM and Virtual memory about 2:1???!! What does that mean?? if I have a RAM of size 2M for example.. the the virual memory should be 1M or 4M?? If RAM is 2M, virtual memory is 4M, using this formula. 2) Also here the author saying if you want to improve the performance then the minimum and maximum size of the VM file identical?? What does that mean? and why.. I could not understand what he is trying to say The concept is valid. Instead of dynamically changing the size of the virtual memory file, a fixed-size file is created and remains in a single spot on the HD. In the Performance settings tab, you will see an option to change the default handling of the virtual memory. There are 2 settings involved: Initial size and Maximum size. In your example above, set them both to 2M, then reboot. 3) How can I control the VM in windowXP. Control Panel | Performance and Maintenance | System | Advanced | Performance Options | Advanced | Virtual Memory Click the Custom Options, set the size you want, Apply, and reboot. If you have 1 GB of RAM, 1 GB of virtual memory should be adequate; with 512 MB, try 768 MB or 1 GB. With less than 512 MB, try 2.5 times actual RAM (instead of the 2x quoted above). |
#8
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"Jim" wrote...
Please realize that this statement is going to draw the VM/paging file *experts* crazing, and we will shortly hear various cries as to why this is a bad idea, the usually litany. But as long as you have *sufficient* memory, you do not need a paging file! In fact, the best paging file is NO paging file. So if you're using XP and have gobs of RAM, and disable the paging file, all the paging file "futzing" magically goes PUFF! You can then completely forget about it, it's not worth spending two more seconds thought. Hmm, I think can hear them typing away already. As always, "it depends"... If the computer is used only for e-mail, web surfing, and writing memos in Word, you may be right. However, if you use Photoshop a lot, and work on multiple pix and/or layers at a time, you can rapidly run out of RAM as Photoshop stores all that undo data. Granted, Photoshop also has some internal memory management/swapping ability, but that's probably beyond the scope of discussion for basic pagefile setup... :-) I have 1 GB RAM, and the pagefile is accessed occasionally (I can tell EXACTLY when, because it's on a separate, noisier HD [of equal performance as the boot drive]; at that's all that drive is used for, other than manual data backup). It doesn't happen often under light loads, but is pretty consistent when doing heavy Photoshop work... |
#9
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"John R Weiss" wrote in message news:4FDfc.47930$rg5.98077@attbi_s52... "Jim" wrote... Please realize that this statement is going to draw the VM/paging file *experts* crazing, and we will shortly hear various cries as to why this is a bad idea, the usually litany. But as long as you have *sufficient* memory, you do not need a paging file! In fact, the best paging file is NO paging file. So if you're using XP and have gobs of RAM, and disable the paging file, all the paging file "futzing" magically goes PUFF! You can then completely forget about it, it's not worth spending two more seconds thought. Hmm, I think can hear them typing away already. As always, "it depends"... If the computer is used only for e-mail, web surfing, and writing memos in Word, you may be right. However, if you use Photoshop a lot, and work on multiple pix and/or layers at a time, you can rapidly run out of RAM as Photoshop stores all that undo data. Granted, Photoshop also has some internal memory management/swapping ability, but that's probably beyond the scope of discussion for basic pagefile setup... :-) I have 1 GB RAM, and the pagefile is accessed occasionally (I can tell EXACTLY when, because it's on a separate, noisier HD [of equal performance as the boot drive]; at that's all that drive is used for, other than manual data backup). It doesn't happen often under light loads, but is pretty consistent when doing heavy Photoshop work... Thanx, John, you're absolutely right, Photoshop and similar memory hogging applications can easily exhaust RAM. That's why I always chose my words VERY carefully. If you're using such applications and they need more than the available RAM, then by definition, you do NOT have sufficient RAM! That's the definition of *sufficient* RAM, not needing more than you have! I'm being a bit nit-piky, I admit, but that's why the qualification of "it depends" does not apply. There may be a 1001 reasons that you do not have sufficient RAM, everything from Photoshop, to an OS that can't handle more than 512MB of RAM (Win98?), to "I can't afford it", if so, you don't qualify. If however, everything you do can fit into the available RAM (i.e., you have *sufficient* RAM), you do not need a paging file. Jim |
#10
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"Jim" wrote...
Thanx, John, you're absolutely right, Photoshop and similar memory hogging applications can easily exhaust RAM. That's why I always chose my words VERY carefully. If you're using such applications and they need more than the available RAM, then by definition, you do NOT have sufficient RAM! That's the definition of *sufficient* RAM, not needing more than you have! I guess it's a matter of perspective... Since the OP asked even about the meaning of the suggested 2:1 pagefile:RAM ratio, I suspect he would not be happy with a setup where he found out incrementally that he didn't have enough RAM because another app would fail. That's one reason why general guidelines are useful for those trying to learn -- they have a reasonable baseline for their current equipment when they can't readily throw in another couple sticks of RAM... |
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