Optimal Pagefile setting

November 29th, 2005, 07:54 PM

Does anyone know what is the best setup of the Windows XP pagefile? i have 2 HHDs and i have a good idea what the best setup is but i want to know others oppinions first. Your Oppinion is welcomed.

**Regeneration** · November 29th, 2005, 08:44 PM

* Do not Put the pagefile in the primary HD where is the OS is installed
* Pagefile size should *1.5 of your installed memory.

Chaos · November 30th, 2005, 01:30 AM

also preferably put the 2nd drive on a seperate ATA/SATA controller as apposed to a seperate partition or a 2nd drive on the same controller

November 30th, 2005, 02:24 AM

actually i think 1.5 of actually RAM is quite wrong. think about it for a second. what if someone had only minimun ram for Windows XP which is 128MB that means that would need to have 192MB pagefile right? now think of someone that has 2GB of RAM if they follow that rule then that means they would need 3GB of pagefile....i dont know about what you think but wouldnt it make more sence if the person with less ram have MORE pagefile then the person with more ram??

November 30th, 2005, 02:30 AM

One other thing. its true that if you place the pagefile in another hard disk instead of where you installed your OS then it should work better. BUT not in the same IDE controller as the main OS hard drive. this is because of parallel ATA the 2 hard disks cant be accessed at the same time because of this rule. so if you place the OS on the Master and the pagefile HHD on the Slave..you are killing the purpose since its actually degrading its performance. if your doing this its better of on the OS hard disk as a FIXED setting so it doesnt get fragmented.

November 30th, 2005, 04:50 PM

how do you put pagefile on another hard drive? i have 2 hdds on separate cables

December 1st, 2005, 08:19 PM

To change your pagefile setting you need to go to system properties (quick way is right clicking on My Computer in the start menu) in there go to the Advanced tab then click on Performance. In the Performance Options pick the Advanced tab then click on "change" in the Virtual Memory section. here you can pick how much virtual memory you want in each hard drive. you should pick a FIXED amount meaning same minimun as maximun numbers so it doesnt get fragmented. Also use a disk defragmenting utility like Diskeeper, Perfectdisk, or O&O Pro to do a boot defragmentation make sure you pick the pagefile to be defrag. This will ensure that the pagefile is defragmented and on the outer tracks of the hard disk where speed tranfers are much faster

Harel · December 3rd, 2005, 02:39 AM

If your machine is not intended to be heavy server or to have applications that need much virtual memory,
the appropriate settings maybe on the same HD :
Initial size : 300 MB
Maximum size : 900 MB

December 3rd, 2005, 08:54 PM

You also need quite a bit if you have a small amount of ram. even thou 256MB of ram is enough to do basic tasks and multitask about 2 or 3 things at once it still isnt enough even for basic operations sometimes.

RefleX · December 4th, 2005, 05:15 PM

I have 2gig of ram a 200gig EIDE which os is on and a 36.6gig raptor with games on, what should I set mine at and on what hard drive ?