2Gigs of RAM & Windows Paging File

[Kalero]

I just bought 2x1024 PC3200 sticks...
should i still set to use paging file in windows? if yes how muc? ~1.5-2gigs or ~4gigs?
now with 2x1024 i think i dont's need PF anymore...
thanks

[RyderOCZ]

I set mine to 1024 (1GB) no matter how much ram the rig has. Everything runs very well

[Zanr Zij]

If you don't run hard Graphic-audio-Video softs like : photoshop, 3ds Max... You shoult set PF = 0...

[Disposibleteen]

If you don't run hard Graphic-audio-Video softs like : photoshop, 3ds Max... You shoult set PF = 0...

Where did you hear this becuase it is very wrong. You should always have a page file no matter how much ram you have. It is there as backup and will only be used if the actual ram is not available. That being said it really should make a difference what you set it to (mine is at 1.5GB and i have 1GB of ram) Try running BF2 with 2GB of ram and no page file, it doesnt work well. My buddy has 2GB of DDR2 in his intel 920 rig and while playing BF2 he gets roughly 550mb of page file usage while i get roughly 1.2GB of page file usage.

[KoolDrew]

You should never disable the pagefile, regardless of how much RAM you have. The optimal pagefile size should be determined by your workload. So run some of your most intensive applications and then measure your pagefile usage using the "%usage" counter in perfmon. The initial size should be set to at least 4x the observed PF usage and the max should be at least 2x the initial.

Make sure you are measuring PF usage using perfmon. The chart in task manager that says "PF Usage" is not PF usage, oddly enough.

[Zanr Zij]

Where did you hear this becuase it is very wrong. You should always have a page file no matter how much ram you have. It is there as backup and will only be used if the actual ram is not available. That being said it really should make a difference what you set it to (mine is at 1.5GB and i have 1GB of ram) Try running BF2 with 2GB of ram and no page file, it doesnt work well. My buddy has 2GB of DDR2 in his intel 920 rig and while playing BF2 he gets roughly 550mb of page file usage while i get roughly 1.2GB of page file usage.

Do you understand my meaning : "Hard video softs" ? Big game is very hard video softs, you have to set PF # 0 to run it. These softs load a lot of data so 2GB insn't enough => need PF !

[KoolDrew]

Zanr Zij, it doesn't matter what you do with your computer or how much RAM you have, disabling the pagefile is always a terrible idea.

[Kalero]

ok, thanks guys...
actually i play a lot of BF2 and set PF to 2048... hope it's enough.

[ctrl_j]

Zanr Zij, it doesn't matter what you do with your computer or how much RAM you have, disabling the pagefile is always a terrible idea.

I agree with U that disabling the PF is not optimal. But it is not necessary use PF 1,5x larger how is default set by Windows when you have 2 GB physical Ram.
I have only 1,25 GB RAM and PF is set to 256 MB and no problem. Sure, I dont play games such as BF2, HL2, F.E.A.R. etc. but for common work at my PC its good.

[Kobalt]

I set the pagefile to 1.5x the amount of ram in the system. I set the max as the same as the initial so it doesnt resize, which can slow the system down a lot. But if you get "out of memory errors" it is best to increase the maximum.

[[XC] moddolicous]

I just leave windows to manage it (system managed). Works well for me. On some of my vmwares though, I have it set to 50mb and 100mb.