No Swapfile in PCs with more than 1 GB of memory, is it a good idea?

J

Juan I. Cahis

Dear friends:

In the last PC World, there is an advice to eliminate the Swapfile in
PCs with more than 1 GB of memory, in order to increase its speed. Is
that a good idea?

My PC has 1.5 GB of memory, but I could increase it to 2.0 GB if PC
World is correct in its advise.

Any hint?

Thanks
Juan I. Cahis
Santiago de Chile (South America)
Note: Please forgive me for my bad English, I am trying to improve it!
 
K

Ken Blake, MVP

Juan said:
Dear friends:

In the last PC World, there is an advice to eliminate the Swapfile in
PCs with more than 1 GB of memory, in order to increase its speed. Is
that a good idea?
Click to expand...



No, it's poor advice.

1. If you don't have a page file, you can't use all the RAM you have. That's
because Windows preallocates virtual memory in anticipation of a possible
need for it, even though that allocated virtual memory may never be used.
Without a page file, that allocation has to be made in real memory, thus
tying up that memory and preventing it from being used for any purpose.

2. There is never a benefit in not having a page file. If it isn't needed,
it won't be used. Don't confuse allocated memory with used memory.
 
M

Mike Hall \(MS-MVP\)

Juan

You might want to read through this..

http://aumha.org/win5/a/xpvm.htm

--
Mike Hall
MVP - Windows Shell/User


Dear friends:

In the last PC World, there is an advice to eliminate the Swapfile in
PCs with more than 1 GB of memory, in order to increase its speed. Is
that a good idea?

My PC has 1.5 GB of memory, but I could increase it to 2.0 GB if PC
World is correct in its advise.

Any hint?

Thanks
Juan I. Cahis
Santiago de Chile (South America)
Note: Please forgive me for my bad English, I am trying to improve it!
 
R

R. C. White

Hi, Juan.

Where was that article? I read PC World regularly and don't recall having
seen that advice.

My understanding is that WinXP always uses virtual memory, even if you have
plenty of RAM. That's just the way it works.

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP

Dear friends:

In the last PC World, there is an advice to eliminate the Swapfile in
PCs with more than 1 GB of memory, in order to increase its speed. Is
that a good idea?

My PC has 1.5 GB of memory, but I could increase it to 2.0 GB if PC
World is correct in its advise.

Any hint?

Thanks
Juan I. Cahis
Santiago de Chile (South America)
Note: Please forgive me for my bad English, I am trying to improve it!
 
R

Ron Martell

Juan I. Cahis said:
Dear friends:

In the last PC World, there is an advice to eliminate the Swapfile in
PCs with more than 1 GB of memory, in order to increase its speed. Is
that a good idea?

My PC has 1.5 GB of memory, but I could increase it to 2.0 GB if PC
World is correct in its advise.
Click to expand...

I knew there were good reasons why I quit reading PC World.

Without a paging file Windows has to allocate RAM for all requested
memory, even for the parts that are never actually used. In total,
this can add up to quite a substantial amount.

If you have a grossly excessive amount of RAM, such as 2 gb in a
system where it would never actually use the paging file with only 1
gb of RAM installed, then you can probably get away with no paging
file without a significant performance penalty.

But in most instances the least damaging effect will be a reduction in
the size of the disk cache, which will have a performance impact.

Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
 
F

Frank Saunders, MS-MVP OE

Juan I. Cahis said:
Dear friends:

In the last PC World, there is an advice to eliminate the Swapfile in
PCs with more than 1 GB of memory, in order to increase its speed. Is
that a good idea?

My PC has 1.5 GB of memory, but I could increase it to 2.0 GB if PC
World is correct in its advise.

Any hint?

Thanks
Juan I. Cahis
Santiago de Chile (South America)
Note: Please forgive me for my bad English, I am trying to improve it!
Click to expand...

Some programs will not run if there is no paging file, whether they need it
or not.

--
Frank Saunders, MS-MVP OE
Please respond in Newsgroup only. Do not send email
http://www.fjsmjs.com
Protect your PC
http://www.microsoft.com./athome/security/protect/default.aspx
http://defendingyourmachine.blogspot.com/
 
P

Plato

Juan said:
In the last PC World, there is an advice to eliminate the Swapfile in
PCs with more than 1 GB of memory, in order to increase its speed. Is
that a good idea?
Click to expand...

The writers there work in a 4 foot cube. They dont work on pcs. They
never have to fix a a pc. Does that answer your question?
 
F

Frank Saunders, MS-MVP OE

Plato said:
The writers there work in a 4 foot cube. They dont work on pcs. They
never have to fix a a pc. Does that answer your question?
Click to expand...

The writers work in a small office with a door and ther do have a PC or two.
At least that's how it is in every building in Redmond that I've been in.

--
Frank Saunders, MS-MVP OE
Please respond in Newsgroup only. Do not send email
http://www.fjsmjs.com
Protect your PC
http://www.microsoft.com./athome/security/protect/default.aspx
http://defendingyourmachine.blogspot.com/
 
B

Bob I

Umm, PC World is in San Francisco.
The writers work in a small office with a door and ther do have a PC or
two. At least that's how it is in every building in Redmond that I've
been in.
Click to expand...
 
M

Mike Hall \(MS-MVP\)

Bob

There will always be differences amongst even the most learned, regardless
of geographical location..
 
F

Frank Saunders, MS-MVP OE

B

Bob I

No problem, I work on caffeine too!
Sorry, I was thinking he meant programmers at MS. Reread his post and I
don't know how I got that idea. Maybe my caffeine level was still too
low at 5:37 AM.
Click to expand...
 
J

Jonny

Bad advice.

I like to put the swapfile in its own little corner to play on its on and
leave windows, 3rd party apps, et al alone. The corner is a 4GB partition
on a separate hard drive, at the beginning of that hard drive. Don't play
with its size constraints either. Just let it play in its sandbox to its
heart's content.

--
Jonny
Dear friends:

In the last PC World, there is an advice to eliminate the Swapfile in
PCs with more than 1 GB of memory, in order to increase its speed. Is
that a good idea?

My PC has 1.5 GB of memory, but I could increase it to 2.0 GB if PC
World is correct in its advise.

Any hint?

Thanks
Juan I. Cahis
Santiago de Chile (South America)
Note: Please forgive me for my bad English, I am trying to improve it!
 

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