Pagefile size won't change

[Guest]

I'm trying to change my minimum pagefile size from 574 MB to about 120 MB. I
should be able to do it, but something is causing it not to happen. I would
appreciate any suggestions or advice on what my problem might be.

My computer has 383 MB of RAM. My maximum pagefile size is about 1150 MB,
just about the recommended three times my physical RAM. I'm trying to
change my minimum pagefile size from 574 MB to about 120 MB. I haven't
changed the maximum size, do not intend to do so. In doing all this, I'm
trying to follow Alex Nichol's advice in his article about virtual memory.
See http://aumha.org/win5/a/xpvm.htm. I am currently using the Raxco
PerfectDisk defragger, but otherwise am using native Windows XP disk
applications. I don't use any memory intensive applications on this
computer, so that isn't the problem either as far as I know.

Despite rebooting several times, as well as clearing it at shutdown and even
deleting and then reinstating the pagefile, I cannot seem to get it below 574
MB, even though I barely use more than around 50-60 MB of the pagefile even
after several days of normal activity. The registry entries for my pagefile
size (under both currentcontrolset and numbered currentcontrolsets) show the
correct range, but my pagefile.sys file itself continues to be 574 MB.

Any ideas on what my problem might be, or why it continues to insist on
taking 574 MB of my harddrive rather than shrinking to the minimum of 120 MB.
It's not a major problem at all (my HD is plenty big enough), but I'm
curious as to why it won't shrink to the minimum size.

TIA
Ken

 

[Guest]

You seem technically versed enough to give this a try for curiosity's sake...

Boot to DOS with NTFS support and delete the pagefile. Then boot to XP and
see if it comes back as 120MB.

 

[Guest]

Thanks. I tried something similar to that. I removed the pagefile under the
Performance tab to System, rebooted, made sure it was gone from my C drive,
reset the pagefile to the parameters I wanted, and rebooted again -- and it
came back at 574 MB. The problem seems to be a registry or program setting
that keeps resetting it to 574 MB regardless of other settings in the
registry or in the Performance tab under System.

Incidentally, I forgot to mention in my original post that I am running
Windows XP Professional, SP2 and totally up to date on patches, updates, etc.

 

[Alex Nichol]

Despite rebooting several times, as well as clearing it at shutdown and even
deleting and then reinstating the pagefile, I cannot seem to get it below 574
MB, even though I barely use more than around 50-60 MB of the pagefile even
after several days of normal activity. The registry entries for my pagefile
size (under both currentcontrolset and numbered currentcontrolsets) show the
correct range, but my pagefile.sys file itself continues to be 574 MB.

Well - possibilities are that you are not trying to set it from an Admin
status account, and that you are not remembering to click the Set button
immediately after adjusting the settings.. But if the registry settings
then show that as your new initial size it *ought* to be starting it
over at boot, with that initial size. One thing you could try is
booting with the F8 key to the menu, take
Safe Mode - Command Prompt only
and delete it from that

 

[Alex Nichol]

Any ideas on what my problem might be, or why it continues to insist on
taking 574 MB of my harddrive rather than shrinking to the minimum of 120 MB.

Oh - and an afterthought: Are you running Photoshop? - it does not
sound likely, but that and one or two other things grab a large chunk of
the pagefile to use for their own ends. This is deplorable, but they do
it

 

[Guest]

Well - possibilities are that you are not trying to set it from an Admin
status account, and that you are not remembering to click the Set button
immediately after adjusting the settings.. But if the registry settings
then show that as your new initial size it *ought* to be starting it
over at boot, with that initial size. One thing you could try is
booting with the F8 key to the menu, take
Safe Mode - Command Prompt only
and delete it from that

I am indeed trying to set it from an Admin status account, and I have not
only clicked the Set button immediately after adjusting pagesize to the news
settings, but also double-checked the registry (including the old
controlset00x entries as well as the currentcontrolset entry) to make sure
that the change that I had set was reflected in the registry.

Since writing my original post, I have also tried, as an experiment,
disabling all of my startup programs using the msconfig utility to see if one
of them was the culprit. That didn't work either. I have tried temporarily
turning off System Restore and them rebooting, also without success.

Incidentally, I'm not running any unusual software as far as I know that
requires the computer to allocate so much space at bootup that it won't
change the pagefile below its current huge 574 MB. I have lots of RAM, and
nothing unusual running within it. Doug Knox's pagefile monitor program says
that right now I am actually using only 5 MB of the pagefile, even though it
has been hours since my last reboot and I have ran several programs. I have
tons of disk space. The computer is cuurently running great, as it always
does. In short, there is no reason I can think of why the dang Pagefile
won't change sizes.

This one is a real stumper. I will try your suggestion of deleting it
from safe mode with the command prompt and see what happens. Otherwise, I'm
just about all out of ideas. It is more an annoyance than a problem, but it
is annoying if for no reason other than it isn't working quite the way it
should.

Thanks
Ken

 

[Guest]

Oh - and an afterthought: Are you running Photoshop? - it does not
sound likely, but that and one or two other things grab a large chunk of
the pagefile to use for their own ends. This is deplorable, but they do
it

No, I'm not running anything like that. The only program I have that runs
at startup is my E-Trust anti-virus program, although I recently tried and
uninstalled [ugh] the Quickheal antivirus program as another experiment.
According to msconfig, there is nothing in my startup file or services that
shouldn't be running at startup that might be causing this problem. I use
this computer mainly for e-mail, Internet, word processing, and newsgroups,
not for anything like Photoshop, games, or any other memory-intensive
program.

I'm thinking that the problem has got to be a rogue registry entry
somewhere, but I haven't yet located it.

 

[georgex]

I have exactly the same problem. I have 4 disk drives in my system and
have set a pagefile in all of them, but XP keeps using only the
pagefile in C drive, and this not with the size i specify.
The size of the pagefile on C drive is 1.5 times the amount of RAM. I
think this is what happens in your case, Ken.

The pagefile.sys files on the other disks *have* been created at some
point (before applying SP2 maybe?), but have not been used since then.
I suspect that at some point when setting up the system it did create
and use them, but then something happened and changed back to the
default configuration.

The sizes I have set for the other drives shows in pagefile
configuration page, but the total appearing at the bottom of the page
is the windows default.

Ken have you found any solution?

 

[Uncle John]

George

If you are using Norton or Symantec Antivirus 2004 or 2005 the default
application setting enables autoprotect at start up. This is liable to clash
with the loading of the pagefile setting so Windows just does its own thing
usually a huge pagefile.

If this is the cause of your problem, turno off Norton Autoprotect and
reboot and then check that it is indeed off. Then set your pagefile. You
must set a page file at least minimum size on C or Windows will not set page
files on other drives but will do its own thing. After setting the pf for C
set the size(s) for other drives. Reboot check that the files have inded set
i.e. search for pagefile.sys on each drive. Turn on autoprotect manually but
do NOT enable it to start with Windows. If you are anxious to have
Autprotect enabled you can do a work around by moving the command that
starts it from the HKLM in the Registry to the All Users Startup Folder. The
command line to move is C:\Program Files\Common Files\Symantec
Shared\CCAPP.EXE
This will cause Norton to start after the pagefile has been loaded.

 

[Guest]

The sizes I have set for the other drives shows in pagefile
configuration page, but the total appearing at the bottom of the page
is the windows default.

Ken have you found any solution?

No, I didn't. Since my original post, I have bought a new computer,
reformatted the hard drive to get rid of the preconfigured stuff (I always do
this with new machines), and then reinstalled my previous software (with some
changes). I did see the post about Norton antivirus software, which I did
run at one time on my old machine. The new machine has run Trend Micro 2005
since day one, and this problem has never reappeared.

Ken

 

[Alex Nichol]

I have exactly the same problem. I have 4 disk drives in my system and
have set a pagefile in all of them, but XP keeps using only the
pagefile in C drive, and this not with the size i specify.
The size of the pagefile on C drive is 1.5 times the amount of RAM. I
think this is what happens in your case, Ken.

Two points: One is that after changing settings on a drive you must
click Set immediately for it to come into effect (and of course the
;logon must have Admin status)

Second is that if you have set up the other disks as Dynamic. not basic
disks, the VM system appears not to like having page files there