why is my pagefile.sys so huge 32GB ?

drugo · 13 Nov 2015

Hi

i have 32gb of ram , and i noticed that my pagefile.sys is 34.306.260.992
this at a cold boot , and w7 64bit sp1 keeps it around this size for the all day

i have this option system managent size

i tried to set no paging file , reboot -> the pagefile.sys disapear
after i set system managent size on -> and it set at 34gb again

is too big ?

thanks

Brink · 13 Nov 2015

Hello drugo, :)

If you like, set your page file to a custom size of about 6 GB to see how it goes. If you ever get an "out of memory" or "low memory" type error, then increase the size of the page file until you no longer get the error.

Virtual Memory Paging File - Change

LMiller7 · 13 Nov 2015

There is considerable confusion on the Internet about what a "System Managed" pagefile actually means. There is a widespread misconception that such a pagefile is continuouslt adjusted in size to meet the need. This is not the case. I suppose the idea comes from a too literal interpretation of what "system managed" would seem to imply. But even a casual monitoring of the size of "pagefile.sys" in Windows Explorer will show this is not so.

Actually a System Managed pagefile is set to an initial size equal to RAM size and a limit of twice that. The rules change for very small RAM sizes. Under normal conditions the initial size will be adequate and the pagefile will never grow. The pagefile can be enlarged if necessary but this is more an emergency action, not something that happens under normal circumstances.

The large size (32 GB in this case) is based on the assumption that the workload will be proportional to RAM size. Lacking other information this would seem a reasonable assumption. The large pagefile would be necessary to make optimum use of RAM. With more modest workloads this just wasts disk space. In that case you can set a much smaller pagefile size with no ill effects. Setting no pagefle is usually safe but some applications may object to this.

AddRAM · 13 Nov 2015

Your page file is usually the same size as your installed ram, Windows does this automatically, just change it properly.

IMO, with 32 GB you don`t even need a page file, people say some programs need it, if you don`t have those programs , why have a page file. Especailly if you`re running an ssd.

Personally, I haven`t used a page file in over 3 years, I`ve never had a problem.

drugo · 14 Nov 2015

LMiller7 said:

Actually a System Managed pagefile is set to an initial size equal to RAM size and a limit of twice that. The rules change for very small RAM sizes. Under normal conditions the initial size will be adequate and the pagefile will never grow. The pagefile can be enlarged if necessary but this is more an emergency action, not something that happens under normal circumstances.

The large size (32 GB in this case) is based on the assumption that the workload will be proportional to RAM size. Lacking other information this would seem a reasonable assumption. The large pagefile would be necessary to make optimum use of RAM. With more modest workloads this just wasts disk space. In that case you can set a much smaller pagefile size with no ill effects. Setting no pagefle is usually safe but some applications may object to this.

AddRAM said:

Your page file is usually the same size as your installed ram, Windows does this automatically, just change it properly.

IMO, with 32 GB you don`t even need a page file, people say some programs need it, if you don`t have those programs , why have a page file. Especailly if you`re running an ssd.

Personally, I haven`t used a page file in over 3 years, I`ve never had a problem.

thanks
this is windows 7 because w8.1 and w10 handle it in a different way
for example on a similar partition the pagefile.sys is really smaller , is around 5gb