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I want to disable my page file in Windows 7. The reason is I'm running a complex virtual environment where disk writes are REALLY slow, so I want to minimize Windows writing to disk.
My problems is that when I disable I get the stupid low memory warnings, even when there is plenty of memory left. The other issue is I read that Windows has some special uses for a page file even when there is plenty of free memory. Even Mark Russinovich, a well known expert mentions these. I'm not an expert so don't understand these details though.
My question is, would it make sense in my case to put the page file on the RAMDisk in order to 1) get rid of the memory warnings 2) accommodate whatever special uses Windows has for it. Thanks
duplicate of Should I move swap file to a virtual RAM drive? and Suppress “low memory” warnings in Vista when running without paging file?
– guest-vm – 2016-06-26T16:16:05.643Thanks, there seems to be a lot of conflicting "opinions" on this issue, most people including "experts" say there is no point, others say there is in fact a performance increase due to the fact Windows manages memory inefficiently. It seems to me the people saying there's no point do not have any data to back up their claim and often contradict themselves or give dubious explanations. If anyone replies please only reply with substantiated facts if you actually know what's going on. Thanks – None – 2016-06-26T17:15:04.770
2The main problem, and the one I believe that Mark cites, is that many programs request a large amount of memory before they need it, even if they don't actually need it. Without the page file Windows cannot guarantee that new memory requests can be fulfilled, hence you get "out of memory" errors. Rightly or wrongly Windows will not over-commit memory that has been requested but not actually used by applications. – Mokubai – 2016-06-26T19:23:42.543
If you are sure that paging to the swap-file is happening a lot and slowing down your environment, then the only REAL solution is to install more RAM to satisfy your virtual environment's needs. Surely you can see the faulty logic in reducing your usable RAM by turning it into a RAMDisk, only to then put the swap-file onto that? – misha256 – 2016-06-26T23:18:04.430
I have enough usable RAM to spare, so reducing it is not my problem. My problem is I need to minimize DISK writes. My question is whether having a pagefile in RAM disk to avoid the low memory messages and to accommodate other idiosyncratic uses windows has for it - i.e. even using the page file when there is plenty of physical memory free - is a good idea. – None – 2016-06-27T07:59:54.303
I found that the best solution for me for this problem was to add a second hard drive and put all the heavy-write stuff on the second disk. I went from sitting for hours waiting for my virtual environment to never even noticing the disk writes. Changing the hard drive for an SSD helped even more. – Moshe Katz – 2016-06-27T17:57:39.103