Pagefile enabled vs disabled?

As you can see from my sig i have a g73jh with a 160gb x25-m g2 SSD and a 500gb HD.
Now to avoid having 12gb less space on my SSD and to reduce cell wear becouse of writing, i am thinking about disabling the page file (im actually already testing it to see if anything i use has a problem with it).
I know if i run out of RAM the system will either close the program thats hogging it or crash and some programs which depend on the page file being there dont even run, but i cant see myself running out of 8GB RAM...
The alternative would be to either leave the page file on the SSD and sacrifice the 12GB and hope it wont wear out the drive too much, or make the page file smaller (i was thinking up to 4gb) or put the page file on the 500gb HD, which would make the system run slower when swapping files...

Which would you choose and why?

 

Unless you use an application that will use that much memory, you can disable the pagefile safely with that much memory.

 

I'm using a G73jh-a2 so mine is 2x 500gb hd. I chose to disable the pagefile as we really don't need it. Its going to be some sort of heavy 3d rendering to use up that much ram. Softwares that come to mind that uses a lot of ram would be "photoshop, premiere pro, 3ds max, after effects". But even those usually let you pick a scratch disk rather then depend on the page file. So my take would be to disable until a time comes when your 8gb ram isn't up to it.

 

how do you disable page file???

 

Right click My Computer - Properties - Advance System Settings - Advance Tab - Performance Settings - Advance Tab - Change Virtual memory - Select "no paging file" on each drives.

I don't know if there's another way but thats how i do for mine.

 

Oh this same old question. Put it on the HDD as you will never use it. Make it smaller if you want. Say even 1GB. That would hardly cost you in space. I recommend this for legacy applications that might look for a PF.

I am very happy that at this point the discussion is focused on do I need it. Not removing it will increase performance. The later is the most absolute biggest bunch of crap.

Try what you want to, I think you will be fine. I myself would if I was considering what you are make a tiny PF for kicks. No harm no foul. Then again 12GB on my 500GB is hardly critical? That is why I am not focused on this.

 

I have had pagefile disabled since 07 when Vista 64bit had just come out along with ssds and have yet ....to this day... had any problem whatsoever.

 

You can disable pagefile for the ssd and let it run on you hdd. Theres freeware if you need more configuration options.

-Googlei

 

Yes and you do not need 3rd party software.
.

 

You have liberty with 3rd party software, I would recommend it especially if you have an ssd and want to enhance the longevity of the cells.

-Googlei

 

Unless you have a program that complains about it, there's really no need for a paging file on systems with 4 or more gig of ram. Back in the day when computers came with 256 or 512 mb ram it made sense, but these days it's really more of a dated, obsolete feature for modern machines.

 

@googlei
I dont like to use such software, id rather do everything manually in the advanced settings and registry. You never know what such a program might do.

@mindinversion
I had it disabled on the D900F and Crysis wouldnt run, although it didnt use up even close to the 6gb ram. It just wanted to have a page file. So i had to enable it again.
And theres the other scenario where there are some programs that have a memory leak problem, and those will crash without a PF.

Yesterday i was working with Photoshop, and it i used up all of my ram, since i couldnt save my work (kept saying theres not enough memory). So i had to close photoshop and lost all my work...
In the end now i decided to make a smaller PF on the SSD anyway, so if there is swapping at least it will be faster and i hope it wont wear out the SSD too much (i made it 2048-4096MB).

I also noticed that if you disable superfetch, as most SSD optimization guides suggest, the boot time is a bit longer so i turned it back on and set it to 3 in registry (cache boot files only).
If i understand correctly, superfetch doesnt really write to the ssd, but rather only preloads stuff in the ram right? So why do they suggest turning it off?

 

Can anyone actually tell how much windows writes to the pagefile?

 

I believe the photoshop could be something to do with your scratch disk. I'm not too sure about it.

 

For some reason i quite never agreed with PF disabling. Have always set it at 2048-4096MB in all my systems and have yet to face any problems.. Also advantage is you save up a lot of space and have a PF for demanding programs. I currently use only 12.4GB on m SSD.

 

This has been discussed in other threads. But to recap; do not disable page file if you want Windows to be able to do a dump or mini-dump whenever there is a system crash. The main system drive needs about a minimum 100-160 MB of pagefile I believe. Not much of a sacrifice on your SSD.

Secondly put the large pagefile on your D: drive. That way you have all your bases covered, with minimal loss of space.

I'm surprised you are worried with a 160 GB SSD. I'm using an 80 GB SSD, and I am not having any problems. See my sig..

 

Ok, so if I have 16GB of 1333 MHz RAM in the G73, the pagefile really does nothing for me, right?
__________________
"Cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of war..."

ASUS G73Jh-A1 w/ Intel i7-720QM
1GB ATI Radeon HD5870 graphics
16gb DDR3 1333mhz RAM
Intel 160gb SSD Primary Hard Drive
500GB HDD Secondary Hard Drive
Blu-Ray Reader/DVDRW Super Multidrive
Intel 6200 Wireless Advanced Card
Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

 

Incorrect. You need it for system dumps, some programs wont run without it and if you have a program with a memory leak problem, it fill up all your ram and crash.
If you dont have any crashes, if you dont have any programs that rely on the PF and if you dont have any programs with a memory leak problem, than you shouldnt have trouble, otherwise if youre not sure its better to leave a small PF at least.

 

I have my desktop setup with the SSD and the pagefile on the mechanical drive set to 2048/2048 and never have any issues with performance ... I did the same thing when i was running an SSD in my G73 and Clevo(Pagefile was on mechanical) and again never had performance issues on those either... As you said some programs refuse to run so i always set it at 2gigs and leave it ....

 

How are you only using 12.4GB? Do you have practically no programs on there or did you disable something else (besides system restore and hybernation)?
I am currently using 21GB (2GB being the current PageFile). But i do install all my programs and games on the SSD, since if i dont i dont see a point in having it, since the programs wont load any faster if theyre not on the SSD (like photoshop, which loads a few seconds faster on the SSD). I only use the HD as a storage for music, documents, movies and downloads, for which speed doesnt matter, since they already open in an instant from the HD and since theyre too large to have on the SSD (got a bit over 50GB of music and photos only).

@billyray
Why would you install all your programs on the HD? Whats the point of having the SSD if yore installing all the programs on the HD and with that youre not using the faster load times the SSD could give you...
I did think about putting the entire system managed pagefile (16GB) on the HD, but than id have slower swapping, so in the end i decided to make a smaller one on the SSD...

 

Hellcry, well, all my benchmarking and system optimization tools and small programs are on the SSD. I dont have any game in it. All are in the HDD. No photoshop or any such in my laptop. I dont even have MSOffice Documents, movies, songs are all in the HDD.. I have the SSD optimised (system restore, hibernation, superfetch and all that crap). Pagefile is 2-4GB max..
Yup, i guess thats all..

 

But why do you have the games on the HD? It wont give you any benefit for benchmarking programs such as 3dmark or similar ones, but you could have better load times with games and programs with the SSD or why did you buy it? Just to have better boot times?

 

Vantage will start up quite abit faster on the SSD ... Jane Nash use to be notoriously slow but they have since patched it but its still quite abit faster on an SSD.... I keep Vantage and 06 on my SSD...

Any games that have longer load times i keep on the SSD as well like GTA4 for example... Even with a 256 SSD it does not take me long at all to fill it up thats for sure ....

 

Damn, 16 gb 1333 mhz /bow

 

Relax Hellcry.. I dint install any games yet on the SSD because all the ones have arnt original.. I just wanted to check if everything plays well.. I misplaced my Counterstrike CD(which is the only legit CD i have as of now..rest are in INDIA) and hence cant install steam.. I dont have enough time to play anyways.. I will be buying the legit CDs of MW2, BF2BC and some others and then only i will install games on my SSD..dont worry, i dint buy the SSD for fun or faster boot times..

 

16GB is overkill if you ask me...why would anyone need that much RAM anyways??

 

I meant the scores wont be any higher, the load times will obviously be better.

 

More RAM for the Win7 Disk cache

 

LOL
10char

 

Btw. i just noticed in resource monitor that i have 1812mb in use and 3845MB ram in standby, leaving only 2316mb free... what in the world is in that standby bit?? How much ram do you have in standby (cached)?

 

I have the same question. My resource monitor shows that i have 12xx MB in use, 76MB hardware reserve, 162MB modified, 1382 standby and 5304 free.whats up with that??

 

Standby is file cache stuff. Code and data marked as free but kept around in case it's needed again in the near future.

For example, you notice how programs load faster the second time you start them?

As more memory is needed by existing /new processes, the system will use the free memory first before dipping into the standby.

Smarter memory management than just allocate and free...

 

it's the auto drive cache. nothing to be worried about.

 

Still, ive got almost 4gb cached and i didnt run anything that would use nearly as much since i booted up... i wonder what it cached...

 

There's a lot more processes running than just the ones you explicitly start.

For rapid reuse, the system can and will keep any memory blocks around after they are freed.

The amount may grow while your machine sits apparently idle.

It's available memory so you don't have to worry about it.

For study: Memory Sizing Guidance for Windows 7

 

Interesting... i should really be learning, but this is just a better read...