SSD and Page File

Hello,

Question on the laptop config below. I just added a SSD to my L502x, should I move the page file to the hard drive? With 16GB of RAM, do I even need a page file?

 

I'll direct you to this thread:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/sol...644988-there-any-recommended-tweaks-ssds.html

 

Aside from asking you to read a very lengthy thread, let me make it simple for you.

You've got 16GB of RAM, so there is no need for a page file. Many of us with only 8GB of RAM don't use a page file with SSD's or even HDD's for that matter. Of course, there's always the rare risk of whatever in disabling the page file. I've come across no issues in the past 1.5 years of using an SSD.

In the event that you decided to keep a page file, in either a limited or full capacity, here is my recommendation...

You got your SSD for speed. There is no point in moving things to an HDD in order to 'preserve' the life of your SSD. I've had an Intel x25-M 80GB for 18mths. I average 10GB of writes per day and my media wearout indicator in the Intel SSD Toolbox is still at 99... as it was on day 1. If you move things from your SSD that do regular read/writes, that means you cripple those functions. Say you didn't have that much RAM and were relying on paging. If you want the speed of the SSD, then you want the page file to be on it, no?

I also believe that other things like indexing and temp files should be stored on the SSD. Otherwise, what's the point? Once programs are initially opened, they're stored in RAM until they're either dumped or a restart happens. So, after initial launch, the SSD is rendered useless unless other processes are getting to make use of it.

In a nutshell... disable the pagefile... you don't need it. BUT... if you keep it... leave it on your SSD.

 

anseio GR8 Summation, I read this in another forum, "If the spare area was enough, you wouldn't need TRIM at all since TRIM cannot work on space that is not visible to Windows. TRIM means the free space on your filesystem is free space for the SSD; so you can limit the REAL spare area to 7%. Enterprise drives will have up to 50% capacity reserved and do not need TRIM at all. "

It was in a thread about the SSD we have, (not an enterprise) what is your opinion?

 

Thanks, JOSEA!

Sorry, I dunno very much about TRIM and reserved space and what not. That's why I got the Intel. I didn't want to have to worry about such things.

 

Anseio, thanks for the reply and information, just what I needed to know.

 

an ssd is the perfect place for a pagefile. there's no need to care about too much writes on an ssd, it's an oberblown panic myth mostly based on those wo needed a reason to justify not having bought an ssd yet.

we all remember the impact in windows xp, when stuff started to move to the page file. system slowed down terribly. this got mostly fixed in vista and win7, but still, the faster the drive the better it is. => on the ssd with it.

about the non-need of a pagefile. everyone knows i 100% disagree there. everyone should have one enabled. it's like a savety belt. normally never needed, but can save your work the moment you'll need it. so no harm in having it on (it doesn't do anything anyways till it's needed). and, the pagefile optimizes some ram-features (making it possible your system uses less ram than without it, reducing the pagefile need actually even more), and it's a helper if you have a bluescreen, as there the system stores everything in case of a crash to then debug the crash afterwards.

pagefile:
- reduces your active ram usage
- saves you from application crashes in the (rare) event of not having any ram left
- helps you fix bluescreens after they appeared (automatically, btw, trough windows update)

question is, is the reserved space that much of an issue to not leave it on? and if so, didn't you have bought the wrong, too small, ssd, in the first place? because once you get to the limit of any disk, you have the wrong disk. the few gb of a pagefile don't matter there anymore.

 

I have 16GB of RAM on a WS2K8 R2 laptop with an 80GB SSD. I keep a 400MB pagefile to keep Widows happy. Will I ever actually page? Probably not, but it's good not to overtweak.

Sent from my SGH-i917 using Board Express

 

How can you make this determination without knowing what the OP even does with their system?

 

Don't you think that if the OP practices were so resource intensive that it would consume all of his RAM and require virtual memory that he'd know just a bit more about the subject and therefore not even have to ask the question?

 

Pretty much that, it happens very rarely that a user with special needs doesn't already know about those.

 

and the user who doesn't know about those should not mess with those. as that kind of user typically doesn't really know what stuff like the pagefile is for. and that's why it's enabled by default: because, for those who don't know that's good for them, there is a sensible default chosen. the one microsoft has chosen with now 20 years or so of experience. sometimes it's the right thing to not think you know better.

 

Exactly. Mac does paging automatically, and IIRC it's not user configurable.

 

I wasn't aware that a user's supposed prowess indicated how the system was used. The truth is, we know neither, they're mutually exclusive anyway, and we should ask more relevant and critical questions before jumping to the conclusion that a system is better off with its page file disabled.

Would you like to know why having a page file is good for any system?

 

Perhaps you should reread my posts. At no point in time do I advise the OP that he'd be better off without a page file. That it's not necessary is a completely different statement.

Of course a user's supposed prowess indicates how a system is used. Someone who knows nothing of computers will use their system out of the box without question. Someone who knows quite a bit more will make changes as they see fit to suit their needs. Is this not obvious?

I know why having a page file is a good thing. I never said it wasn't.

 

If it wasn't prescriptive advice, what was it? How did you determine the page file was of 'no need?'

There's nothing obvious about the OP or how they use their system (its application). Neither is defined, and one does not imply the other. In other words, any guess about the OP supports no conclusion of how the system should be configured.

 

Well, I didn't mean to start an argument, and while I have a pretty good understanding of memory management in Windows, I was more curious what others were doing.

And since it came up, I run a number of virtual machines daily for work to demo product software, the VMs range in memory allocation from 2-8GB each. I also run photoshop and lightroom for my photo editing on the side. I could setup resource monitor and look and see if I ever actually page, however, the question was more meant as to see what others are doing.

Again, didn't mean to start a flame war, and I'm not insulted by anything posted here (yet )

 

@op, really depends. having 16gb with no page file on is pretty safe even if you're running a lot of VMs, however I think I set mine to having 1gb on the ssd for pagefile just for the occasional app that may ask for it

 

@Geekz

...out of curiosity, does that setting mean that you get the size of the RAM + 1GB, or is it actually 1GB?

I'm asking because pagefile is supposed to be a superset of RAM. I might have used that term incorrectly; what i mean is, everything in ram is copied into the pagefile. therefore, if your pagefile is 16gb in size and your ram is 16gb in size, then you have effectively have no pagefile.

 

As a default, RAM is a factor in the size of the pagefile. This is easily changed in the advanced settings if one were to need more or prefer less.

The pagefile is not a direct copy of RAM. One of its functions is as an overflow for when RAM is full, but it does and is useful for more than just that. Some programs demand a page file. One game that I played did.

 

OMG, this old argument again. Here is the gist, if you have to ask then leave it enabled as per the default, no ifs, ands or buts! If you are system knowledgable enough to know whether disabling this will benefit you and the risks, if any, that are involved then make the decision for yourself. Do not ever recomend disabling the page file unless you are going to be there 100% of the time for support to correct any issues!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Exactly!

Great, most usable post on the subject anywhere.

 

Set the page file on the SSD - it's not going to get used most of the time, and when it does, you will greatly benefit from the performance.

Btw, I believe the page file can't really be disabled on 7 - once you're low on RAM, Windows 7 pops up a notification stating that it will increase the amount of virtual memory, so there's that (on XP, you'd have a lot of trouble with the page file disabled)...

 

Just set the pagefile to a range with minimum of like 256MB and max of 2048MB. That way it won't reserve more than 256MB unless it needs it.

 

roughly 1gb, by default windows would set the same amount as your ram (not too sure if it's a bit higher).

as HT said anywhere from 256mb to 2gb would be perfect, you'll just want to have something in there for the occasional rare time an app or game would look for it.