Getting 2 GIGs of RAM and turning off virtual memory?

I've heard of people getting at least 2 gigs of ram and turning off vitual memory in win xp, thus gaining an enormous performance boost.

I was wondering about this, and I'm thinking that win xp uses around 300mb RAM to run efficiently, and other apps uses at most 1 gig of RAM, excluding bleeding-edge fps games like BF2 and FEAR.

Since I don't game on super high resolutions nor do any video editing, would I be able to do this? In other words, with 2 gigs of ram and win xp, does the memory recycle fast/efficient enough to allow stable comp usage with no VM enabled?

What are your thoughts on this?

I think the question is more complex than you realize.
I've run 1GB of RAM (2x512MB) for a while and never saw any difference disabling virtual memory ( which some people claim can't be done at all anyway) over just setting a fixed size for the swap file.

Twice now I've purchased 2x1024 sticks of Patriot EP RAM (same as my 512's) and performance took a big hit doing so. The 512's will run 2,3,2,5 @1T up to 220HTT and only need the cas upped to 2.5 to reach a stable clock of 240x11, again at 1T with the RAM running 1:1.
On the other hand, the 1GB sticks must have the timing loosened just to run 220HTT and get really cranky over 230.
4x512MB won't run at 1T at all.

Mostly I suspect the memory controller on my Winchester CPU.

The point here is that two gigs of RAM might eliminate hitting the virtual memory but result in worse overall performance in the process depending on the specific components in your system.

K thx, I disabled VM, and internet surfing/everyday comp usage is performing well.

Doom 3 did crash on me, although task manager told me that Doom 3+other apps were only using ~800MB of ram.

I think it's better to leave Virtual Memory running. You can run into problems, because some software requires the use of it. It doesn't speed up your computer disabling it, because your computer is always using RAM in the first place.

It's like having an external back-up hardrive. Without it, your speed stays the same.



An example of software that always uses the Virtual Memory is Animation Shop 3. Loading a video file frame-by-frame to edit into a .gif takes a lot RAM, and it maxes out my 1gb easy. I'm glad the virtual memory is there, because the program would probably crash without anymore space to store the open process.

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Originally Posted by Wolfmight

It doesn't speed up your computer disabling it, because your computer is always using RAM in the first place.

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That's simply not true. Windows always uses Virtual Memory if it is available. If your memory usage exceeded your physical memory, and nothing had been written to VM you would get a sudden performance hit.

To prevent this Windows attemts to spread things proportionately between physical memory and VM. However, that means you always get a smaller performance hit even if you've got enough memory that you never exceed it.

I've been running without VM for about a year now. I've only twice had problems, and that's with only 1GB of memory in this machine.

I agree with clocker about 2x1GB giving poorer performance than 2x512MB, but it is still way faster than VM could ever be.

Myth - "Disabling the Pagefile improves performance."

Reality - "You gain no performance improvement by turning off the Pagefile. When certain applications start, they allocate a huge amount of memory (hundreds of megabytes typically set aside in virtual memory) even though they might not use it. If no Pagefile (i.e., virtual memory) is present, a memory-hogging application can quickly use a large chunk of RAM. Even worse, just a few such programs can bring a machine loaded with memory to a halt. Some applications (e.g., Adobe Photoshop) will display warnings on startup if no Pagefile is present." - Source

"In modern operating systems, including Windows, application programs and many system processes always reference memory using virtual memory addresses which are automatically translated to real (RAM) addresses by the hardware. Only core parts of the operating system kernel bypass this address translation and use real memory addresses directly. All processes (e.g. application executables) running under 32 bit Windows gets virtual memory addresses (a Virtual Address Space) going from 0 to 4,294,967,295 (2*32-1 = 4 GB), no matter how much RAM is actually installed on the computer. In the default Windows OS configuration, 2 GB of this virtual address space are designated for each process' private use and the other 2 GB are shared between all processes and the operating system. RAM is a limited resource, whereas virtual memory is, for most practical purposes, unlimited. There can be a large number of processes each with its own 2 GB of private virtual address space. When the memory in use by all the existing processes exceeds the amount of RAM available, the operating system will move pages (4 KB pieces) of one or more virtual address spaces to the computer's hard disk, thus freeing that RAM frame for other uses. In Windows systems, these "paged out" pages are stored in one or more files called pagefile.sys in the root of a partition. Virtual Memory is always in use, even when the memory required by all running processes does not exceed the amount of RAM installed on the system." - Source

I assume you are quoting from XPmyths, but you need to read their content very carefully.

However, the Microsoft page explains the true the case, Virtual Memory is always used, if it is available. There is no argument by anyone, VM is VERY SLOW compared to physical memory. Consequently, if you've got enough physical memory it is far faster than using VM, but you have to force Windows into using physical memory rather than VM. Obviously, if you haven't got enough memory you are going to run into problems, but that sort of speaks for itself. If you've got simple applications that are going to use 2GB of memory, find alternative applications.

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Some applications (e.g., Adobe Photoshop) will display warnings on startup if no Pagefile is present.

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Ask yourself why these applications display warnings. It is because they are poorly written over-bloated pieces of crap. I won't install a single Adobe product on my systems apart from Adobe Reader, and that only because they've conned so many people into believing that pdf is a useful format. Adobe products have always been inefficient under-performing resource hogs, but that's what you expect from mud-hut technology.

People who are conversant with Unix systems well know that Microsoft's model is badly flawed. Microsoft assume that you always need to use VM, so they always use it. Unix systems know that you may need to use VM, but rather than use it always or wait until you run out of physical memory, they put thresholds on when an individual program needs to use VM, or when the system needs to start swapping. It's called thinking things through rather than using the "sledge hammer to crack a nut" scenario.

http://www.foxitsoftware.com/bbs a nice alternative to adobe reader :D

For everyday use turning off VM with 1 GB of RAM is fine, but if you do a lot of gaming then it's better leaving VM on as I've had couple problems running out of physical memory when playing FPS games.

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Originally Posted by Seedler

For everyday use turning off VM with 1 GB of RAM is fine, but if you do a lot of gaming then it's better leaving VM on as I've had couple problems running out of physical memory when playing FPS games.

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:cheers: We both agree that having a stable system is worth the tiny, if any, drop in speed. Hell, I don't think anyones system gains but a mere decimal of speed by turning it off.

The only times my system bottlenecks is when 100% of the RAM is used. It never bottlenecks when there is free RAM and VM on. I'd rather have bottlenecks than nothing at all. Applications stay open instead of crashing and losing data.

I wonder in my setup if 2 gigs would give any noticeable improvements. I have an asus board with dual channel ddr400, and I run 1 gig now (2x512). I set my page file to a static 1500 or something. I never tried turning off the swap file. I also heard that running your swap file on another drive or partition speeds things up. Any info on this? :)

Brilliant.

Loads of people saying "I've never tried it but I'm sure it won't make much difference". Just the sort of people I like to take advice from.

Oh, hang on, I have tried it and I find it makes a tremendous difference. Better ignore my opinion then.

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Originally Posted by Mïcrösöül°V³

I wonder in my setup if 2 gigs would give any noticeable improvements. I have an asus board with dual channel ddr400, and I run 1 gig now (2x512). I set my page file to a static 1500 or something. I never tried turning off the swap file. I also heard that running your swap file on another drive or partition speeds things up. Any info on this? :)

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Im curious about that other partition thing.:unsure:

Many people claim that putting the swap file in a separate partition (preferably on a different physical drive than the OS) will increase performance.
I've tried this (and just about any other combination of virtual memory size/partition/location I could arrange).

Can't say I noticed much, if any, difference at all.

Give it a try yourself...your mileage may vary.

If it's hard to notice...then what's the point hehe.
:01: I only notice a "major" difference in speed after upgrading my hardware most of the time. (Faster CPU, Video Card... the core components of your system's overall performance really.)

The only software tweaks I notice a speed improvement from are after defragging a very fragmented hardrive and cleaning over 300+ bad registry entries. I believe cleaning the registry too often is a bad thing, but once in awhile is ok. Kinda like Red Bull.

Hell, I'd say the majority of windows tweaks are merely for user customization or curiosity. Speed is hardly noticed after messing with all those cache settings...it's the human brain that tends to believe speed has been gained when nothing has changed whatsoever.

In some cases, a tweak may even nock out system stability...ouch. (i.e... this Virtual Memory *cough* tweak *fart*)

I stand by defraging and registry tweaks because they both successfully decrease windows xp's load times. Windows Explorer tends to gain the most speed, because it'll start to flash open windows and icons, when it was dragging it's ass taking 2-4 seconds opening them a few minutes before running those two processes.