I set it to 16-32Mb and the machine hasn't had a single problem, so I'll leave it at that

I set it to 16-32Mb and the machine hasn't had a single problem, so I'll leave it at that

I invite you to read something like this: http://serverfault.com/questions/23621/any-benefit-or-detriment-from-removing-a-pagefile-on-an-8gb-ram-machine

As this guy so correctly puts it, Microsoft have spent a lot of time and money on their OS and ultimately know a lot more than even the most seasoned sysadmin or casual forum viewer/power user.

A page file is different to a memory buffer, it is a physical reserved section on your hard drive.

I started switching off my page files nearly 10 years ago, as soon as my systems reached 1GB, and never had a problem, although with the demands of modern systems I make sure I have 2GB minimum now.

You are correct in one respect, the OS will use the page file if it is present, even though it usually doesnt need to, and this slows down your PC as HDD read/write times are a glacial compared to those for RAM; these days we can go back to the system the Amiga used 20 years ago (nearly), and use a RAM DRIVE to store stuff we want to access quickly.

Errr, you still need a swap/page file on the hard drive. The OS will stil utilise it even if you do have that much RAM.

You don't technically need one, although you'll most likely get some undesirable results if you manage to allocate all the physical RAM (which isn't too hard with greedy or badly written applications) Tbh, if you have 16Gb of RAM, having a pagefile defined too isn't going to slow the machine down as it's rarely going to be used.

And this is different, IIRC. Depending on how Windows is configured, not much is dumped *by default* aside from "mini dumps". You can configure it to leave behind a memory dump, and when configured a BSoD will leave behind a MEMORY.DMP file which can then be analysed by tools like WinDbg.

Agree with this, although the minidumps can also be viewed with windbg and can often be more manageable and easier to pick apart because they only contain information related to the process that failed, rather than the whole system ... at least in my experience

Chris

Agree with this, although the minidumps can also be viewed with windbg and can often be more manageable and easier to pick apart because they only contain information related to the process that failed, rather than the whole system ... at least in my experience

Haha, yeah, indeed. BSoDs are an absolute nightmare to troubleshoot most of the time anyway.

I don't run a page file, but I do run16GB of ram, I only do that because it was dirt cheap, I can get up to about 10GB being used at one time, when I was running 8 GB the system crapped out on me although I was running BF3 and searching a HDD for lost files at the same time !!

I invite you to read something like this: http://serverfault.c...8gb-ram-machine

As this guy so correctly puts it, Microsoft have spent a lot of time and money on their OS and ultimately know a lot more than even the most seasoned sysadmin or casual forum viewer/power user.

I'm sure, but as I stated, I very very rarely get a BSoD to worry about. I'd put myself in the "most seasoned sysadmin" category too. Also, I'd never set a SERVER not to have a pagefile. For my gaming machine, I couldn't care less.

I'm sure, but as I stated, I very very rarely get a BSoD to worry about. I'd put myself in the "most seasoned sysadmin" category too. Also, I'd never set a SERVER not to have a pagefile. For my gaming machine, I couldn't care less.

Cool, well ultimately it doesn't matter, we all have different opinions on things I guess

And it wasn't me who mentioned the BSoD with relation to the page file. My point was (mainly) performance