Pagefile.sys is over 500Gb with 32Gb of RAM

[Fgaff]

Hello, 

I've looked for solutions to this problem, but I am not sure if the solutions given would be the best option given the amount of overflow onto my Pagefile.sys.

 

I've been using SpaceSniffer to clear out some extra data on my hard drives. The biggest file on them is pagefile.sys which I understand is necessary when the system may run out of RAM. I found online that it only needs to be 1.5x or 2x the amount of RAM that you have. I have 32Gb, so I assume I only need 48-64Gb, which I would be fine with.

 

Currently, I have 2 internal hard drives and 1 external.

C:\ drive, which has used 367.8 / 500Gb and the pagefile.sys is 26.8Gb

H:\ drive, which has used 1Tb / 2Tb and the pagefile.sys is 167.1GB

K:\ drive, which has used 2.53Tb / 4Tb and the pagefile.sys is 565.1Gb

 

When I look in the Control Panel at the Virtual Memory, it says the total paging size for all drives is 777,418MB. The recommended size is 4985MB.

 

My question is if I change the maximum size to the recommended, will it delete anything necessary for my computer to run? Or is this all temporary memory that is put on the pagefile, that the computer no longer needs and can be deleted anyway? If the pagefile is made for RAM overflow, I would think the latter might be the case, but articles online don't make it super clear.

 

Also, why is this so large in the first place? I have had 32Gb of RAM for the majority of the life of this computer. I use a lot of Adobe Products for photo/video editing and have allocated lots of this Ram towards them when they are running. Are these two related? For example, could I have set too much allocated RAM for Premiere, and if I open Photoshop it starts dumping onto the pagefile.sys? I have had a lot of issues with running out of RAM on my MacBook when merging pictures in Photoshop, but have never had the issue on my PC.

 

Thanks in advance,

Fgaff

 

Edited August 5, 2020 by Fgaff
Submitted before finished post

[Eigenvektor]

3 minutes ago, Fgaff said:

I found online that it only needs to be 1.5x or 2x the amount of RAM that you have.

That advice is fairly old and applies to small memory sizes. With 32 GB you can get away with less. I would say maybe 0.5x or even 0.25x. Some will probably tell you to disable it entirely (I disagree: https://superuser.com/a/810384)

 

You can change the size of the page file in Windows settings. I'd set an upper limit or even a fixed size. https://mcci.com/support/guides/how-to-change-the-windows-pagefile-size/

[Fgaff]

1 minute ago, Eigenvektor said:

That advice is fairly old and applies to small memory sizes. With 32 GB you can get away with less. I would say maybe 0.5x or even 0.25x. Some will probably tell you to disable it entirely (I disagree: https://superuser.com/a/810384)

 

You can change the size of the page file in Windows settings. I'd set an upper limit or even a fixed size. https://mcci.com/support/guides/how-to-change-the-windows-pagefile-size/

Is all that data in this file something that could be deleted and not necessary for my computer? I don't have a problem setting the max size to something larger than the RAM, but I don't want to delete something a program or the system might need.

[Eigenvektor]

1 minute ago, Fgaff said:

Is all that data in this file something that could be deleted and not necessary for my computer? I don't have a problem setting the max size to something larger than the RAM, but I don't want to delete something a program or the system might need.

It contains memory contents that were paged out because they weren't actively needed. You're not going to lose data. It's not persistent data anyways.

[aDoomGuy]

1 minute ago, Fgaff said:

Is all that data in this file something that could be deleted and not necessary for my computer? I don't have a problem setting the max size to something larger than the RAM, but I don't want to delete something a program or the system might need.

Sure you can disable the pagefile entirely and Windows will remove it automatically if I'm not mistaken. However this is not something that I recommend because some applications (games) seem to rely on it and I have been plagued with some games crashing with no pagefile even with available RAM. Just set it to be smallish... like 8 GB on SSD and you'll be fine.

[SkilledRebuilds]

1 hour ago, aDoomGuy said:

Sure you can disable the pagefile entirely and Windows will remove it automatically if I'm not mistaken. However this is not something that I recommend because some applications (games) seem to rely on it and I have been plagued with some games crashing with no pagefile even with available RAM. Just set it to be smallish... like 8 GB on SSD and you'll be fine.

I agree, I personally have used a manual mode for years (Saving on Min Space) 2GB Minimum and 32-64GB Maximum (without worrying about filespace unlike OP) otherwise i'd make the Max smaller.

[GoodBytes]

Pagefile should always match your RAM (or be greater).

Your pagefile grew because at some point in time, you consume past your RAM limit. This can occur with RAM Disk type utility that was improperly configured or faced a memory leak by a driver or application.

 

Pagefile does more than extend your RAM, it allows the OS to move items in RAM, and allows to defragment free space (regrouping free space together). Keep in mind, regardless of the OS you use, process in RAM is NEVER fragmented nor can be moved at runtime. CPUs don't support this.

So if you do like our friend @aDoomGuy did, and your RAM layout is: 

• [-- Process A --][--  Process B --][---- Game ----][-- Free space --][-- Process C --][----  Free space  ----]

And your game (in the above example, but it can be a program) consume more RAM from its initial state, and the free space available next to it is not enough for it, it will touch Process C, and the game will crash, as the system will avoid overriding RAM consumed by another process.

 

Normally, the OS (speaking generally) would clear Process C in RAM to free up the space for Game (or whatever process that is colliding with Process C), and copy it's replica/backup of Process C from its pagefile back to the RAM at a new location (OS may use a fancy algorithm to aim to reduce this task from happening as it is taxing, by having a certain amount of free space between processes).

 

So, while I am sure someone here will say that disabled pagefile or shrinked it and have 0 problem. The proper/best advice for maximum reliability, is to have the pagefile be the size of your RAM. This is the default by Windows. If you want, you can disable it, reboot (important step), and set it back to "Windows managed", and it should make a new pagefile with the proper size (ie: matching your RAM size).

[dreamcast4599]

for me i do 1024x however big my physical ram is x2.5 so for me its 1024x16gbx2.5 and then i set that as my static ram