Pagefile Location recommendations

[thewelshbrummie]

Only just realised that the reason my HDD isn't parking/idling as it should (& is regularly making noise when I'm not expecting it) is that at some point since I installed it last summer, my Windows installation has moved the pagefile to it.

 

Currently running my PC from a 500GB SSD but I'll be starting over in March once I'm back from a holiday with a new and empty 2TB m.2 drive that's already installed in the PC...

 

...but am I right in thinking that the pagefile is fine to go on an SSD? Back when I built my first rig I put the pagefile on a 2nd drive to help performance but that was back when HDDs were the only option. I can't say I've thought about it but the constant sounds of my lone HDD constantly spinning are grating, especially when the drive is intended for archival data storage only and not for running the system in any way.

 

Going back 10 or so years I remember a fair discussion about it being better for the pagefile to remain on an HDD even with an SSD installed... but that's 10 years ago on what were very small SSDs and even then it wasn't clear cut on which was better (from memory it was the idea that constant rewrites to an SSD would massively reduce useful life but I'm sure that's changed in the 10 years of technology improvements). Pretty sure I'm good to manually move it for the short term but would appreciate any 2nd opinions.

 

Thoughts?

[SImoHayha]

I would do Pagefile on SSD or NVME. Faster in general, some testing has shown that it has increased low end FPS 1%.  Over HDDs. Remember page file isn't used until all RAM is used up so you won't run into constant write issues. I would just put it on the SSD, cause it's faster over HDD period.

[Eigenvektor]

46 minutes ago, SImoHayha said:

Remember page file isn't used until all RAM is used up so you won't run into constant write issues.

Not quite true. The OS may use swap to free memory used by idle background processes to make more room available in physical RAM, even when it isn't filled to capacity.

[venomtail]

Yes, put in on an SSD. I had pagefiles on HDD for a while and holy shit did my 2700X system at the time turn into £1200 wasted system. The noise didn't annoy me, the system slowdown did. In theory because pagefiles are now on an SSD it technically has more wear but in the real world there's no difference, within margin of error. Would get the same "wear" results by just installing 200GB CoD and uninstalling it straight away cause you've realized installing CoD was an accident cause no one plays it.

 

I've now added a 1TB M.2 and just dedicated 100GB of it to pagefiles. I should be good for a while.

[Mark Kaine]

i mean i always have page file on my OS drive, but its also not advisable to have modern windows on a traditional hdd, so maybe having it on a secondary SSD could be beneficial. 

 

The thing is,  either way, my page file almost never gets used, even after several days uptime... so I'm not sure what's going on that some systems this is apparently a problem? 

 

 

"0%"

 

 

Spoiler

mind you, even if it gets used its "2%" tops, i just don't see how that's an issue? 

 

[venomtail]

21 minutes ago, Mark Kaine said:

i mean i always have page file on my OS drive, but its also not advisable to have modern windows on a traditional hdd, so maybe having it on a secondary SSD could be beneficial. 

 

The thing is,  either way, my page file almost never gets used, even after several days uptime... so I'm not sure what's going on that some systems this is apparently a problem? 

 

 

"0%"

 

 

  Reveal hidden contents

mind you, even if it gets used its "2%" tops, i just don't see how that's an issue? 

 

For me it was just workload. I did UE for a while and it's a RAM hog. I'd get UE crashes or GUI would corrupt and I'd have to navigate around my PC like how UI looks in Cruelty Squad or Hypnospace Outlaw. Have a screenshot someone that I can't find. Hilarious. Appropriate pagefile size prevented these crashes but then my UE renders/compiles were noticeably slower like a snail.

 

[Mark Kaine]

3 hours ago, venomtail said:

For me it was just workload. I did UE for a while and it's a RAM hog. I'd get UE crashes or GUI would corrupt and I'd have to navigate around my PC like how UI looks in Cruelty Squad or Hypnospace Outlaw. Have a screenshot someone that I can't find. Hilarious. Appropriate pagefile size prevented these crashes but then my UE renders/compiles were noticeably slower like a snail.

 

ok, it might be useful for some applications,  but otherwise 100gb seems excessive! 

 

funny enough i tried ue5 (the "clay engine" how i call it?) and there weren't really any issues,  i did just the basic stuff though... dude walking around etc. 

[Mark Kaine]

4 hours ago, Eigenvektor said:

Not quite true. The OS may use swap to free memory used by idle background processes to make more room available in physical RAM, even when it isn't filled to capacity.

correct,  my ram *never* "gets used all up", i still sometimes get "2.1%" pagefile usage (oddly specific i know) i just don't see the issue. 

However,  i once tried to "manage" this myself... BIG mistake! all kinds of stuttering issues etc occured,  nah kids, leave it at "let windows handle it" settings and all is good!