Disabled Page Memory?

[nirmeets]

I know page memory is back up for main memory but what if I disable it? I've 8 Gb of DDR4 2333Mhz Ram and currently no title is taking up more than 3-4 Gb. The system is using up around 2 Gb of my,  only storage option, SSD for paging. Is it okay to disable it completely? 

[ybriK]

You can but don't be surprised when you run out of memory for whatever reason and your PC hangs up.

[AlTech]

5 minutes ago, nirmeets said:

I know page memory is back up for main memory but what if I disable it? I've 8 Gb of DDR4 2333Mhz Ram and currently no title is taking up more than 3-4 Gb. The system is using up around 2 Gb of my,  only storage option, SSD for paging. Is it okay to disable it completely? 

I would only disable it if you had 16GB RAM or more.

[Electronics Wizardy]

47 minutes ago, nirmeets said:

I know page memory is back up for main memory but what if I disable it? I've 8 Gb of DDR4 2333Mhz Ram and currently no title is taking up more than 3-4 Gb. The system is using up around 2 Gb of my,  only storage option, SSD for paging. Is it okay to disable it completely? 

Don't do this. The system uses the page file for idle programs so it can keep the ram for caching and other uses. It needs the page file and will crash/hang if you use to much ram. 

[AlTech]

4 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Don't do this. The system uses the page file for idle programs so it can keep the ram for caching and other uses. It needs the page file and will crash/hang if you use to much ram. 

If OP had 16GB or 32GB then i'd say that it would be fine to do this but with anything less than 16GB don't.

[Electronics Wizardy]

Just now, AluminiumTech said:

If OP had 16GB or 32GB then i'd say that it would be fine to do this but with anything less than 16GB don't.

Not even then. The os needs the page file to work right.

[AlTech]

2 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Not even then. The os needs the page file to work right.

I have 16GB Ram and I disabled the page file and it works like charm.

[Lehti]

26 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

If OP had 16GB or 32GB then i'd say that it would be fine to do this but with anything less than 16GB don't.

I have 16 GB of RAM and when I was rendering a video in Premiere the RAM usage got very close to 100%. I'm not sure if Windows allocates as much RAM as it can or if that's the requirement for rendering my videos, but it's better safe than sorry and leaving the page file alone.

Also, you aren't going to store all that much data in 2 GB, so you're not really losing much. The safe (if a bit expensive) route is to get an additional hard drive. Try to get one with a good price per GB, like a 2 TB model. 1 TB ones are fine, but avoid 500 GB hard drives completely.

[nirmeets]

I'm mainly worried about the limited number of writes. I've plans to upgrade my storage and ram so until then I'll keep the paging enable.

[Lehti]

Just now, nirmeets said:

I'm mainly worried about the limited number of writes. I've plans to upgrade my storage and ram so until then I'll keep the paging enable.

The limited number of writes isn't really a concern with newer SSDs.

[ybriK]

2 minutes ago, nirmeets said:

I'm mainly worried about the limited number of writes. I've plans to upgrade my storage and ram so until then I'll keep the paging enable.

I'd be amazed to know what you're writing if you can achieve AT LEAST 1 Petabyte.

[SpaceGhostC2C]

1 hour ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Not even then. The os needs the page file to work right.

It doesn't, and that's why it can be disabled with two clicks. As @AluminiumTech pointed out, many users disable it with no consequences.

 

Then again, whether it's a good idea depends on your particular case, so just because it can be done and it doesn't always have a negative impact, it doesn't mean it's generally advisable.

It's important to notice that the page file is not only used when the system runs out of physical ram. Windows allocates a set of memory to each process even before they actually need it, based on what they demand, and often more than what the program will ever really need. Hence, the "insufficient memory" message can appear even way before 100% usage - I've seen it happen at barely 50% and without disabling the page file (which also proves that "just leave it in auto, Windows knows what to do" is also an unjustified advise: I had to set the page file manually to a big enough size, because Windows wouldn't increase it dynamically to allow for the commit set my program apparently required -despite never exhausting the 16GB of physical RAM).

 

And that's exactly all that would happen if you lack a page file or it can't/doesn't get big enough: you'll get an error message and the program that triggered the request for additional memory will fail to run.

[nirmeets]

5 hours ago, ybriK said:

I'd be amazed to know what you're writing if you can achieve AT LEAST 1 Petabyte.

I highly doubt, the manufacturer quote writes cycle of 200Tb, if it last for 1Pb it would be the best SSD

[ybriK]

8 hours ago, nirmeets said:

I highly doubt, the manufacturer quote writes cycle of 200Tb, if it last for 1Pb it would be the best SSD

I guess the "best" SSD would be the 840 Pro then in this case.

http://techreport.com/review/27909/the-ssd-endurance-experiment-theyre-all-dead/4