How to Manage Virtual Memory (Pagefile) in Windows 10

How to Manage Virtual Memory (Pagefile) in Windows 10. If you want to a just your Virtual Memory which also known as Pagefile just follow this guide, we are using Windows 10. The Pagefile is in every Windows operating system and is a hidden system file called Pagefile.sys. The file is located in your computer’s system drive C:\

The operating system will open applications in Pagefile to reduce the workload of the physical memory, also known as RAM.

So if you have a number of applications open, Windows will start to transfer some of these to Pagefile to lighten the load on the system memory (RAM). So the Pagefile is acting as secondary memory in your computer. This is also known as Virtual Memory.

Some people don’t want Windows to do this and want all programs to be run in physical memory (RAM) so you not confused, this is the memory which is plugged into your motherboard. But default Windows deals with all your memory, but a lot of people like to be in control of their own memory.

So why do we disable pagefile? Memory (RAM) is a lot faster than a mechanical hard drive, today we have super-fast SSD solid state drives and a lot more memory to play with then previous years when tweaking pagefile was the norm.

But before you start disabling the Pagefile it can lead to an unstable operating system and you can receive crashing a low memory errors when doing trying to multitask and do heavy tasks on the computer. These errors can be BSOD Blue Screen of Death, Applications crash or reach you Windows memory limit.

So what would be the right custom virtual memory settings to use? This is one of them debatable subjects that people like to talk about. The minimum and maximum size of the Pagefile can be up to 1.5 times of the physical system memory, well that’s what I was told years ago, now I not so sure after reading Mark Russinovich article
So if you have 8GB of RAM you still need a pagefile according to Mark Russinovich you should set your pagefile to 1GB or 2GB this will make sure you have a buffer in case a RAM-hungry application needs it. If you have 8GB of RAM and a max 3GB of memory usage, you should still have a pagefile, but you would probably be fine with a 1 GB size.
How to Manage the Pagefile size manually in Windows 10.

Here’s how:

  1. Make sure you are signed in to administrator account.
  2. Right click the Start button to open its context menu and click System.

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3. On the left pane of the System window, click Advanced system settings.

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4. On System Properties box, chick Advanced tab, then click Settings.

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5. On Performance Options box, click Advanced tab. Then click Change.

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6. In Virtual Memory box. Remove Tick from “Automatically Manage Paging File Size For All Drives”

  • Next select Custom Size and Enter your settings you want 1.5 times the memory
  • or Mark Russinovich recommendations
  • Hit Set and OK. Now Reboot your computer.

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7. If you want to disable pagefile, put radio button in No Page File.

  • click Set and Reboot your computer.

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That’s it, all done. What do you guys think the settings should be?

Let me know in the comments below.

Latest Comments

  1. Bill Rhodes August 19, 2016

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