How to set up virtual memory to make your computer run faster

How to Set

If the computer is slow and unresponsive due to insufficient memory, you can set the virtual memory size appropriately to compensate for the lack of memory and speed up the system's response. Its specific practice is as follows:

1. Right-click on "My Computer" and select "Properties".

2. In the Properties pop-up page, select Advanced, and in the performance area, click the Settings button.

3. Select advanced in the Performance tab, click the Change button in the virtual memory area

4. Select a partition with large free space to hold the virtual memory Pagefile.sys file.

5. Set the virtual memory size to 1.5-3 times times of physical memory in a custom size area

Little Tricks

Microsoft has provided us with an official solution to the problem of how virtual memory is set up, and in general it is recommended to use the following Setup methods:

1. The paging file can be set up in the partition where the system resides and set up as system managed, which can be managed automatically by the system. The paging file is set only in one partition, and the other hard disk partitions do not set any paging files. Because too many partitions are set up in the paging file, this causes the hard disk head to be read back and forth repeatedly on different partitions. This delays the system rate and reduces the life of the hard disk, and if you have more than one hard disk, you can create a paging file for each hard disk. When information is distributed across multiple paging files, the hard disk controller can perform read and write operations on multiple hard disks at the same time. The system performance will be improved.

2. Virtual memory, the minimum value is set to 1.5 times times the physical memory, the maximum value is set to 3 times times the physical memory, the partition is dedicated to storing the paging file, do not store any other files. A separate partition is used to set up virtual memory, mainly based on two considerations: first, because there are no other files on the partition, so that the partition does not produce disk fragmentation, so that the page file data read and write is not affected by disk fragmentation, and second, according to the Windows Memory management technology, Windows takes advantage of paging files on infrequently accessed partitions, which also reduces the chance of reading the paging file on the system disk, easing the pressure on the system disk.

 
Precautions :

1. Location of virtual memory
When setting up virtual memory, it is also important to note that if you have more than one hard disk, it is best to set the paging file on the hard disk that does not have the operating system or application installed, or on the fastest drive on all hard drives. This will not cause the same hard disk to be busy reading the application's data and paging at the same time when the system is busy. Conversely, if your application and paging files are on different hard disks, you can minimize disk utilization and improve efficiency. Of course, if you have only one hard drive, setting the paging file to another partition will not significantly improve disk efficiency.

2. Virtual memory paging files and disk fragmentation
Because virtual memory uses a hard disk, files that are not continuously written on the hard disk produce disk fragmentation, so once the files or partitions used to implement the virtual memory are too fragmented, the drive's seek time is extended, affecting system performance. There is a misconception that Windows systems frequently read and write Pagefile.sys will produce disk fragmentation, but in reality. Because once the Pagefile.sys file is created, the distribution in the partition continues to be fixed, and the file's internal read and write does not increase or decrease the Pagefile.sys file size. The system-created Temppf.sys will result in disk fragmentation only when the paging file is exhausted. In a Linux system, the parts that are used for virtual memory are placed in separate partitions without affecting other partitions or files, and the impact of disk fragmentation is largely eliminated.

3. Disk Fragmentation
The partition where virtual memory resides, cannot have too much disk fragmentation, and can be used to defragment a virtual memory file in advance by defragmenting the partition with the operating system's own Disk Defragmenter

4. Virtual Memory size
Virtual memory is not set as large as possible, to be set according to the actual operation of the system, the virtual memory size is generally set to 1.5-3 times times the size of physical memory

5. Affect shutdown speed
Setting too large virtual memory will cause the shutdown to be slow or even a few minutes, for example, 2G PC setting 16G virtual memory may take a few minutes to shut down, although it increases PC performance.

How to set up virtual memory to make your computer run faster