pagefile.sys in XP; is it necessary?

[dancray]

WInXP allocates close to 800 meg for the pagefile.sys file; is it really necessary since I have 512 meg ram. Should I turn pagefile.sys off.

thank you

dc

[Dr Mordrid]

You should have seen my Win2K systems pagefile.sys just after I upgraded to a gig of ram. It swelled to over 1.7 GIGS!!

I reset it to a minimum of 256 megs and a maximum of 768 megs with no discernable problems.

Dr. Mordrid

[Greebe]

For compatability reasons I've set it to 256 meg min/ 256 meg max with 512 meg installed. Found a few proggies that don't like being used without it.

[dancray]

thanks!

[Jammrock]

Ditto with Greebe. I have run Windows XP in the past without a pagefile and it worked with a few exceptions. Photoshop will not run without it. Some games like Diablo II, Baldur's Gate and some others. But if you do not do any graphic intesive stuff, you may be able to do without.

We had a thread about this some months ago. People with at least 512 MB RAM didn't have trouble unless something like Photoshop required it.

Jammrock

[ayoub_ibrahim]

I've disabled it as I have a gig of ram!

[Gurm]

I'll reiterate - don't DISABLE it. But turning it down and locking it at a nice 256mb isn't a half-bad idea.

However, you may discover that you need it. Once you get your machine all loaded up with all the memory-resident stuff it's gonna run, you may discover that you are pushing more of that 512mb than you thought... and might NEED some swap space.

- Gurm