HOW BIG SHOULD THE SWAP FILE BE ??

[EddiE314 0]

Look BigB, no damned salesman told me to buy a dual socket 370 mobo, nor did he tell me to buy two 400mhz celerons, nor did he tell me to get 256mb of ram, i built it cause i could, i think your little pansy ass is jealous of all of the high end people, if you want one too then go out and bust your ass like the rest of us....or does mommy and daddy still support you?

--------------------------------

As for all of the people out there who think that it would be great to use ram for a swapfile......LEARN A THING OR TWO ABOUT A FRICKIN COMPUTER......yes ram is fast, but say you have 384MB ram, and you make a 128MB ramdisk, and try to put a swapfile on it, thats using up 128Mb of your ram that could be used by the computer. the ram going to be used anyway by the computer anyway as cache, which would be faster than making a stupd RAMdisk and making it a swap file.

 

..Ok, by reading these worthless.."I wanna make my ram my swap file"...posts, i think my IQ just dropped 20 points and I can't remember how to be nice anymore, especially after ByronT had a Stroke because some people can't get it through their melons.

 

P.s. No offense to anyone....but some of you must be have serious problems.

 

Have a nice Day.

and smile

 

 

 

[This message has been edited by EddiE314 (edited 04 February 2000).]

[JimmyK 0]

ohh man, I jsut came back from a test, I was kind of down, but god dang, u all are some funny SOB's. Im gettign watery eyed here. Im smiling from ear to ear, this hoenst to god has to be just the funniest post. I mean subject matter aside (forget about wahts right or wrong), just reading it as a third party its funny as nutz.

 

I guess ur right bigb, heh we shouldnt get so worked up. and ur right I have a confession, I paid 4,324 that is four thousand three hundred and twenty four dollars, for a packard bell p100 with 16 megs of ram, and a 2.1 gig drive. and I didint know squat about comptuers. BUT with tinkering and playing around I learned a lot, I didnt expect/want to be spoon fed answers by people on forums, like many people are now a days.

 

hehe Im still having a good laugh about all this. You all are a bunch of comedians, and Eddie, I knwo what ur saying man, I got frustrated the first time I figured out what was really going on witht his post, but bigb is right, to many people are duped into buying something cuz its "bigger and badder"

 

u know what my father just bought? an 9,000 dollar laptop and docking station with 22" inch monitor. Its top of the line Ill tell u that much, with space for pci expansion and everything, BUT my dad cant even use home row keys or type more then a 25 words a minute. But thats what he wanted for his "arc view" and "cad" programs, who was I to argue, and he didint even consult me because he knew Id tell him to do something else, instead he called up some "professionals" and said he wanted a powerful laptop to run everything and have a docking station. they said anywhere from 5,000 to 12,000 dollars and they said the 9,000 dollar system would run everything flawlessly, so he got it.

 

its got a dvd player over 160 emgs of ram my father said, hi end PIII processor and what not. so after all my babbling u se bigb was right

 

hehe that iq thing was pretty funny as well, u all are just killin me here....

[ByronT 0]

I do have to admit that I wrote that last post of mine with a smile ear to ear. And I laugh everytime I find this post at the top of the hardware forum! Especially when I was trying to figure out what a "UPS" would be for someone playing solitaire...

 

I just can't wait for the next self-proclaimed computer expert to tell me that a SWAP file on a RAM disk is a good thing... I'll get another dose of those good ole endorphins with the ensuing laughter. My programmer still can't believe somebody went to the trouble of a RAM disk for a swap file...

 

And maybe this is the answer to the question "How do we convince these people that a SWAP/RAM disk [i got tired of typing the long version] is a bad idea?:" We laugh at it and make fun of it long enough that they finally are humiliated into realizing that it's a dumb idea.

[DosFreak 2]

I'm going to say something just to keep this funny lil' thread going. We all know that Windows needs a swap file and that if you let Windows manage the swap file that it will constantly shrink and grow. What some of us may not know is that even if you have 8m-768m of ram WINDOWS WILL STILL MAKE A SWAP FILE. Sure the swap file may be only a couple of megs but the swap file is still there. NOW I can see if you have an ungodly amount of memory and if you carefully monitor your swap file using swap file monitoring programs and if you notice that you almost never swap to the disk because of your ungodly amount of ram. Then what the hell stick that swap file on your RAM drive. Heck...if ya think about it it'll also be more secure, since your swap file will not be left behind for sneaks like me to snoop through.

 

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C:\Dos

C:\Dos\Run

\Run\Dos\Run

[jonny 0]

I swear I was going to post the same thing this afternoon. I had the message written and everything. But at the last minute I backed out because I was afraid that the computer gods would eat me alive . No in actual reality I thought to myself if you had this much ram couldnt you just zero out the swap file? Then windows would be forced to just use the ram.

[DosFreak 2]

The thing is...Windows loves the swap file. Like I said before it'll make a swap file even if you don't need it. So I don't really think it would be a good idea to disable it. There's also another reason not to disable the swap file you never know when some ram guzzling program comes along cough--unreal cough tournament--and complains because you had your swap file set to a max and a min of 128.

What I wish someone would make is a program you could use to actually tell Windows what you want to put on the swap file. For instance in NT you can specify an option where you can disable kernel paging thereby decreasing HD access...mabye some bright programmer could make a program to do this?

 

------------------

C:\Dos

C:\Dos\Run

\Run\Dos\Run

[YuppieScum 0]

For the last time (yeah, right)...

 

The purpose of the swap file is to make the OS and any apps think that there is more memory than actually exists in the computer.

 

This is because disk space is cheaper than RAM.

 

If you have gargantuan amounts of RAM in your machine (eg, several of my servers have 2Gb+ RAM), then setting the swap file to zero is the thing to do. That way the OS won't swap.

 

Remember - the less RAM an OS has, the more it will want to swap.

 

Making a RAM disk will encourage the OS to swap, because it have less RAM. Putting the swap file on the RAM disk is like p1ssing in the wind...

 

How much clearer can I make this?

[DosFreak 2]

So you actually disable the swap file on your servers!!!???? I know performance is a must...but really...

[EddiE314 0]

I guess he could do that with 2gb of ram.

[Guest]

Wow! This is one of the most entertaining threads I have ever read on this forum! LOL!

 

However entertaining, I was not able to come up with the answer I was looking for. I have 128 megs of RAM.. what should I do with my SWAP file? (ByronT, I promise I won't put it on my RAM!) lol.

[ByronT 0]

Whoa! A convert!!! No way. One person who finally is using their head!

 

Actually, on my way home tonight from my fiancee's, I was thinking of what you could actually use a RAM disk - with the sole reason being performance. Believe it or not, I came up with 1 usage (in terms of my usage.)

 

Before I give the "one", let me kill some of the bad usages of a RAM disk. First, the SWAP file (dumbest of all) - but no more said about that. Second, a temp directory - some people don't realize that MS in all of it's glorious knowledge does have some installation scenarios where they place files in the system TEMP directory and then reboots - accessing those supposedly saved TEMP dir files after the reboot. Guess what happens if you put your TEMP dir on a RAM disk. Third, games/CDs copied to the RAM drive. This has some positives - but your negatives are the same as the SWAP file - if the game really needs memory (see Unreal Tournament), you just stole gobs of memory from it.

 

The one that I came up with? Placing MP3 or WAV files on a RAM disk for playback. The truth is that this is the only application that I can think of that would have a decent benefit from running from the RAM disk. MP3 files require constant HD reads - and by placing the MP3 files on the RAM disk, you would guarantee no skipping caused by other HD access. Of course, I would forget about running any processor/memory intensive program at the same time... So I would say that if you have the computer (with say 512MB RAM) and you are working in the room with the computer - but not on the computer - yeah, placing MP3 files on a RAM disk could be pretty cool.

 

Now, if you're about to do that. Give me your computer. I actually could use that extra RAM - and the extra processing power that you probably sprung for when you bought the beast.

 

Regards... (and the thread lives on!!!)

[YuppieScum 0]

Byron...

 

Sorry to p1ss on your bonfire, rain on your parade, etc, but...

 

Most MP3/WAV software has some sort of selectable "buffering" option - that is, they'll read x% or y seconds of the data into RAM, instead of streaming directly off the disk.

 

NEXT!

[ByronT 0]

Yeah, I know...

 

I was just trying to come up with some scenario that these people hung up on RAM disks could use as an excuse. And it would still have been a lame excuse. Of course, I had sorta forgotten that WinAmp, RealJukebox, et al buffer the input.

 

And the thread rolls on....

[Guest]

Okay.......

 

So, If I have 128 megs of ram, how big should my SWAP file be? I have max and min both set at 200 right now.. is this good?

[foxman98 0]

OH ****! You have the AND the min set to 200? By doing so you have limited the amount of ram and the OS is gonna start thrashing disk like crazy cause the hard drive to catch on fire and send electrical pulses through the nieghbourhood causing each microwave to emit deadly rays killing all.

 

 

On a more serious note that sounds fine to me. I suggest everyone reads the FAQ and ntfaq.com they have a section on swap files. I have mine placed on two drivers, and i havwe a total of 256 MB (I have 128 RAM). This seems to work fine. IMO if your computer works and it works ok then you're swap file is probably fine.

[comdot 0]

let win2k manage it and leave it alone!

[comdot 0]

let win2k manage it and leave it alone!

[jdulmage 0]

we all know what this post reminds us of, that would be my famous 92 messge post. Now, one question tonight is...if i have 64 MB of RAM, should i zero my swap file, or leave it windows managing or specify, if specify is yes, then how much min/max

[DosFreak 2]

This is the best reply your gonna get mage. Get a swap file monitoring program or you can use that monitoring program that 9x uses. Have it monitor your swap file while you do your normal everyday stuff and then set your swap file to whatever it says. If you don't wanna wait forever and a half to monitor your swap file just load up games like Unreal Tournament and Ultima Ascension and then check the swap file usage monitor. Whatever it says then, then set your swap file to that. NT is better to get a good idea of how much ram you should buy or how much ram is being taken up because all I have to do is look in Task Manager and there is my Peak.

[savedaday 0]

GOOOD POINT!!!!!! still finding other threads funny lol lol.....

 

Quote:

Originally posted by DosFreak:

I'm going to say something just to keep this funny lil' thread going. We all know that Windows needs a swap file and that if you let Windows manage the swap file that it will constantly shrink and grow. What some of us may not know is that even if you have 8m-768m of ram WINDOWS WILL STILL MAKE A SWAP FILE. Sure the swap file may be only a couple of megs but the swap file is still there. NOW I can see if you have an ungodly amount of memory and if you carefully monitor your swap file using swap file monitoring programs and if you notice that you almost never swap to the disk because of your ungodly amount of ram. Then what the hell stick that swap file on your RAM drive. Heck...if ya think about it it'll also be more secure, since your swap file will not be left behind for sneaks like me to snoop through.

 

[theShark 0]

I came across this forum while looking for tweaks for win2k I recently installed and couldn't believe it when i saw

"Man what are all these people doing with these hi end systems when they dont know the basics, dont buy a ferrari if u cant f-ing drive."

What is you problem? you are such a fool that i had to reply. So what if a guy knows nothing abt computers, i don't know ****e abt computers but if i want a dam p3 800mhz coppermine i will buy it and if you don't like it go suck an egg.

Also if a guy posts a question and says somthing dumb you don't have to make a fool of him, the people who do that the most are the ones who got laughed at in school and now are venting their fustration on others behind a monitor and to you i send out a big fat HA!

[Ge0ph 0]

OK, this may be right or this may be wrong but here is how I set mine.

 

Reboot my computer and then use it normally for about an hour or so. Then open up the task manager and go to the performance tab. Look at the “Commit Charge” section and see what the peak says. You can lower the size until the peak is a little closer to the limit. The peak is the most you have used in this session. There are no exact numbers to use, you just have to adjust it to your own use. If your peak never gets close to your limit then you can probably get by with out a swap file. If you have a small swap file and your system runs out of memory then just up your swap file I bit. But use the task manager numbers to go by.

 

I have 288 megs of memory and my swap file is set to 16 meg on a separate hard drive. When I play games (UT) I set my swap to 128 just to be safe.

[Jehova 0]

Sorry if this have already been suggested, but I'm to lazy to read all the preceding posts 8)

A swap file should be size 2x your RAM size. Got that tip from some NT expert - something about how Windows uses the swap file

[EddiE314 0]

Actually Jehova, its 2.5 x RAM = PagefileSize(swapfile)