pagefile

attackingmooseattackingmoose
edited November 2005 in Science & Tech
I'm very tired so I'll be quick. I have a hidden;system file in my C drive called 'pagefile' I set my files to be shown at all times so I could do a little cleaning of my drive because it gets dirty. I noticed that it was a gig big, I need space so I was wondering, am I allowed to delete this or is it one of those 'delete and die' files?

If this is misplaced, it's a half hour before midnight so sorry.

Thanks for your time.

Comments

  • TroganTrogan London, UK
    edited November 2005
    Is it a folder or a file?

    If its a folder, check whats inside. Post back with file names if you need help identifying them.

    Secondly, right-click the folder or file and do a scan with your Anti-Virus. Hopefully, it should come out clean.

    Good luck :thumbsup:
  • attackingmooseattackingmoose
    edited November 2005
    yay for speedy replies

    it's just a file, a lone huge file

    I know I'm safe, I'm good at HJT/ad-aware/SBS&D scans, I was just curious as to why it was there and huge..
  • TroganTrogan London, UK
    edited November 2005
    lol...don't worry, I wasn't gonna send you to the SVT Forum :D

    Have you had it scanned?

    I don't think its anything bad so I would just leave it. That one file shouldn't stop you from cleaning files that are more unnecessary ;D
  • attackingmooseattackingmoose
    edited November 2005
    what do you recomend scanning it with? I have the scan option from winace but it isn't working on me so I don't know...spybot's running now just for fun (it feels left out, I favour ad-aware over it)

    plus, it's a matter of space, I just wanted to see if it was a junk .temp file or if it was important to the computer (like WINDOWS is)
  • fatcatfatcat Mizzou Icrontian
    edited November 2005
    if the file name is

    pagefile.sys

    DO NOT delete it (actually i dont think windows will let ya)

    your system needs it :thumbsup:

    ps. when u got more time type pagefile into google for a million+1 pages of info on the pagefile :)
  • TroganTrogan London, UK
    edited November 2005
    Thanks Fatcat...phew!!!
  • attackingmooseattackingmoose
    edited November 2005
    yup, it's a .sys, I forgot to check that, whoops

    I'm going to read up on it on google now, I only need to be up in 6 hours for school -.-

    thanks for ya'lls help, gonna find out why this file's such a beast now, then sleep..toodles
  • TroganTrogan London, UK
    edited November 2005
    Why don't you go sleep now and read about it later? I don't see how one file can stop you....or...or Anyonre from sleeping. ;D
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian
    edited November 2005
    It's your virtual memory. If you have 768M of vram, then your pagefile.sys is going to be 768mb. The file IS the virtual memory. It's the container for your paging file.
  • profdlpprofdlp The Holy City Of Westlake, Ohio
    edited November 2005
    The page file is a portion of your hard drive which Windows sets aside for use when your RAM is getting hammered. It's also sometimes referred to as the swap file. It is usually set to 1.5X the amount of RAM you have, though that varies in extreme situations, such as having a whole lot or very little physical memory.

    If it wasn't there and you had a program which suddenly needed a bunch of memory, your entire system would probably lock up. Even people with enormous amounts of RAM (say, over 2GB) usually leave at least a few hundred MB for their page file. There are some programs which will not run right at all without it, even if you have boatloads of RAM.
  • TroganTrogan London, UK
    edited November 2005
    I have a laptop here that has 256MB of RAM (64MB shared with onboard graphics) and it constantly says Virtual Memort Low...increasing pagefile. I was going to start a thread about that but I guess prof covered it.

    So, is there something "hammering" on the memory that is causing this? Its all well and good that the pagefile is increasing but I thought something would happen to the laptop after a while.

    Sorry for the thread hijack, mouse :)
  • profdlpprofdlp The Holy City Of Westlake, Ohio
    edited November 2005
    Trogan_1000 wrote:
    I have a laptop here that has 256MB of RAM (64MB shared with onboard graphics) and it constantly says Virtual Memort Low...increasing pagefile. I was going to start a thread about that but I guess prof covered it.

    So, is there something "hammering" on the memory that is causing this?...
    256MB - 64MB = 192MB left for Windows, way below what you need to run smoothly.

    The best solution is to add more memory. You can also adjust the pagefile manually so it's not constantly resizing itself. Go to Sytem Properties>>>Advanced>>>Performance>>>Settings>>>Advanced>>>Virtual Memory>>>Change and see what it's set on now.
  • TroganTrogan London, UK
    edited November 2005
    Yeah, only 192MB. I knew myself that was low but you saying way to low is making me depressed :(

    OK, i'l trying talking to my mum about getting more RAM but that won't be an easy job. I'l also adjust the pagefile and see what happens.

    If we do get more RAM then you'll see a "Laptop RAM" thread sometime :D

    Thanks prof :thumbsup:
  • EnverexEnverex Worcester, UK Icrontian
    edited November 2005
    Lol, it never occured to anyone that the massive file named pagefile was your windows pagefile ;D
  • attackingmooseattackingmoose
    edited November 2005
    haha, the hijack was okay, misspelling my name wasn't :shakehead

    :p

    that's really odd, I never knew this..you learn something everyday

    from the google sites, it's possible to disable it but chances are that you'll kill your computer by accident, also it's possible to make it smaller by decreasing ram (if you're low on space) but you may or may not see a performance difference
  • EnverexEnverex Worcester, UK Icrontian
    edited November 2005
    Um, you don't need to decrease your RAM to make it smaller, getting rid of RAM is never a good thing. Simply set it to user controlled and set it to any amount you want if you want it to be smaller. Dissabling it isn't critical unless you normally run out of free RAM. I've run without a swapfile a few times and it speeds things up until you run out of free RAM and then it all goes horribly, horribly wrong.
  • ronboronbo Connecticut
    edited November 2005
    Another tip is to move your pagefile to another drive, that way it will not get fragged.....
  • EnverexEnverex Worcester, UK Icrontian
    edited November 2005
    Er, that isn't true. It will always get fragemented regardless what drive it is on. The only way to stop this is to set it to a specific size.
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