RAM Disk for Virtual Memory

[UaVaj]

hate virtual memory with a passion. it is slow and pathetic. okay with that said and done.


there are some programs out there (like photoshop and bf4) that demands virtual memory. since there is no way around this pathetic ness. is there? anyway thinking of making a ram drive. and then put the page file on the ram drive.


64gb of physical memory. 24gb allocated for usage. and 36gb allocated for ram drive for page file.

 

[TheELF]

ASRock's A-tuning suite has this for page as well as temp files,probably other mobo's have similar tools,I only have asrock so it's the only one I know about.

You can also use a ramdisk tool and set it up by yourself,starwind's ramdisk is free and quite good.

 

[techne]

IMHO, to use a RAM disk is always an excellent idea. I use a NTFS compressed 6GB RAM disk (from SoftPerfect) in which are written all my TEMP files, browser cache and some general use.

It's OK to hate virtual memory, and I hate it too. Hence, I maintain my virtual memory within these limits: 200MB (initial size) and 1GB (maximum). You may want to play with the maximum value; I have successfully used 800MB in the past.

But to put the page file in the RAM drive is not a good idea. My advice is: set a strict limit for the virtual memory and forget it for good.

 

[Elixer]

hate virtual memory with a passion. it is slow and pathetic. okay with that said and done.


there are some programs out there (like photoshop and bf4) that demands virtual memory. since there is no way around this pathetic ness. is there? anyway thinking of making a ram drive. and then put the page file on the ram drive.


64gb of physical memory. 24gb allocated for usage. and 36gb allocated for ram drive for page file.

Put the pagefile on a SSD if you want, it won't get hit that much if you have 64GB of RAM.
Allocating 36GB of RAM for a page file is insane, and totally unnecessary.

 

[TheELF]

Put the pagefile on a SSD if you want, it won't get hit that much if you have 64GB of RAM.
Allocating 36GB of RAM for a page file is insane, and totally unnecessary.

He mentioned Photoshop so maybe not that insane,it's worth a try he can test it out and if it's not worth it he can revert back.

(my guess is he already has the mem due to PS)

 

[Elixer]

He mentioned Photoshop so maybe not that insane,it's worth a try he can test it out and if it's not worth it he can revert back.

(my guess is he already has the mem due to PS)

No, It IS insane, why the heck would you allocate that much memory to a page file instead of allocating all that memory to Photoshop itself?
The way Photoshop works is, it will use up to 70% of your system RAM (you can configure this to use more if you want), and if it runs out of RAM, it will *then* hit the page file.
What the OP is suggesting is, using 24GB of RAM for the program, and when it runs out of that 24GB, it hits the page file which is on a RAM drive.
Step back and think about it.
You want Photoshop to use up to 64GB of RAM, and not hit the page file *at all*.

 

[techne]

He mentioned Photoshop so maybe not that insane,it's worth a try he can test it out and if it's not worth it he can revert back.
(my guess is he already has the mem due to PS)

Photoshop lets the user to set how much of the available RAM the program will use (by default, 70%).

 

[UaVaj]

by default. photoshop and bf4 and other programs are too stupid to fully utilize all available physical memory. and insists on paging to no ends. those instances where it has to page from the ssd is getting old quick.

thanks for sharing that photoshop does allow user to allocate physical memory. will tinker with photoshop's custom settings.

what about bf4 and other programs? example bf4 will use ~6gb of physical memory and page ~23gb to ssd. leaving ~58gb of physical memory idling.

 

[techne]

by default. photoshop and bf4 and other programs are too stupid to fully utilize all available physical memory. and insists on paging to no ends. those instances where it has to page from the ssd is getting old quick.

thanks for sharing that photoshop does allow user to allocate physical memory. will tinker with photoshop's custom settings.

You'll find them at: Edit > Preferences > Performance

Think again: would you like to use a program that takes all available RAM to itself in a multitasking environment?

what about bf4 and other programs? example bf4 will use ~6gb of physical memory and page ~23gb to ssd. leaving ~58gb of physical memory idling.

I don't know what "BF4" stands for (if not the game), but that doesn't matter: if the program behaves so blatantly bad, you don't want to use it, do you?

 

[Elixer]

what about bf4 and other programs? example bf4 will use ~6gb of physical memory and page ~23gb to ssd. leaving ~58gb of physical memory idling.

If you are talking about Battlefield 4, then that shouldn't be the case. The program itself will use all available RAM it needs, and it will not hit the pagefile unless necessary for small, trivial things.
I know of quite a few people with 32GB of RAM and the game hardly ever touches the pagefile at all.

Now, if you are seeing pagefile usage of that much, something else is going on, sounds like a leak of some type.
As for programs that are incorrectly using RAM, then, I agree with Techne, don't use sloppy programs.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Setting up a ramdisk for photoshop was a thing back when Photoshop was only available as a 32-bit application, and couldn't address anything past 4GB of RAM.

That's not a thing anymore.

 

[UaVaj]

there is no memory leak. battlefield 4 just loves virtual memory.

btw. this machine with 64gb of physical memory does sports quad gpu (290x x4) on triple monitor (7680x1600). if resolution has anything to do with this excessive virtual memory usage.

just for contrast. on another machine with 16gb of physical memory that sports single 280x on a single 1920x1080. bf4 will use ~4gb of physical memory and page ~7gb to ssd. leaving ~12gb of physical memory idling.

 

[UaVaj]

this issue has to do with how windows (and it's program developers) manages memory. they all write programs to "utilize" as little physical memory as possible, while "storing" everything else in virtual memory on turtle media.

only way to alleviate this lag is to force virtual memory into physical memory. since windows/programs demands a "disk" for virtual memory. will give window a ram disk.

 

[Concerned Citizen]

Primocache,baby.Buy it;even
I do not work for them.But it works.
I even have a 180 day trial somewhere.
I wipe my comp more often than 180 days.

 

[techne]

To put the virtual memory in RAM is not a good idea, but almost every rule does have an exception. Go for it.

I'm about to play BF4, but knowing what I know now, I'll kill those bastards as fast as I can.

 

[Concerned Citizen]

These days it's 90 day trial.
Then you start with a new OS.
And do it all over again.

 

[Ichinisan]

L
O
L
!

 

[Ichinisan]

So a particular program (Photoshop or whatever) uses all your memory and needs to create a virtual memory swap file.

Hmm. I know! Let's place the swap file in real memory, so the program has less real memory available to use, less memory means the program needs to move more data to the swap file, and the swap file now occupies REAL memory.

BRILLIANT!

 

[Concerned Citizen]

So a particular program (Photoshop or whatever) uses all your memory and needs to create a virtual memory swap file.

Hmm. I know! Let's place the swap file in real memory, so the program has less real memory available to use, less memory means the program needs to move more data to the swap file, and the swap file now occupies REAL memory.

BRILLIANT!

Solution:Have more memory!
Seriously though;If you're reading things off the hard drive (SSD?) with a 2-3gb ramcache.It goes much,much better
Almost like having a dedicated RAM card that costs $1k n stuff.

 

[Shmee]

UaVaj are you using mantle or DX11? Mantle may have some issues/memory leaks still, in BF4 with certain configurations.

 

[mxnerd]

64gb of physical memory. 24gb allocated for usage. and 36gb allocated for ram drive for page file.

Page file is just a disk area allocated after system bootup, acts as virtual memory in case system needs more memory than your system has.

IF system needs more memory than your physical memory (64GB in your case), then system will swap less used programs into page file to prevent a system crash but system will become very slow. Until then, it's NOT USED at all!

If you are only running Photoshop & playing games, there is no way you use more than 64GB.

Right now you allocated 24GB to the whole system & 32GB to RAM disk as page file? You just cut system memory to less than half of what you have.

Just uninstall your RAM disk and let the system handle the memory itself. You are doing everything wrong!

In case you do need more than 64GB, buy a SSD and put the page file on it.

 

[UaVaj]

geesh. this is starting to sound like another vram discussion. where is the head banging on the wall smilies when u need it.

 

[Concerned Citizen]

I say if you have enough;Use RAM for pagefile
8 gb? Make the top 2-3 pagefile
16GB? Make a 5gb one if you want.
I use this: http://memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk
Probably an older version

 

[Elixer]

I say if you have enough;Use RAM for pagefile
8 gb? Make the top 2-3 pagefile
16GB? Make a 5gb one if you want.
I use this: http://memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk
Probably an older version

Ugh. More bad advice for the reasons already stated in this thread.

 

[corkyg]

Ugh. More bad advice for the reasons already stated in this thread.

Agree! Consider the source.