"Virtual Memory" errors in Win2K pro

[mobogasm]

A handful of my clients computers have been getting virtual memory errors on boot up. They are win2k pro installations. 256mb ram, default page file size. I tried increasing the page file another 256 mb for min and for max and defragging but I'm still getting the errors. They are currently using Service Pack 3. They are imaged using the same images as numerous other workstations running same software and same hardware that do not have these issues. What gives? Thanks.

 

[Lord Evermore]

The actual error message might be helpful.

 

[mobogasm]

it is saying that the computer is out of virtual memory, windows is now increasing the size of your pagefile. some applications may not function properly.

it happens soon after login.

 

[Lord Evermore]

See what's loading on startup. You said you added 256MB for the min and max, but what does that put them at total?

 

[NogginBoink]

Originally posted by: mobogasm
it is saying that the computer is out of virtual memory, windows is now increasing the size of your pagefile. some applications may not function properly.

it happens soon after login.

It could be that the system is recovering from a blue screen error.

When W2K encounters a blue screen, it writes a dump to the page file. When rebooted, savedump.exe copies the dump from the pagefile to memory.dmp. When savedump is finished, the space in the pagefile is freed again.

This would be considered normal after a bluescreen and isn't worth worrying about.

 

[Nothinman]

Even when saving a full dump I've never seen that error, by the time the VM system tries to use the pagefile it should be freed.

 

[Lord Evermore]

WinXP saves the memory dump directly to a file...why would 2k save it to the pagefile?

I just looked it up. Savedump.exe is used manually to extract a minidump file from a full memory dump file. Win2k does create the memory dump file directly, not copying out of the page file.

 

[Nothinman]

WinXP saves the memory dump directly to a file...why would 2k save it to the pagefile?

Personally I think both are dumb, if the system BSODs it's in an uknown state and writing to any filesystem can cause corruption, that's the reason when a unix kernel panics it doesn't flush any filesystem buffers and if it does write a crash dump it's written to a swap partition.

 

[Lord Evermore]

Well nobody ever said Microsoft was smart.

 

[NogginBoink]

Originally posted by: Lord Evermore
WinXP saves the memory dump directly to a file...why would 2k save it to the pagefile?

I just looked it up. Savedump.exe is used manually to extract a minidump file from a full memory dump file. Win2k does create the memory dump file directly, not copying out of the page file.

WinXP does not write it directly to the dump file. WinXP behaves the same as all other flavors of NT in this regard.

Savedump.exe is called by winlogon.exe at system startup to check for the presence of a dump file in the pagefile and to copy it out.

 

[Lord Evermore]

Yeah I misread a page describing new features in savedump. At any rate, considering the pagefile is still part of the file system, why is that any safer? Does it just depend on the swap file's location being known no matter what?

 

[NogginBoink]

Originally posted by: Lord Evermore
Yeah I misread a page describing new features in savedump. At any rate, considering the pagefile is still part of the file system, why is that any safer? Does it just depend on the swap file's location being known no matter what?

I believe that is exactly the case. I think I read something to that effect in a column written by Mark Russinovich. Search on www.sysinternals.com if you'd like to follow up on it. (I'm too lazy and apathetic right now to do it myself.)

 

[Lord Evermore]

I'm too lazy and apathetic to follow up on your apathy. So I'll assume you're right. At least that explains why NT2kXP won't let you move the swap file while it's running.

 

[Nothinman]

At least that explains why NT2kXP won't let you move the swap file while it's running.

I think the real reason you can't do that is because Windows has no mechanism to shrink the pagefile, so it can't remove a pagefile without a reboot.

 

[mobogasm]

All workstations have 256mb ram.
I know for a fact they are not getting blue screen errors before this happens.
Not much is loading at startup. Nothing abnormal. Memory usage is around 100mb when they get the error.

 

[mobogasm]

BUMP

 

[Nothinman]

It's gotta be an application common to all of them.

 

[mobogasm]

this is happening within 5 to 10 seconds of bootup. the only applications that are loading on bootup are virusscan corporate 7.0 and a built in compaq/hp keyboard utility and mouse utility

 

[metallibloke]

Apologies if this has already been mentioned, havent read every post.

Have you tried clearing the pagefile? This can be done by enabling a group policy setting. It clears the pagefile every time the machine restarts/shutsdown (obviously making the process take a bit longer, but not much especially on faster machines). If you want i'll post how to do it. You can set it directly in the registry without going through group policies but i cant remember how to do this.

 

[mobogasm]

thanks for the suggestion. I'll give it a shot. yeah i'd appreciate it, if you could tell me what the name of the policy was. Thanks!

 

[metallibloke]

Go to Administrative Tools and select Local Policies.

In the window that appears, navigate the list on the left to Local Policies -> Security Options.

On the right, about 10 lines down, there should be a policy that says "Clear virtual memory pagefile when system shuts down", enable this setting. You may need to reboot for the setting to be 'registered' and then reboot again for it to clear the pagefile (if you see what I mean).

Like i said before, depending on how big the pagefile is, this can add a bit of time to the shutdown process. There might not be any hard drive acitivity and it may look like windows has frozen (except you'll be able to move the mouse), but it will get there eventually.

Hope that helps.

 

[Guga]

sometimes when the OS crash it is possible that he loses the path of the swap file.

After that error confirm that the swap file is pointing to the correct location.

The most probably situation here, is you add a second disk or change the existing volumes.