Windows Virtual Memory Low.... (1 Viewer)

[MikeH1]

When playing Battlefield 1942, which I understand from reading many forums on the game, is that it likes to eat up ram. But this doesn't concern me so much (I have 256 and know I should upgrade to 512 - I bring this up cause I don't know if theres a coralation between ram and virtual memory). When I exit the game and use Seeing Eye to find another server the windows bubble with the statement "Virtual memory low" comes on with a brief desciption of what its going to do to rectify the problem. But I don't think it gets solved because it always pops up. Anyway, should I be concerned? Is there any changes I can make so this doesn't appear? The game, for the most part, does run smoothly. Just curious what this is about.

Thanks in advance.

 

[James Zubb]

This just means that at that time there is a low amount of virtual memory. It is not a permanent problem, this condition will change as you open and close programs.

Some possible causes: You may have set your virtual memory size too small. You may be running out of disk space on the drive with your swap file. It is possible that you are going into eye too soon after exiting the game so that all the memory allocated isn't freed yet, so windows thinks that there is not enough memory when there will be in a second or so once the rest of the memory is freed.

Unless it starts to bog down after going in and out of the game a few times there probably isn't a real problem.

I just got this game last week and am hooked bigtime. Tons of fun.

 

[John_Berger]

(I have 256 and know I should upgrade to 512 - I bring this up cause I don't know if theres a coralation between ram and virtual memory)

There most certainly is. Virtual memory (hard drive space) is used when RAM is not available but the system needs more memory. As such, it goes to the hard drive to emulate the memory that it needs, but it slows down memory access by a factor of hundreds.

The most efficient kind of system is the kind that needs no virtual memory (also called swap space) at all, among other things. It is a general rule of thumb that you can never have too much RAM; however, that being said, there is a point of diminishing returns to where more memory will not make a bit of difference.

In this day and age, 256 MB RAM is dangerous territory; less than that is unacceptable. All computers that are used for gaming, video editing, and things like that should have 512 MB because of the bloatware of modern operating systems (coughWindowscough) and the demand by gamers to reduce load times.

If you wanted an excuse to go to 512, this is it.

** Warning: If you're running Windows 9x or ME, you might want to consider an O/S upgrade since those operating systems do not manage more than 256 MB very well. Frequent blue-screens will result.

 

[Kevin P]

** Warning: If you're running Windows 9x or ME, you might want to consider an O/S upgrade since those operating systems do not manage more than 256 MB very well. Frequent blue-screens will result.

I have 512 MB w/Windows ME and haven't had any problems. I think these issues were only in earlier versions--Windows 95, and perhaps 98. Someday I'll put Win2K or XP on but I'm just too cheap and lazy...

 

[John_Berger]

Someday I'll put Win2K or XP on but I'm just too cheap and lazy...

Don't worry about it. Windows 2000 is my preferred Windows O/S, but I go by the attitude that nothing is obsolete until it no longer serves your purpose, no matter what marketing people and their boot lickers will try to make you think.

 

[MikeH1]

Thanks guys for the responses. I'm using xp and knew I should have went with the 512 instead of 256 but I always planned on upgrading the fact in the future anyway (it would have cost me more to have it pre-installed than buying from a b&m store when I felt it was necessary). I know now that upgrading to 512 is a definate must and will be doing so asap, probably around christmas.

Thanks again.

 

[Matt Weyen]

if you want to change virtual ram for the time being (before upgrading), go to control panel, then performance and maintenance, then system, then advanced, then choose performance settings, then choose advanced and at the bottom of the window will be virtual memory and it gives you a button to choose to change the virtual memory and which hard drive you define it on. Don't go below 150, windows won't like you otherwise. I suggest around 300 or more. Also, remember to hit 'set' when you're done changing the size or it won't go into effect.

 

[Masood Ali]

In this day and age, 256 MB RAM is dangerous territory; less than that is unacceptable. All computers that are used for gaming, video editing, and things like that should have 512 MB because of the bloatware of modern operating systems (coughWindowscough) and the demand by gamers to reduce load times.

I disagree. For Win2k/XP, 256MB is the minimum, but it is in no way dangerous territory. The ONLY reason you'd need more is if you were a very serious gamer, video editor, or graphics artist. I dabble in graphics, the occasional video, and I play CS once in a while, so 256MB is just fine for me. I just keep my swapfile set at a constant 512MB. Variable swapfiles slow your system down; and contrary to popular belief, even if you have 1GB of RAM or more, you should still keep a small swapfile because Windows functions better with one.

 

[John_Berger]

you should still keep a small swapfile because Windows functions better with one

Not true. The whole concept of swap files is to augment hard RAM. There are tweaks that can be made to Windows 2000, and probably XP since it's based on 2000, to force the operating system to load everything into memory and ignore the swap file. (I don't have the registry modifications on hand.) This takes lots of RAM, but it is fully possible. The notion that a media that is hundreds of times slower than RAM is somehow beneficial is a fallacy. The most efficient system configuration will never have any need whatsoever to go to any kind of swap space.