Windows XP Virtual Memory, Paging File?

[SillyBilly]

My question is, Do I need to have a paging file, System Managed or custom size, and what are the advantages and dis advantages? I play alot of Quake2 on line, and I am still shooting for speed, does this affect any of this?

Tower
CASECOOLERMASMaster
MotherBoard
ASUS M2N-SLI Deluxe
Processor
AMD|A64 X2 6000 3.0G AM2 2x1M R 1
AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 6000+
Version: x86 Family 15 Model 67 Stepping 3
Speed: 3.0 MHz
AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 6000+
Version: x86 Family 15 Model 67 Stepping 3
Speed: 3.0 MHz
Power Supply
PSU OCZ|OCZ700GXSSLI 700W
Memory
x2=1G|OCZ DII800 OCZ2P800R22GK
Brand OCZ Series Platinum Revision 2 Model OCZ2P800R22GK Type 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM Tech Spec Capacity 2GB (2 x 1GB) Speed DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Cas Latency 4 Timing 4-4-4-15 Voltage 1.9V - 2.1V Heat Spreader Yes Features Platinum Mirrored XTC Heatspreader
ATI CrossFire Certified
OCZ Enhanced Latency Technology Recommend Use High Performance or Gaming Memory
Video
x2=VGA EVGA 7600GT 256mb
Sound
E-MU USB AUDIO INTFCE

[caperjack]

http://tweakhound.com/vista/tweakguide/page_6.htm

different strokes for different folks ! as said in this link the most misunderstood function of windows

[SillyBilly]

Caperjack,
That was alot of info if you explore the other links and take time to read. I conscider myself to be an advanced user, but sometimes wonder. I guess everyone could have their own opinion on the tweaking subject, but I have found that 90% of what I have done has realy boosted my overal performance and also made my cpu user friendly, and easy to maintain. Thanks alot for the link, it was awsome info.

[caperjack]

you welcome .i just found it with a google search ,will have to give it a better read tomorrow .

[gerbil]

"Speed: 3.0 MHz" ... that's your speed bottleneck, right there. Ida gone for one of the 3 GHz ones.... :)
Assuming disk space is not a problem, set a paging file of 1.5G. Got a second hard drive? Put it on that, first partition. Don't have one on the OS's disk as well, for XP one suffices.

[SillyBilly]

So do I need a partition on my main drive? It is a sata, and my other hard drive is just a regular drive. I have room for multiple drives, should I add one, say a 10gig just for my paging file, and should it be NTFS, or Fat32? Sorry I am not understanding fully, like one person said to put it at the front of the drive, I do not understand how to get it to the front.

[gerbil]

Sbilly, the reason for having a paging file on a drive other than your system drive is because it is [or can be] quicker.... while the drive heads on the sys drive are working with files the other drive's heads can be accessing the page file. Depending upon what your sys is doing/running it may have easily a million page faults an hour [a page fault is just the name for a page file access operation] - you can see the saving through having another drive holding the page file. Why have it on the outside of your second drive? Well, the outer tracks just hold more info [there are far more sectors on an outer track than an inner one [don't think of pie wedges]], so there is less head movement needed, they rotate under the head faster too. To get the page file onto the outer tracks you just make it the first partition on that hd. A 1.5 or 2G partition would suffice, but realistically speaking, if the drive already has a lot of files on it you may not consider it worthwhile moving them to make room for another partition.... but if you wished to play with that idea you would copy the files to another partition, and then rearrange your first partition with a tool like GParted Live CD. [my pf is on the outer of a second hd]. Or you could add a third drive, but only if you had other uses for it... not cost effective. And where would you get a 10G hd these days? Only from a junk reseller.... min wortthwhile drive is now 120/160GB... Another point, if on say a 120GB hd the first partition is just 5 or 10 GB there is almost no actual operational difference having the pf as the second partition...
Have fun.

[SillyBilly]

Gerbil,,O.k., I do have a 10 and 20gb hard drive that I formated and is clean, NTFS. So it would be sufficient to put this drive in and place paging file on it cause I would put nothing else on it..??? A very complicated subject even after all the reading I have done, and I am sorry if I am being difficult understanding.

[gerbil]

Sbilly, that would be a fine plan. Those drives do sound a little old so they may not be as fast as a modern drive but nevertheless your sys should show an improvement [although you likely will not notice it...]

[SillyBilly]

Gerbil,
I will let you know and thanks for all!!
www.ethanmilesband.com
SillyBilly