Virtual Memory?
 

I installed Planetside about a week ago. The games runs laggy, but everything else runs fine. When I play, I sometimes, about 70% of the time, i get a pop up saying that my Virtual Memory is running low.

What is this error, and how can I fix it so Planetside runs properly.

It sounds like your system is running out of RAM. If you have sufficient RAM to run the game you probably won't need much virtual memory.

If your hard drive is completely full you can also get this warning. Virtual memory is when information in RAM is written onto the harddrive because it won't all fit in RAM.

I got this with Battlefield 1942. Here's some of the steps I took:

1. Defrag. A defragged hard drive is a happier drive, that can pre-fetch stuff faster, making for less lag. Also, once you've defragged, re create your swap file on the HD, and set it for 1.2 times the size of ram. What you want to do is setup the swap file so it uses a contiguous portion of the HD, rather than being spread/grown all over.

Run Defrag more than once. I ran it 6 times before I got it down to a well defragged HD.

2. Shut off unnecessary services/apps: If you're on XP, run task manager, take a look at what you're running. If you don't need it, you don't need it. Spooler service? Nice, but unneccessary for games. Right click & end process. One warning, make sure you know what your killing. The same thing goes for all those nice helper icons in the system tray...they eat RAM that Planetside could be using.

3. Make sure idiot roomate doesn't have uploads set to unlimited on his kazaa connection. Nuff Said.

think of virtual memory like RAM but on your hard drive. if you have some free drive space you can increase your virtual ram...i believe windows has a gui interface to do this...

give us your stats, how much ram do you have installed, how much virtual do you have inables (it is ususaly 1.5 times the real memory)

if you dont know go to the task manager and it will say at the botom of the screen.

and if we need to get you more virtual memory its easy to do but befor we step that up lets see your stats.

What do yall set your VM at. A long time ago I heard 3x your memory if under 512, 2x if over 512. Does that still hold true?

Also, it's a good idea to have your swap file on a different IDE chain, different hard drive than the C: drive. That way the system can read/write from C: while also read/write from the swap file. I have 1 GB of RAM and my swap file is barely used. I tried turning off the swap file, everything ran fine, except PhotoShop 7, which refused to start without a swap file.

nOOb Q: so, i currently have 2x256(512)ddr pc2100. according to a previous thread, the vm should be set to 3x512? step by steps would help. THX :thumbsup:

Make sure that you disable your swap file before defragging, since Windows will not defrag it. Recreate it after defragging, and you will have a nice, contiguous swap file.

Exactly incress the size of the virtual memory by going in the property's of my computer.

Sorry it took so long to reply.
well, Planetside still runs like crap... I deleted tons of crap, and havent gotten the 'virtual memory' warning again.

I'm not sure how to get my stats but....
I have a
Pentium 4 1.70GHz
256 MB of ram

Used Space -30.9 GB
Free Speace - 43.5 GB


I dont know how to check the 'swap file'

thanks for all your help

wow you lost 7 gigs of HDD space?!

I have 256 MB PC2100, the E: partition has 1 gig - 2 gigs of VM
and the C: has 256MB - 512MB. Games run really fast (well in comparision to the PIII 933mhz 192 MB SDRAM setup im used to)

As for where this 'swap file' is, I have no idea

But here's how to increase your VM!
Go to Start -- Right click on My Computer -- Go to Properties -- Go to the Advanced tab -- Go to the Performance Settings -- Go to Advanced tab -- At the bottom of the window you'll see Virtual memory, then click Change -- Basically change it to what the guys told you to, 3x the RAM if its under 512MB, 2x if over. And make it larger on the partitions other than C:, if you have them, like I do.

Good luck

256MB ram may not be enough to run newer games... If I had to pick one reason it runs like crap, that would be it.

Don't worry about changing your virtual memory settings, as long as you have hard drive space windows will manage it on it's own.

would someone mind giving me a step by step on how to set the VM? I have 512 of pc2100.

Jephree:

I'd agree that the issue is physical RAM. I recommend at least 512 for anything more than basic office stuff

What kind of RAM should i get? I went to Staples, and the salesguy named very different types of RAM. He asked what kind of RAM i have. I dont know, and i have no idea how to search for it.
How do i find out what kind of RAM i have?