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Is explorer.exe related to pagefile.sys?


Aloha

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Wow, it seems that I misunderstood. He might want to get rid of the ribbon completely.

Can I ask something a little off topic? Is there any relation between explorer.exe and pagefile.sys? I remember when I first installed W8, the pagefile was around 3 GB. A few days ago I happened to see it and found that it is only 524 MB! I don't know how to set it back to the default, I mean the recommended size before.

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Edited by Tripredacus
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Wow, it seems that I misunderstood. He might want to get rid of the ribbon completely.

Can I ask something a little off topic? Is there any relation between explorer.exe and pagefile.sys? I remember when I first installed W8, the pagefile was around 3 GB. A few days ago I happened to see it and found that it is only 524 MB! I don't know how to set it back to the default, I mean the recommended size before.

The page file is used when the OS runs out of RAM and starts writing to the hard drive for memory instead. By default, the page file is set to 1.5x the amount of RAM you have installed (might be wrong, I've been on Linux/Mac the last few years predominantly). So if you have 2Gb installed you get a 3Gb page file. However, you can easily change your preferences such that the page file size is dynamic- you set the upper and lower bounds and then Windows will grow it as it is needed (does anyone know if this is default now in Win 8?). This sounds like what you have happening. If it's 524Mb, you're still using the page file substantially, which isn't a problem (it's the design), it does not favor perormance. I would recommend upgrading your RAM if you have anything less than 4Gb, and even then, 16Gb isn't such an extreme goal these days ;)

/endlecture

To answer your actual question, explorer.exe doesn't directly relate to the page file. But like any other running process, it executes within RAM and therefore needs memory allocated for it. If your Explorer is running Metro, aero glass, etc etc it will use more RAM than if it were running the classic interface (although a lot of windows management is handled by the DWM service). Enough to flood all of your RAM and force the OS to run half a gig of pagefile? Probably not, unless you have a seriously buggy extension on there or something. Hope this was helpful!

EDIT: Thanks to OP for the effort- when this becomes more developed it may the only reason I move past Windows 7 :D I'm one of the Metro haters...

Edited by SausageHack
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Many thanks, SausageHack.

I don't look at the system files every day. When I tried Tihiy's patch, logged out and then signed in a couples of times, and I find out the pagefile.sys has changed its size, not sure when. If I hadn't put the new folder with the patch on the drive where I installed W8, I wouldn't have known about this change. I am very surprised. Any chance that W8 made this change itself?! Because I never touch this file or change anything recently.

And my computer works fine with the current RAM installed. Task Manager says usage of memory is usually around 27-28%. I just found this page and guess I can change the size of pagefile.sys:

http://helpx.adobe.com/x-productkb/global/set-virtual-memory-paging-default.html

But now after reading your post, I wonder if it is necessary to set this size back. Or I should leave it as it is now? Thanks again for replying.

-----------------

Tihiy,

Sorry for asking something irrelevant here. Hope will stop it soon.

Regards.

Edit: remove the image.

Edited by Aloha
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By default, Windows (including Windows 8) is set to manage the size of the pagefile automatically. This works fine and is probably how yours is set if you never changed your setting, but for purpose of principal, I prefer to set mine to the recommended size after a new Windows installation, so that the PageFile doesn't get fragmented.

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I usually just double the recommended amount (the minimum), and you're welcome!

FYI I see you dual-boot 7 & 8. I've been dual-booting since XP, and I typically put my pagefile on a third partition (my "Data" partition, which is where I move all my docs, etc to), and have both Windows installations use the same size pagefile, since there's no use having two separate pagefiles taking up gigs of space.

Another possibility I've done before is to put it on a completely separate hard drive, which speeds things up technically, since then Windows files and the pagefile can both be accessed simultaneously without any performance hit.

Edited by roirraW "edor" ehT
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I usually just double the recommended amount (the minimum), and you're welcome!

Thanks. I don't know that we can put the pagefile somewhere else rather than on the OS drive. I decide to leave it there. Glad that now I can change its size back to the same size as before.

PS. I notice that I can call you Warrior!

------------------------

Hey Vinifera,

We are just waiting for the new patch from Tihiy.

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these days pagefile is useless

even Win7 auto disables it if user has SSD

some old programs still ask it but mainly if you have enough RAM (3 GB or more) you can disable it

PF only chokes HDD anyway

Edited by vinifera
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Some programs require way more RAM than 3GB (even 32-bit programs if they use multiple processes)... I personally never disable pagefile. Windows shouldn't use it anyway as long as there's enough memory available.

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