Cant access last 2GB memory in laptop.

sand_dune · 1 Jun 2017 at 23:09

Hi I have a laptop with intel i7 CPU and 4000 integrated graphics. Also there is a Nvidia graphics card 600 generation. Laptop's got a total of 8GB ram DDR3. I have paging file disabled, one of reasons so that it uses my SSD as little as possible.

My programs cant seem to access the last quarter of RAM. When using just browser and other simple programs and taking 75% of memory (maybe 76%) I get windows (10) message that there's not enough memory and my programs crash.

I know that intel iGPU takes up some ram, but that amount is not static, but depends on how much is being needed. I don't think a lot is needed for simple internet browsing.

So why do I end up with just 6GB ram instead of 8GB? I can't do the simplest things on this laptop and will need to upgrade to 16GB.

Cheers

james.miller · 1 Jun 2017 at 23:11

When using just browser and other simple programs and taking 75% of memory (maybe 76%) I get windows (10) message that there's not enough memory and my programs crash.

probably because your page file is disabled. enable it and test, it wont harm your ssd. If that doesnt work, reinstall windows. you dont need 6gb of ram to browse the internet.

sand_dune · 2 Jun 2017 at 00:17

Disabled dump file writing. Can now use up to 85%. 20 tabs in Chrome eats half my RAM easily. Will need an upgrade anyway.

After that allowed 1024MB for paging file. Why wouldn't it harm my SSD? I thought it's got a limited resource. I want mine to work forever.

Woden · 2 Jun 2017 at 00:22

sand_dune said:
Disabled dump file writing. Can now use up to 85%. 20 tabs in Chrome eats half my RAM easily. Will need an upgrade anyway.

After that allowed 1024MB for paging file. Why wouldn't it harm my SSD? I thought it's got a limited resource. I want mine to work forever.

An SSD will never work forever. IMHO an ssd is perfect for the page file, you use it when you run out of ram so want the fastest response.

james.miller · 2 Jun 2017 at 00:42

sand_dune said:
Disabled dump file writing. Can now use up to 85%. 20 tabs in Chrome eats half my RAM easily. Will need an upgrade anyway.

After that allowed 1024MB for paging file. Why wouldn't it harm my SSD? I thought it's got a limited resource. I want mine to work forever.

Nothing works forever. That said, consider this: Samsung rated their 830 pro at somewhere between 100 and 150Tb written ( I cant remember exactly). I've had my 830 pro installed as my boot drive, hibernation and page files included, for almost 5 years now. I've written 24Tb to it. I've got another 75tb to write before i hit 100. Given i'm writing about 5tb a year then i've got another 15 years before i get there. At that point, the drive would probably be the only thing remaining of my current PC. It may well fail before then but odd are totally against it failing because of drive wear. Basically SSD drive wear is not an issue.

Rroff · 2 Jun 2017 at 00:47

Open resource monitor and check what the memory tab shows - some people get issues like this because the system is reserving massive amounts for hardware reserved (there are various different ways to resolve it if that is the issue).

I wouldn't disable pagefile but manually set it to an initial size of 1024MB and max size depending on usage but for most people 8192MB - it should minimise unnecessary writes to the SSD with the odd way pagefile is handled while keeping good compatibility.

bremen1874 · 2 Jun 2017 at 01:05

With Windows 10 and a modern SSD is there any good reason to be messing with pagefile settings? I'd say not.

Rroff · 2 Jun 2017 at 01:20

bremen1874 said:
With Windows 10 and a modern SSD is there any good reason to be messing with pagefile settings? I'd say not.

I actually don't know with Windows 10 - the default settings for 7 and 8 are actually quite a long way from the most optimal settings but it does attain blanket compatibility that way and it could be argued most users won't notice the difference.

bremen1874 · 2 Jun 2017 at 01:29

The defaults may be 'sub-optimal', but never as bad as disabling the pagefile completely (for most people, most of the time).

I'd guess that there's still plenty of now out of date SSD related pagefile advice floating around. They used to be v.small, v.expensive and write cycles were potentially a real concern.

Rroff · 2 Jun 2017 at 01:53

Well disabling pagefile is rarely a good idea with an SSD (or anything really) but in some cases Windows default settings will pointless use like 25GB of space for the file, etc. depending on what the user setup is and the rather archaic way (atleast in 7 and still mostly in 8 - not sure about 10) the OS works with the pagefile can needlessly add writes to the drive albeit with modern SSDs it shouldn't' be a big deal.

For best compatibility you don't want to go below about 1024MB really - most people will have around ~300MB utilisation from OS and applications and it gives the system enough space to work with things like dump files if needed - with an SSD there is no real penalty to having the pagefile dynamically adjust - if you are a power user that needs 35435345GBs and dynamic adjustment might not be optimal then you probably have the hardware to support that and know enough about what you are doing to set the pagefile to something appropriate anyhow.