Hi All, I'm confused about some terminology here, and hopefully some of you XP veterans can straighten me out... I've set my virtual memory to 384 MB (both min and max) which keeps it at a static value of 1.5 times my physical RAM. However, it is never reported as such, regardless of which program i use to get this information. I thought that all of these terms were pretty much used interchangeably? Why the difference in these reported numbers? My Computer...blah,blah...Virtual Memory Paging File Size for E: (Windows XP) = 384-384 MB Windows System Information: Total Virtual Memory = 2.00 GB Available Virtual Memory = 1.96 GB Paging File Space = 618.46 MB Page File = E:\pagefile.sys Everest: Swap Space = 618 MB Virtual Memory = 873 MB Tuneup Utilities: Paging, Max. Size = 618.46 MB Task Manager: Commit Charge Limit = 633300K (This of course works out to be 618.46 MB) Thanks for any input you may provide :) Jim

Why not let windows handle it?

Earlier versions of Windows (Win9x) referred to it as virtual memory. In Windows NT it is called the pagefile. Hope this helps, Sandman

Location for virtual memory is the total hard drive space available for a page file. you can have 2 gigs of virtual memory but only a small area currently being used. this is called the page. it’s often called a swap file because its swap back from disk to ram as needed

Here is a little clarity concerning pagefile and swapfile terminology. First off they are not the same. Both are similiar in that they deal with physical memory and how the OS handles it. Having worked with VMS [digital's OS] the pagefile deals with a process whereas the swapfile is for the entire systems memory management. Microsoft really is running a swapfile but calls it a pagefile. This is in tune with their philosophy of calling the boot partition where the OS home folder is located and not where the boot files [system]reside. Go figure. Concerning the values being reported. I have the same issue and I run NO pagefile. I have 768megs of ram and have run XP for almost 2yrs now with no pagefile. Stable and much faster. Yet all the utilities report varing sizes of pagefiles. Only conclusion I can come to is they are wrong. Why they can't report this function correctly is a question I still don't have a answer to.

Virtual memory = RAM + swapfile (aka pagefile) Everest indicates this - Swap Space = 618 MB Virtual Memory = 873 MB 618 + 255 (first meg is conventional memory and ROM areas) = 873 One wonders why it's not 384 instead of 618. I guess XP thinks it knows better than you do - typical. IMO, Windows is a joke when it comes to its swap space and usage thereof.