SYSTEM SPECS

AMD FX4100 5ghz
HD6970
16GB of DDR3 kinston hyperx RAM
64GB Kingston SSD

Had 8GB RAM before the install. Bought same package again, than installed it.

I looked before I installed it and on the SSD that I use only for essential programs and it also contains the OS. It had 32GB of Space left.
I put the extra 8gb of RAM in, than proceeded to boot up and run AIDA64 for stability tests and to see if it detects it. Worked fine, 16gb total memory. Reboot and look at my drives, the SSD that contains the OS just lost 16gb of memory down to 16.7GB total now.

Whats up with that. Does installing more RAM cost HD memory or is my SSD just failing on me and somehow managed to lose 16gb at the same time I stick more RAM in????

Its your hiberfil.sys file used for Hibernation. It uses around the same amout of space as you have RAM. I always disable mine now.

Open up command prompt (run as admin)

Type in
powercfg -h off

You should get your space back.


Also you could move your page file to another drive or disable it altogether.

Lets see if this works. If it does I owe you about 100 bucks

It's either that or an increased page file size.

Is a reboot required? I believe that just gave me back about 11GB of space. Are there other things like this to disable? Sleep maybe? Why does this even cost space to begin with?

A reboot shouldnt be required for the hyberfil.sys file. You might have to move or disable the page file to completely get your space back.

With 16GB of RAM, I disabled mine.

The page file size has increased as has the space used for system restore & hibernation.

Happened to me.

Starforce9 is bang on the money with his explanation.

Hot damn Starforce! I've never known about this...wow, works like a charm, freeing up some of my precious SSD space! You da man!

Very bad idea. Regardless of the amount of ram, Windows needs a pagefile in order to work properly.

^^^ this; totally disabling the page file can cause problems. However, it can be set to a small size instead if you have a lot of RAM.

It's indeed the page file. Windows still holds on to the old rule about RAM and page file (amount of RAM x 1.5): in your case, if set to Automatic, that would be a page file of between 16 and 24 Gb.
Disabling page file is an option but not recommended, especially not with Windows 7 because in Windows 7 they made it so that some programs and/or functions do need page file to run at all. If you can run without page file, then fine and no problem. But if you get strange behaviour or errors, then the best you can do is to set a fixed amount as page file. Something like for both Minimal and Maximal at 8 Gb.

remove the hibernation or impose a significantly reduced limit...

ALSO

ensure you either shrink your pagefile down from it's likely 16gb+ size down to something floating around the 800mb or 2gb zone.. otherwise disable the pagefile altogether.

Totally disabling a pagefile can cause problems all by itself, no matter the amount of actual RAM.

Pretty much when pigs fly it will... disable it.. and try it... if you get a problem.. re-enable it.

Page file is pretty pointless for anyone running significantly large amounts of memory beyond what any 32bit program can use. SSDs do not fair well with a pagefile.

(for the general gamer or user)...

even with video encoding using x64 encoders and compilers.... i've yet to see under a 8gb ram setup, see anything exceed the 5-6gb limits.

Obviously anyone trying to run a few games plus encode a video plus who knows what else with 8gb of ram may see a virtual memory low message, but 16gb, no, not unless your rendering out 3D images and such, even then they have their own scratch disks to work from typically.

The only way i've EVER seen a virtual memory low message has been due to using a specifically/purposely built program to essentially cause a unstoppable memory leak.... beyond that.... good luck.

It's never recommended to completely disable your pagefile. Not that you'll need it, just that some programs look for a pagefile and are so poorly coded that they error out or cause weird problems if they don't find one.

In the last 10 years.. this hasn't been the way majority of the game lets alone programs have been programmed.. aside from some heavily and horribily backwards type software that i've been dealing with from companies that don't even like windows xp let alone refuse to support vista/win7.... i just haven't seen or heard of an issue revolving around the page file... even false positives that may suggest to increase your page file such as lineage II which doesn't resolve anything. It's just poorly coded or erroring and placing a general error that really has no impact. Actually looking at the way skyrim was initially setup without the Large Address Aware functions, The way it would CTD would typically present you with a "Insufficient Memory" or "Virtual memory low" error message due to hitting the 2gb address limits. However due to the absurdity of this error message in todays enviroment, some developers are a little more intelligent putting such an error message in place where several gb of physical ram and by default several GB of pagefile is available to the system. 32Bit limits are causing more and more grief recently.

It's fairly pathetic.

NOW, short of having the same thing parotted over and over and over again about how disabling the page file is a terrible thing. In windows xp/vista/7, the only benefit of the page file is to offload the mostly idle or considered unnecessary memory to swap file/page file. Outside of that, the page file has a minimum value preset specifically for handling error reports and crashed that involve a BSOD, without the page file you get a BSOD but no memory dump because it has nowhere to dump to with it disabled. NOW unless your trying to diagnose a specific error by using these error reports (99% of the people don't including me typically) you don't need it at all. If you do find you need it, it's not hard flipping the light switch back on.

Practically from the beginning of computer games on personal machines, I have tried keeping business and gaming separate. My games were on a C64, and business was on a PC-XT (which had terrible graphics before I got a (monochrome) HGC card for it.

I had to give that up for awhile when Pentiums were brand new, and I had a 486-100. My personal finances went through a period of inadequacy then. Once the worst part of that was over, I had two PCs again, but both were about the same, not good enough.

OK, OK, I'm getting there. I do still keep whatever "business" I do separate, but the developers are screwing me over by requiring such foolishness as Steam, which I can't stand. I want to disconnect from the 'net almost all of the time (and I do), run without AV or browser, the absolute minimum.

By forcing us to mix gaming with Internet activity, game developers are asking for trouble, if they can't throw aside old dinosaurs such as rewrites of GameBryo. There are conflicts with firewalls, AVs, PMs, and especially the so-popular "networked friends software" such as Xfire. When I was allowed the freedom of gaming apart from the Internet, I could get by with disposing of Pagefiles, even with only 4 GBs in 32 bit Windows XP, but that never worked for networked machines I've owned, although 16 GBs is still an amount I haven't experimented with. Overkill, that.

unless your haveing a network related memory leak of some sort where the stacks are overflowing like mad... i don't see how or why you've experience a pagefile issues only when using the internet... even if you are running the bloatware dubbed norton or mcafee....

I hear ya. Preaching to the choir here...
However, I do like to help out that 1% that work with old, antiquated, programs that may have a problem if they disable their pagefile. I'd also like to point out that having a fast(er) hard drive is MUCH more important than turning off the pagefile and that turning off the pagefile doesn't improve performance by 'leaps and bounds' like some will attest.

Disabling the page file is stupid advice. Period.
It shows a complete lack of understanding in how Windows' memory allocation works.

You have a way with words like none other.
I don't know if it's on purpose, but every once in a while I read one of your posts and laugh out loud.

...and I'm totally using that line next time I get a chance.

I have 8gb of Corsair Vengeance ram in Windows 7 and according to the Virtual Memory screen I have the following.

C: - 'System Managed' - This drives is my SSD.
D: - '12163 to 12163' - This is a Samsung Spinpoint F1 HDD

If I go back to the previous screen called 'Advanced' it says I have 20272mb allocated to Virtual Memory. Since I have 12163mb allocated to the D Drive does that mean I have 8109mb allocated to SSD?

Is it safe for me to disable page file for my SSD since I have 12163mb on my D Hard Drive? Or would it be better for me to reduce this and what can I reduce it to?

I have used the powercfg command prompt since I don't use hibernation mode anyway and got 6gb

Managing page file is the debate of the century.

IMO. You should minimize or eliminate page file on any SSD or O/S drive, if possible. If you have only one drive and its not a SSD, then let the System manage the page file. If you have more than one drive, then set the O/S drive to 300MB [static](you need some for memory dumps) and System managed for a secondary drive (only one additional drive).

If you have only one drive and its SSD then you can force a static page file of about 2GB, but you should try to get a non SSD drive for a page file if possible.

Edit: After changing the page file settings it is recommended that you defrag any partitions affected. SSD generally should NOT be defragged, but I would it this case. Unless someone can prove that this isn't required.

Prove it.

I've been very indepth into the memory subsystems of windows xp and vista/7 as well as recently diving around the windows 8 system...

Page file is required (very little) for memory dump for STOP errors. Unless you disable this function you need some as it cannot store this information to RAM.

Certain applications like CAD and Photoshop basically require a page file be active to function correctly.