Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Why Use Virtual Memory In Modern Systems?

Posted by timothy on from the virtually-useless dept.

Cyberhwk writes "I have a system with Windows Vista Ultimate (64-bit) installed on it, and it has 4GB of RAM. However when I've been watching system performance, my system seems to divide the work between the physical RAM and the virtual memory, so I have 2GB of data in the virtual memory and another 2GB in the physical memory. Is there a reason why my system should even be using the virtual memory anymore? I would think the computer would run better if it based everything off of RAM instead of virtual memory. Any thoughts on this matter or could you explain why the system is acting this way?"

3 of 983 comments (clear)

  1. Are you sure you mean virtual memory? by fiftysixquarters · · Score: 0, Redundant

    You seem to be confusing virtual memory with physical memory and swap space. Try this.

  2. Why use swap? by NecroBones · · Score: 0, Redundant

    I think the more relevant question is why use swap if you have enough ram? If you're 100% certain that everything you do will always fit inside physical memory, technically you can do away with swap. I'm not sure how Windows will deal with this however.

    --
    I have not lost my mind... it's backed up on disk somewhere!
  3. Re:Virtual Memory v Paging by Anthony_Cargile · · Score: 0, Redundant

    Too bad he isn't using Mac OS Classic otherwise I would not recommend placing the computer in a box, mailing it to the OEM and never touching a computer again.

    (See a couple of posts above ;))