Windows SpoolFile on separate drive?

[pglenn]

I am re-installing an XP system that has the following:

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AMD XP 2200+
80GB Ultra ATA133 7200rpm 2MB Hard Drive
MSI-440T MSI GeForce4 MX440 W/TV-out 64MB 8X AGP Video Card
MSI KT4AV-L Socket A/KT400A/DDR400/8X/A/L/ATX Motherboard
2 x 512MB DDR333 PC2700 Kingston Original
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This will be used as an HTPC system, and the only additional software installs will be directx 9.x, DIVX codec/player, a software DVD player (either the bundled PowerDVD XP, PowerDVD 5.0, or the also bundled MSI-DVD), an ATI-Remote (from an AIW-7500 system), and a version of myHTPC.

The drive is already partitioned in a 5gig and a 75gig (actually about 5 and 67 with 8 reserved). At this time I dont want to change the partition. I had and will have the OS installed in the 5gig partition.

As a question and a potentially crazy idea, I was wondering if it is possible, and what would be the advantages and disadvantages of, installing a 2nd HD of maybe 8gig, and having it reserved exclusively for the WIN SpoolFile? I would think this may improve performance, allow quicker access, and allow the SpoolFile to grow at will without being limited by the 5gig partition and anything else installed on it

Also, what is the "average" and "optimal" size of a WIN XP SpoolFile, if such a number actually exists?

Patrick

[stiltman]

spoolfile? or do you mean pagefile?

Hard drives or partitions?


Optimum pagefile location and size
Separate HDD from OS not separate partition but physically separate hard drive. The pagefile minimum should set at least 2 and 1/2 times the size of RAM you have (i.e. 256MB RAM = 640min) I then usually double the minimum number to create the maximum size.

[pglenn]

oops - you're right, PageFile and not SpoolFile...

and I was referring to my current drive being partitioned into 2 - 5gig and ~67gig. I am considering adding a 2nd small physical drive just for the PageFile

[sterno]

Usually about 2.5x physical memory is a good size for pagefiles in Windows. Always set the minimum and maximum sizes to the same because otherwise it'll usually make it too small and then have to grow it, which is slow and leads to fragmentation (which makes it even slower).

A small drive is very likely an older drive. Putting the pagefile on there could hurt performance. Depending on your use, the best location for the pagefile might very well be on your C: drive, as long as you make sure it's not fragmented.

[Jayhawk]

I agree with everything sterno says execpt for the size of the pagefile. Normally for 256mb or less of memory I would agree 2.5 times is good. In your case, you have 1G (2 X 512) of real memory which would lead to a pagefile of 2.5G. Way too large. You might do a search on pagefile size in this forum. I believe it was a week or two ago there was a lengthy discussion of this with a lot of links. One was to a free program that monitors your pagefile size over a given period and tells you the maximum used. I have two machines, one with a gig of memory and one with .75 gig. Over the course of a week I never exceeded pagefile size of more than a couple hundred mb. I now keep booth my pagefiles at 700mb (just in case) and have not experience any problems.

[sterno]

I found that even on machines with 512MB-1024MB I got better results with a huge pagefile. If the pagefile was small it would page things out to disk even though it had plenty of free RAM, and it would always do it at the worst possible time. If I made the pagefile huge it never touched it. No, it doesn't make sense, but I've seen it happen quite a few times.

Best advice: try it both ways for a few days and see if you find a difference during your typical use. If your use works nicely with a small pagefile, good for you.