Recently I have seen my 98se machines slowing down. I have run Disk Defragment utilities, and there has been son improvement, but they are still running slowly. I was recently told that if I move the Pagefile (Swapfile), from the c:\ location to a seperate hard drive, that the system would improve performance noticability. I there any truth to this idea, or are there other things that might help us improve performance?
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Pagefiles ?
- Thread starter Greyfoxvt
- Start date
Moving the swapfile to a separate drive (and making it a fixed size to prevent it becoming fragmented) should improve performance - a little. If you look in the FAQ for this forum, item 15 (Speed up your Win9x/ME machine ) might be useful. Quite often though, you need to backup and clean reinstall 98 to regain lost performance - even applying all the advice only gives a small improvement. Its a feature of the operating system! (2k/XP are much better in this respect).
If all you've got to work with is 1 HDD then to even have it on it's own partition should yield an improvement.
Also, the defrag would be more effective if, prior to defragging, in System Properties - Performance tab - Virtual Memory button, you tick Disable Virtual Memory and reboot in safe mode.
After defrag, go back and enable the swapfile again and reboot.
This will result in better file placement on the HDD.
Also, the defrag would be more effective if, prior to defragging, in System Properties - Performance tab - Virtual Memory button, you tick Disable Virtual Memory and reboot in safe mode.
After defrag, go back and enable the swapfile again and reboot.
This will result in better file placement on the HDD.
ski
Technical User
- Oct 11, 2000
- 2,467
Moving the swap file to a different partition will help things run a little faster.
But if the slowdown problem just started recently, then it's caused by something other than the swap file being installed on the same partition as Windows.
Try these:
-Check for a virus.
-Remove all spyware(d/l Ad-aware 6.0).
-Restart the computers to maximize system resources and unused physical memory.
-Turn off all programs running in the background, except Explorer and Systray, in System Information/Tools/System Config. Utility/Startup(You may want to document which ones are currently checked for future rechecking.).
-Open System Monitor, enable 'Swap File In Use' and 'Unused Physical Memory', select 'Line Charts' for the display, minimize SM to the taskbar, and then check if the swap file is activating and how much unused memory remains when the slowdown problem occurs.
If the SF activates and the unused RAM drops to near zero, then either do not run a lot of programs simultaneously, or install more RAM(How much is currently installed?).
-Do a clean boot to troubleshoot the problem:
But if the slowdown problem just started recently, then it's caused by something other than the swap file being installed on the same partition as Windows.
Try these:
-Check for a virus.
-Remove all spyware(d/l Ad-aware 6.0).
-Restart the computers to maximize system resources and unused physical memory.
-Turn off all programs running in the background, except Explorer and Systray, in System Information/Tools/System Config. Utility/Startup(You may want to document which ones are currently checked for future rechecking.).
-Open System Monitor, enable 'Swap File In Use' and 'Unused Physical Memory', select 'Line Charts' for the display, minimize SM to the taskbar, and then check if the swap file is activating and how much unused memory remains when the slowdown problem occurs.
If the SF activates and the unused RAM drops to near zero, then either do not run a lot of programs simultaneously, or install more RAM(How much is currently installed?).
-Do a clean boot to troubleshoot the problem:
Hi Greyfoxvt,
The advantage in moving the swap file is that it is a major source of fragmentation that occurs during use. If after defragging, the system still runs slow; then moving the swap file will have no further benefit than the defragging did.
I suspect these machines are in a business setup and usually such setups have machines with less than 128MB RAM. The less RAM a machine has, increases the use of the swap file. It is the management of that swapfile in a low RAM situation that slows the system down....jumping all over the HDD with bits and pieces the low RAM can't handle. To stop all this jumping around, it is best to have a preset swapfile of a set size. This sets a block (all together) on the HDD and thus limits the jumping to one area of the HDD making a noticeable increase in speed. To do this: Open System Properties (WinKey+Break). Select the Performance tab. Click the Virtual Memory button. Click the radio button next to Let me specify my own virtual memory settings. Set the Minimum AND Maximum to 2.5 times the RAM on that machine (ie. 64MB RAM, then 2.5 x 64 = 160MB...in this case the settings on both are 160MB).
You will still need to defrag, but the fragmentation is not due to the swapfile.
If these systems have net access and after doing the above, you might note that the programs run faster while the net runs slower. If so, then let me know...that net trash can really slow down a system.
HTH, Dana
)
The advantage in moving the swap file is that it is a major source of fragmentation that occurs during use. If after defragging, the system still runs slow; then moving the swap file will have no further benefit than the defragging did.
I suspect these machines are in a business setup and usually such setups have machines with less than 128MB RAM. The less RAM a machine has, increases the use of the swap file. It is the management of that swapfile in a low RAM situation that slows the system down....jumping all over the HDD with bits and pieces the low RAM can't handle. To stop all this jumping around, it is best to have a preset swapfile of a set size. This sets a block (all together) on the HDD and thus limits the jumping to one area of the HDD making a noticeable increase in speed. To do this: Open System Properties (WinKey+Break). Select the Performance tab. Click the Virtual Memory button. Click the radio button next to Let me specify my own virtual memory settings. Set the Minimum AND Maximum to 2.5 times the RAM on that machine (ie. 64MB RAM, then 2.5 x 64 = 160MB...in this case the settings on both are 160MB).
You will still need to defrag, but the fragmentation is not due to the swapfile.
If these systems have net access and after doing the above, you might note that the programs run faster while the net runs slower. If so, then let me know...that net trash can really slow down a system.
HTH, Dana
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