Virtual Memory, Paging File OR Physical Memory in Windows

Virtual or Physical Memory or Paging File

Virtual Memory plays an important role in Microsoft Windows computers.

Sometimes, you might have seen messages like computer is low on memory or virtual memory is too low, etc.

This message may appear in any version of Windows, including Windows 11. Mostly it has been seen in Windows 7 and Windows 10.

If you are getting these kind of messages on your Windows computer, that means you need to pay attention to your computer.

Do not ignore this message. If you do so, then your computer will start running slow, programs will stop responding and may result in Not Responding message on screen or your computer may not boot properly, etc.

How Does Paging or Virtual Memory Work?

What Exactly is Physical Memory?

How does it work on Windows computers?

I am sure you have the above questions in mind and you wanted to know the answers. So, here I will make you understand with an example below:

Virtual memory is a hard drive space, which can be consumed by your Windows when your RAM memory is filled up.

For instance, if your computer has 2 GB of RAM. You might have run so many software/programs on your computer that required more than 2 GB of Memory.

In that case, your Windows computer takes the rest of the space virtually from your hard drive. It is called paging files, physical memory or virtual memory.

Check the steps below to increase the Virtual Memory manually in order to avoid any harm to the computer:

Note: The steps I will show you are on a Windows 10 computer and it should work with earlier and later versions of Windows.

 

Step 1. Right-click on This PC Icon and select Properties

Step 2. On the left pane of the screen, click on Advanced system settings

Step 3. The System Properties screen will open. Under the Advanced Tab, go to performance and click the Settings button.

Step 4. In the Performance Options window, click on the Advanced Tab then click Change

Step 5. Another screen prompts of Virtual Memory, uncheck “Automatically manage paging file size for all drives”, if checked.

Select the radio button for Custom Size and enter the figures manually and that should be more than the Recommended paging file

Click on the Set button. Lastly, click the OK button to close.

Then, click the OK button to close other screens as well.

It should prompt you to restart your computer in order to save changes to your computer. Go ahead and click on restart.

All right! you have successfully increased the virtual memory of your Windows computer.

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