The page file in Windows 2000 is the equivalent of the swap file in Windows 95/98 and is the file that the system uses as virtual memory. It is important to note that however much RAM you have in your system, you will always need to have a paging file. Unlike Windows 9X the page file size is not set dynamically: to see the size that has been set for your page file go to Control Panel, and open System . Here you will find a tab called Advanced/Performance Options which will tell you the size of the paging file that has been set for your system. You can alter the settings by entering minimum and maximum values, and pressing Set, then rebooting. It is advisable to perform a defragmentation before doing this.

So, what is the right size for this file? Microsoft recommend RAM + 12MB as a minimum i.e. a system with 256 MB RAM would set the paging file at 268 MB. This is to allow a full dump of system memory in the event of a crash. People using less than 256 MB are advised to set the value slightly higher than RAM + 12MB: those with 128 MB or less should try RAM X 1.75, those with over 128 MB should try RAM x 1.5. Remember of course that there is no harm in setting your page file higher than these values, you just lose disk space! If you are really tight for space, the absolute minimum you should set your page file to is equal to your RAM, any less than this could cause your system to crash. You can also use some of the built in performance monitors in Windows 2000 to guide you.

Make the maximum page file setting as large as possible. Don't worry about the maximum size of the page file. Use a setting two to three times the size of the initial page file size or more. Windows 2000 will only expand the size of the page file when it needs to, so you are not using valuable hard drive space unless you need to. This way, you can avoid the "Insufficient Memory" error during a complex operation.

You can also improve performance by spreading your page file across multiple physical disks, don't worry about the relative speeds of the hard drives Windows 2000 automatically selects the fastest drive to page memory to. When creating page files, don't confuse hard drives with partitions. You shouldn't create page files on multiple partitions on the same hard drive. This set-up degrades system performance significantly because when Windows NT writes to these page files, the disk arm of the hard drive is forced to swing back and forth across the disk rather than being able to stay in the general area of the single page file. For those with IDE hard drives, it is recommended to place the page file on separate IDE channels. Ensure that the disks are defragmented, and that the page file is contiguous - most decent Defragmentation Utilities will do this: the full version of Diskeeper for example. Completely moving the page file from the disk where you have your boot partition is not advised, as this prevents the system from creating a memory dump during a crash. However if you intend to use only a single paging file placing it on a separate drive to the one where Windows 2000 is installed will usually give the best results. In this case disable the memory dump option in Control Panel/System/Advanced/StartUp and Recovery by setting Write Debugging Information to None.

There are also some registry tweaks that can improve memory performance, but they do not produce performance gains on all systems.