The Virtual memory of my PC is too low.What does it mean?

India
August 31, 2007 12:23pm CST
whenever i play games on my desktop or surf the internet, my pc gets dead slow & a warning flashes that the virtual memory is too low & the windows is increasing it..Waht does this mean? does it mean that my RAM is too small? i have a 256MB RAM..pls help..Thanks
1 person likes this
5 responses
@Taskr36 (13963)
• United States
2 Sep 07
As everyone else has said, you need to increase your memory. 256MB is barely adequate for Windows XP. It's ok if all you do is type and check email, but 512MB will get you much further with less slowdowns. If you do any 3D gaming you should check to see if your computer can be upgraded to 1GB of RAM.
@sandeep_t (428)
• India
1 Sep 07
When complex programs are running (Say some high graphic games), the system allocates some memory where it stores all the necessary variables or programs requires for your game (program )to execute. Although you already have those supporting programs or variable in your hard disk, they have to be in the cache memory or virtual memory so that they are accessed quickly. You can solve the problem by increasing the virtual memory capacity. But you can't increase the virtual memory beyound you RAM size. So better go for 1 GB Ram and allocate atleast 512 MB for Virtual memory
@Asylum (47893)
• Manchester, England
31 Aug 07
Increasing the amount of RAM that your computer has will definitely reduce the chance of such an error. When the amount of RAM is insufficient to comfortably handle the applications then Windows dumps partially calculated data on the hard drive and takes it back later to continue with the processing. The area used is a Swap File, and supports the installed RAM. This is known as Virtual Memory. Increasing the RAM will reduce the need for using the hard drive and spped up access to programs. 256 Mb is fine for Windows 98, but Windows XP would use a fair quota of this just to support the system.
@tammyr (5946)
• Etowah, Tennessee
31 Aug 07
I got that message one time. I choose to let the pc increase it. I am not sure what it means really but I would suggest that you go into your files and delete any that you do not need. I also have a program called crapcleaner, or ccleaner that finds unneeded files that are left over after deleting piles and programs. I don't have a link, but a search for ccleaner will give you the site. I delete unneeded files, photos and such often. Also be sure to go in to your browser and delete cookies, cache, and saved URL, etc. That will help as well!
@nehems (109)
• Indonesia
31 Aug 07
increse your pc ram to 512,1G or higher... it's god to play games who need big graphic.. or uninstal unnececary appl it would help....