Increasing Virtual Memory in Vista

At times you may receive an error on the PC saying the PC is Low on Virtual Memory or Low Memory. This usually occurs when the physical memory (RAM) installed on your PC is less for the applications to run which you might be trying to install or run. To fix this problem, we may try increasing Virtual Memory (This is system memory that is simulated by the hard drive. When all the RAM is being used the computer will swap data to the hard drive and back to give the impression that there is slightly more memory). This is just a workaround. The ideal way is to increase the physical RAM of the PC.

1. Open System by clicking the Start button, clicking Control Panel, clicking System and Maintenance, and then clicking System.

2. In the left pane, click Advanced system settings. If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation.

3. On the Advanced tab, under Performance, click Settings.

4. Click the Advanced tab, and then, under Virtual memory, click Change.

5. Clear the Automatically manage paging file size for all drives check box.

6. Under Drive [Volume Label], click the drive that contains the paging file you want to change (Eg: C:\ drive if the OS is installed in C Drive).

7. Click Custom size, type 2000 in the Initial size (MB) 6000 in the Maximum size (MB) box, click Set, and then click OK.

Note: Initial Size would be close to the physical RAM installed, and the maximum size at 3 times the amount of RAM installed on your computer. The above size which is selected assumes 2GB RAM installed in the PC.

Increases in size usually don't require a restart, but if you decrease the size, you'll need to restart your computer for the changes to take effect.