Windows 7 Moving/Removing pagefile.sys

J

jvanderholf

New Member
I'm trying to move my pagefile.sys to a separate hard drive, but to no avail. Let me be clear up front: I know what I'm doing. I don't need a list of ethics on why it's bad, or not bad, to do so. I don't care about one's opinion on whether or not it should be done. I'm going to do it. That being said, let me explain the issue I'm having.

I'm trying to move the file (doesn't matter why), but it keeps telling me it's in use. I have set a page file on my external drive and set the primary drive to have no page file, and then reboot (as per Windows stated requirement). Upon login I'm informed that Windows has created a temporary pagefile.sys to manage memory dumps. I don't want this. So I did some more research.

The only thing I could find was to disable kernel memory dumps, which I did. At the same time I went in and changed my page file size again (since Windows decided to reset it for me). Once again a reboot was required. Same message on start up.

After further investigation on my hard drives I've found that pagefile.sys is still located in my C: directory, and any attempt to modify it says that it's in use. Meanwhile, I go to my B: directory, where I want the new pagefile.sys, and can't seem to find it anywhere (and no, it's not just simply hidden).

Any suggestions on how to remove this from my primary hard drive? (Again, I don't care about the ethics of it. I just want to know a solution on HOW to do it.)
 
There are no ethics involved - just personal choice - and that is yours my friend! I have set a start value of 2gb and a max of 6gb on my data drive with a zero pagefile on the system drive as in the attached graphic. I assume the following is the route you have followed and it works ok on my lappy running Win 7 64 bit:

Control Panel, Advanced System settings, Advanced, Performance, Settings, Advanced, Virtual Memory, Change.

Capture.JPG
 
Yeah, I tried that. But when I reboot Windows says that a temporary page file has been created to manage memory dumps. Which I don't want it to do. That's where I'm running into my problem.
 
No dice. I did that, but it still didn't do what I feel it should. However, it may have solved part of my problem. Let me explain in a little more detail what it is I am trying to do, and perhaps you can help me further. I'm trying to install the Windows 8 Consumer Preview. I had initial problems with it, but finally got it to work. However, it tries to force install to the primary C directory, and won't let me do a custom install. I tried to put it on my external hard drive and install it from there, but it still wanted to use the internal drive. I don't want to overwrite my current Windows 7, I would much rather dual boot. So I've been trying to partition the internal drive. However, even though I have nearly 60GB free, it won't let me create a partition larger than about 4GB. That's not sufficient to install an OS. From what I understand the problem is due to a file allocated to the primary partition which cannot be moved automatically by Windows. It suggested, though, that I temporarily move it manually, partition the drive, and move the file back. I tried looking in the Event Viewer to find out which file it had issues with, but it was very unspecific. So, I resorted to my attempts to remove the page file. (That was the generic suggestion provided by Windows.) Having tried everything that I mentioned above, including what you have provided, I still couldn't shrink the volume below 4GB. So I looked in the Event Viewer again, just now, and this time it's complaining about a thumbcache file. Which also can't be moved, because it's in use. Any thoughts or ideas?
 
Smashing success! Well, sort of. What I ended up doing last night was slightly different. I have a solid state drive that I've been using for other things, but haven't done much with in the past few weeks. I formatted that, installed windows 7 on it (since I have an install disc for it), and then upgraded it to Windows 8. However, I can't dual boot if the secondary operating system is on an external drive connected via USB (unless you know a method that works). So while I had my primary HDD in an external case and connected with a USB cable I partitioned it, which worked since those files were no longer in use. (I did use the EaseUS partition manager to do so, though. Thank you very much. I like that A LOT more than the Disk Manager.) Now I should be able to install Windows 8 on the new partition and have the dual boot option on my primary drive.

However, my next task is to figure out why Windows 8 WON'T install on the new partition. A friend of mine said he just put the ISO on his new partition, mounted it, ran the setup, and it worked like a charm. Mine is not being so cooperative. I'm half tempted to just go buy some DVD-R discs, burn the ISO onto that, and boot from there. I believe that would then give me the option to do a custom install.

Thank you very much Patcooke for your assistance. I appreciate it.
 
Glad it's been of some help. I doubt very much if burning a dvd and booting from that will enable a custom install but always worth a try. I did look at Win 8 myself with the same intention of dual booting but I get the impression MS just doesn't want people doing that so the drive C seems to be hard wired into the install and, like you, I'm not prepared to sacrifice my working pc to an early beta so I've mothballed Win 8 for now.
 
patcooke said:
Glad it's been of some help. I doubt very much if burning a dvd and booting from that will enable a custom install but always worth a try. I did look at Win 8 myself with the same intention of dual booting but I get the impression MS just doesn't want people doing that so the drive C seems to be hard wired into the install and, like you, I'm not prepared to sacrifice my working pc to an early beta so I've mothballed Win 8 for now.
Click to expand...
As to whether MS wants us doing it or not, I don't know, but this evening, I setup a new tri-boot. Windows XP MCE, 7 Pro x64 & 8 CP x64. I had to dump Vista to do this, but I don't need Vista anyway. And I did this w/o having that 350MB partition installed.

All 3 OS's are running perfectly fine.

Once I buy a SSD for my notebook, I'd like to create a separate partition myself for the page file (Windows 7). The few who I know who does this reports speed advantages. I'm only going by word of mouth, but from time to time, this issue arises, so there must be some benefit to it. But should this be done on the same drive that the install is on? If not, it's of no use to me.

Cat
 
Good news! My friend informed me of what he did to install from the ISO onto his second partition, and I'm now up and running with a dual boot option. Life is grand.

Tri-boot? That's intense! My same friend is doing the same thing, only with Windows 7, Windows 8, and Ubuntu. He really likes it. I have Windows XP on a virtual machine, so I technically have three OS now as well. It's nice to have such versatility.
 
Congratulations and well done! Just another thought - I have not had a pagefile on my main system at all for years. Depending on how much RAM you have and what sort of apps you run you may find you don't need one. I have 4gb and no pagefile anywhere. Try running without - at worst you may find some memory hungry apps complaining in which case you can re-create one. There apps around which use the pagefile unnecessarily and can slow systems down with all the disk transfers so I reckon it's worth testing the water.
 
jvanderholf said:
Good news! My friend informed me of what he did to install from the ISO onto his second partition, and I'm now up and running with a dual boot option. Life is grand.

Tri-boot? That's intense! My same friend is doing the same thing, only with Windows 7, Windows 8, and Ubuntu. He really likes it. I have Windows XP on a virtual machine, so I technically have three OS now as well. It's nice to have such versatility.
Click to expand...
There's really nothing to a tri-boot, nor a quad boot. Only problem with a quad boot is that a Data partition cannot be created (the 4 primary rule).

The thing to keep in mind when installing an OS that creates that 100MB partition (350MB w/Win 8 CP), is to use a formatting tool, such as Mini Tool Partition Home Wizard, to create & format each new one, labeling it & making it primary beforehand. That way, you can install w/o formatting, avoiding the 100 or 350MB partition from being created.

Cat
 
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