Re: [gentoo-user] Boot Gentoo to clean windows

[Stroller]

On 28 Mar 2008, at 22:12, Alan Milnes wrote:
> On 28/03/2008, Stroller <stroller@××××××××××××××××××.uk> wrote:
>
> Your note is excellent but I disagree with this bit:-
>
>> If the PC is still slow then check disk-space, pagefile settings
>> ("allow the system to manage pagefile size for me", click "set")
>
> unless as a temporary workaround you should always have the paging
> file set as a fixed size to avoid worsening the chronic
> fragmentation problem on Windows.


I'm not arguing with you, but for me it depends on the user & usage &  
stuff. Several years ago, before XP, I used to be a Windows "power  
user" - I kept my pagefile on a separate disk and set it's size  
manually. I even monitored usage in Task Manager (or was it one of  
the utilities under "Administrative Tools"?) to see what actual  
amount of swap was used, but was never convinced of the accuracy of  
the results (it seemed so little). Whilst a pagefile of fixed size on  
a separate disk may be the "best" way to configure a swap file, I  
don't think it's optimal for most users.

There are times when someone else may work on the PC, and having the  
swapfile on C: is simply what they'd expect to find, if they ever  
need to mess with it. I generally like to have systems that I  
configure for my Joe Sixpack customers to generally look "normal" and  
"standard", so that there's ease of maintenance and so that  
everything just "makes sense" if anyone else (probably less  
experienced than I) works on it in the future.

Take, for example, partitioning - it's quite logical and correct to  
have a separate partition for the C: drive and another, D:, for  
users' files & folders; this protects users' documents on D: if  
filesystem corruption occurs on C:, or if a Windows reinstall is  
otherwise needed. But unfortunately this configuration needs more  
maintenance in the future if one of the partitions becomes full -  
experience tells me that there's always one user in the household who  
will not understand to use D:, and that users will try uninstalling  
programs and deleting their letters to free up space, if the system  
starts complaining that the C: drive is full. I would prefer they  
call me, so that I can delete something that's REALLY consuming  
space, or resize partitions appropriately, but they often do not do  
so, and with 5% or less free space the partition gets rapidly  
fragmented and slows down considerably (to the extent that  
defragmenter may be unable to do its job). When short of disk space  
other users may right-click on the drive properties and choose  
"compress files on this drive to save space" - this slows down the  
system even more!

But I admit that - if the system has two drives installed already -  
then putting the swapfile on the second drive is probably less of a  
problem than my partitioning example. (Although, having said that, if  
this user _does_ choose to have a D: drive and intends to use it for  
something, then a pagefile.sys scattered amongst their music or video  
files might be confusing, or simply considered clutter).

Just because you set the swapfile to a fixed size doesn't mean it's  
not fragmented - admittedly, if you do set it to a fixed size, then  
boot from another disk and defrag the drive then the pagefile should  
never fragment in the future, but I'm not convinced of the cost- 
benefit of doing so. A fragmented swapfile is only  going to be a  
problem (I think - please correct me if I'm wrong) if the system is  
writing out a page of memory that spans multiple fragments. If the  
swapfile is contained in only (for example) two fragments then how  
often will this occur? I have no idea - and one of the reasons I gave  
up Windows on my own machines is its the sort of thing that's  
completely undocumented - but I'll bet it's not too often.

A swapfile of a fixed size is a compromise between consumption of  
disk-space and the risk of running out of pagefile. I have customers  
I don't see for two years, so what seems perfectly adequate for a  
swapfile now may seem silly small when I next see them. Although I  
don't tend to monitor swapfile sizes & usage, Windows memory  
requirements have bloomed in that time - 2 years ago one might've  
gotten away with 256megs of RAM, but I'm certainly recommending at  
least 768meg now.

Considering the size of hard-drives these days I guess I'm being  
silly in not simply allocating a fixed-size swapfile of 2gig (or even  
4!) and trusting that that'll be adequate for the life of the  
machine, but I don't like to waste space unnecessarily, and I'd just  
far rather the machine said "out of virtual memory, increasing swap  
file size" if it needs it.

To generalise, I have two kinds of customers - those who fragment  
once a month, and those who never do. I don't think the slight  
penalty of a fragmented swapfile is noticeable to either category.  
Either their machine is quick enough, anyway, or it tends to  
horrendous slowness. The risk / hassle of running out of swap space  
is more considerable, IMO.

Like I say, I'm not saying you shouldn't set the swapfile to a fixed  
size, I'm just saying it's horses-for-courses. I guess I'd recommend  
setting the swapfile to a fixed size to readers of this list, whereas  
I wouldn't to most of my customers.

Stroller.
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