You’ve got 32GB or 64GB of RAM and still notice disk usage spikes or stuttering? That might be your Windows Page File behaving inefficiently—or being completely disabled when it shouldn’t be.
Contrary to some myths, the page file is still important—even on high-RAM machines.
What Is the Page File?
The page file (pagefile.sys) acts as virtual memory, allowing Windows to offload inactive memory pages from RAM to disk. This ensures system stability and lets applications handle more memory than physically available.
Disabling it completely can cause crashes, especially in apps like:
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Adobe Premiere Pro
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Photoshop
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Virtual machines
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Games with memory leaks
Why Customize It?
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Windows manages page file size dynamically by default, which causes performance overhead
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Having it too small can lead to app crashes
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Having it too big wastes SSD space
Recommended Page File Setup for 16GB+ RAM
| RAM Size | Minimum Size | Maximum Size |
|---|---|---|
| 16 GB | 1024 MB | 4096 MB |
| 32 GB | 2048 MB | 6144 MB |
| 64 GB | 4096 MB | 8192 MB |
Set it manually to avoid fragmentation and background resizing.
How to Set a Custom Page File
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Open System Properties → Advanced → Performance → Settings
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Go to the Advanced tab → Virtual Memory → Change
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Uncheck “Automatically manage…”
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Select your OS drive → Choose Custom size
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Set initial and maximum size based on your RAM
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Click Set → OK → Reboot
Real Fix Example
A developer with 64GB RAM experienced random crashes in Android Studio. His page file was disabled. Re-enabling it with a fixed size of 4–6GB resolved the instability without affecting performance.
Page files are like seatbelts. You don’t always need them—but when you do, they save your system.