Windows-Virtual memory Minimum Too Low

[Woodrow]

hi,
i have 15.6" Dell 2GB 160GB Laptop.I keep getting this popup thing and it says "Windows-Virtual memory Minimum Too Low" What I would like to know what this warning means?During this process, memory requests for some applications may be denied. Is it bad? What can I do to improve? Does anyone know what causes this issue and how to fix it? Any help will be extremely appreciated.

[Calvin K]

In WinXP, right click My Computer, and select Properties. Go to the Advanced tab, and under Performance, click Settings. At there, click the Advanced tab. There, you will find one option at the bottom to change your virtual memory. Select Change and increase it.

[jesse]

Any programs currently running on your computer must reside in memory. These programs include Windows itself and any programs that you have started; they may be running in the foreground – where you interact with them, or in the background – where they act on their own or await your interaction.
The main memory in your computer is the physical memory, or RAM (random access memory). This physical memory generally is not large enough to hold all of the running programs, so Windows sets up some additional virtual memory as a file on the hard drive. It then swaps portions of the programs between the physical and virtual memories, always having the currently active portion of a program in the physical memory.

[Solomon]

Virtual Memory has to do with memory from your harddrive that your computer treats like RAM. How much RAM do you have? (Right Click on My Computer and select Properties...it should be found on the general tab) The minimum requirement for an XP system is 128 MB of RAM. If you have this amount (or less) then you are probably running too many applications at once. The more applications that you run at once the more RAM that is required. Once you are using all of your RAM the computer starts using a reserved part of your hard drive as if it were RAM. This is called Virtual Memory.

To see the amount of Virtual Memory that you have reserved, right click on My Computer and select Properties. Select the "advanced" tab and click the Performance->Settings button. Select the "advanced" tab. There should be a box titled "Virtual Memory".

[MrChris-]

This looks like Xp has now determined that that initial size was not enough and is issueing a warning that that amount needs to be and will be increased. I assume since that increase wil not take effect until a reboot, programs may still be resource starved.

Part of XP's ability to monitor and adjust to a users habits and needs:Not unusal, Xp has done this at least once on one of the comps at home. Of course it only has 74mgs of ram, hence the need to increase that initial swapfile or in XP lingo "Pagefile.sys".