This is a follow up on my previous question, here:
Windows modified memory without a pagefile - Super User
I have no pagefile and a lot of modified memory according to resource monitor (Win 7 x64). The answerer to my original question said that the modified memory must be written to the "backing store" and when I asked if he meant files on the disk he said yes. So I have Sysinternals' RamMap program and I've tried the option 'Empty Modified Page List' but nothing changes.
Right now I'm using gigabytes of modified memory and it seems it's always that way with VMWare Workstation (several VMs open) and Firefox (ton of tabs open). How can I flush the modified memory, and is there any way to make Windows do that more often short of enabling a pagefile?
Thanks
EDIT - I've since discovered the source of several gigs of modified memory came from running Sysinternals' Process Monitor. When I closed Process Monitor I got back a few gigs. That modified memory does not show in the process list in RAMMap.
3 Answers
Windows can't write them to the disk, because they are still in use. The only way to "free" this memory is to enable a pagefile, so that the modified pages are written to the pagefile. Here they can be restored into the RAM when they are needed again.
4Figuring out what is consuming your modified memory is not obvious. I found that by adding the "handles" column in task manager, processes tab, I could identify the process that was locking modified memory. Killing that process made the modified memory get released.
hanksterr7 had the answer I was looking for. After a few days of having my computer on, I would be at up to 10 GB modified memory usage, about 14 GB total usage (out of 16 GB). I couldn't run any games without getting a low memory warning. I was ready to uninstall Chrome because I thought it had developed a memory leak.
Adding the 'Handles' column to task manager identified a Realtek Network Adapter updater that I installed with drivers for a new 5Ghz 802.11ac WiFi USB adapter that I bought about a month ago. It was using almost 500k handles, compared to anywhere from 30-1500 handles for other processes.
Thanks for this tip hanksterr7. You had the real solution that I was looking for.
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