>In the second case, is there any benefit in setting the swap file to be in
>fixed length?

Yes ...the OS will not have to spend time and resources dynamically
resizing the swap file.
In addition a fixed size swap file will be written to the drive in one
continuous block instead of all over the drive.

>Is there a benefit in setting its minimum size to zero (so that it will not
>be bigger than it is needed)?

you will pay the price in  CPU time allocated  to resizing it

>Will windows know to use the full size of the logical drive but not to try
>more? Or perhaps we should also set a maximum size.
>If the logical drive is on the same physical drive as the other logical
>drives, does the fact that the swap files might be physically distant from
>the other files, will slow down in swapping?
>If we make a fixed size swap file, say 5 times bigger, will it take longer
>for Win98 to make the swapping?

The idea is you set a fixed size.... say 300 meg minimum and 300 meg
maximum. Windows will create it when you boot up and it will stay at one
place and one size. The  OS knows exactly where it is and will use it when
it is needed. It won't spend resources dynamically resizing it for every
situation. You can make it bigger but there are only a handful of
circumstances when a workstation would require a larger swap file.

NT4 and Win 2000 allows you to have as many swap files as you have drives.
Linux allows you to have....I believe it is up to six....however they can't
be larger then 128 megs. If you aren't running a busy server that is
swapping out to the hard drive all the time then there is little reason to
do this and in fact multiple swap files can slow things down.

For your purposes the best scenario is to put a single fixed size swap file
on a different physical drive and controller then the OS ...preferably on
the outer edge of the drive...ie the first partition . For example ...put
your OS is on the Master drive on the primary controller ... first
partition...your C drive ....and your swap file  on the master drive
secondary controller ....first partition.
This will allow the OS to access the it's own files and the swap file
simultaneously which can dramatically increase performance.

Mark Rode
The NoSpin Group

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