How to Use an External Hard Drive As RAM

Techwalla may earn compensation through affiliate links in this story. Learn more about our affiliate and product review process here.
Windows can allocate memory to a hard drive as well as to a RAM module.

Your computer has two types of memory: physical memory and virtual memory. Physical memory refers to the RAM chips installed on your computer, while virtual memory is a reserved section of the hard drive. Windows uses virtual memory to store data for programs that are open but not in use. To boost the amount of virtual memory in your computer, connect an external hard drive to your computer and set Windows to use it as virtual memory.

Advertisement

Step 1

Click the "Start" menu, right-click "Computer," click "Properties" and click "Advanced system settings" on the left side of the window. Enter the Administrator password if prompted.

Video of the Day

Step 2

Click the "Advanced" tab in the System Properties window, then click the "Settings" button in the "Performance" section of the dialog box.

Advertisement

Step 3

Click the "Advanced" tab. Click "Change" near the bottom of the window.

Step 4

Un-check the box next to "Automatically manage paging file size for all drives."

Advertisement

Advertisement

Step 5

Select your external hard drive from the list. Click "System managed size" to allow your computer to allocate virtual memory on the hard drive. If you want to set a customized virtual memory size, click "Custom," type a minimum and a maximum for the memory size and click "Set." Click "OK" and restart your computer.

Video of the Day

Advertisement

Advertisement

references

Report an Issue

screenshot of the current page

Screenshot loading...