As usual with these kind of parameters, you can improve the performance of your machine but losing “security”. Pagefile.sys may contain sensitive information like passwords, web browsers cookies, … that many people prefer to delete to not beeing available after restart the machine.
If security in this topic is not your concern you can boost the start-up process of your machine not deleting pagefile.sys when you shutdown your machine.
To disable pagefile clearnig at shutdown this is the key that you have to set to “1″ :
ClearPageFileAtShutdown
You can find it in the registry path :
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management
![share save 171 16 Boost Windows Start Up : [ClearPageFileAtShutdown]](http://www.hkeyusers.com/wp-content/plugins/add-to-any/share_save_171_16.png "Boost Windows Start Up : [ClearPageFileAtShutdown]"){kind=small}
A very confused article.
By default Windows does NOT clear the pagfile on shutdown. Setting the value to 1 will enable clearing the pagefile, not disable it. In a highly secure environment it may be desireable to set this value. However, this makes sense only as part of a comprehensive security policy. By itself it will do very little. Clearing the pagefile means overwriting the contents with zero’s, it will not delete the pagefile. This will increase shutdown times.
Whether the pagefile is cleared or not has NO impact on startup times. At bootup WIndows pays absolutely attention to the previous contents of the pagefile. The pagefile is never cleared on bootup.
Most users will be best served by leaving the setting on it’s default value.
Larry Miller
Microsoft MCSA