Moving the Windows NT Default Paging and Spool File

The information in this article applies to:

• Microsoft Windows NT Workstation versions 3.5, 3.51 and 4.0
• Microsoft Windows NT Server versions 3.5, 3.51 and 4.0

SUMMARY

This article explains the steps necessary to move the paging file and print spooler to another hard disk drive. You may want to do this if you install an additional drive that is faster than the hard disk drive currently storing your paging and print spooler files.

MORE INFORMATION

There are three sections to this article:

I. Moving the Paging File II. Moving the Default Spool Directory for All Printers III. Moving the Default Spool Directory on a Per Printer Basis

     and Creating Multiple Spool Directories

Section I: Moving the Paging File

1. Run Control Panel and choose System.

2. Choose Virtual Memory.

3. Set the Initial Size (MB) and Maximum size values to 0 (zero) and then choose Set.

4. Select the new drive that you want to use to store the paging file.

5. Set Initial Size (MB) and Maximum size. For the Initial size, Microsoft recommends using the "Total Page File Size for All Drives" Recommended Value.

6. Choose Set and then choose OK twice.

7. Choose Restart Now

II. Moving the Default Spool Directory for All Printers

NOTE: Following this procedure applies a new default spool directory to all printers configured on this system.

1. Start Registry Editor.

2. From the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE subtree, go to the following subkey:

         \SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Print\Printers
   

3. Select the Printers key.

4. From the Edit menu choose Add Value.

5. Add a value using the following information:

         Value Name: DefaultSpoolDirectory
         Data Type:  REG_SZ
         String:     <full path to printer spool directory>
   
   

6. Exit Registry Editor.

7. Go to File Manager, select the drive on which the new spool directory will be created and then create the directory on the drive defined in the Registry value DefaultSpoolDirectory. For example, if in the Registry under DefaultSpoolDirectory the value "F:\SPOOL" was entered, then a directory called SPOOL would need to be created on the F: drive.

8. If the new directory is located on an NTFS drive, please assign the appropriate permissions to the spool directory. Q137503 describes the appropriate entries.

9. Stop and Restart the Spooler service in the Services section of Control Panel.

   spool directory(s) on the appropriate drive. Then open an application,
   like Write, with a document over 100Kbytes in size. print the document
   and, while printing, immediately press ALT-TAB to move back to the File
   Manager window. There should be two files now appearing on the right
   hand side window under the spool directory. They should have extensions
   of .SHD and .SPL. Once the print job is completed these two will be
   deleted by NT. If no files appear, try printing a larger file. Then
   verify Registry settings and NTFS permissions (Q137503) if spool
   directory resides on NTFS partition.

     and Creating Multiple Spool Directories

NOTE: Following this procedure applies a new default spool directory to a specific printer configured on this system. If you want to define this for all printers, use procedures listed in Section II.

1. Start Registry Editor.

2. From the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE subtree, go to the following subkey:

         \SYSTEM
           \CurrentControlSet
             \Control\Print\Printers\<specific printer>\SpoolDirectory
   
   

3. Select the Printers key.

4. From the Edit menu choose Add Value.

5. Add a value using the following information:

         Value Name: SpoolDirectory
         Data Type:  REG_SZ
         String:     <full path to printer spool directory>
   
   

6. Exit Registry Editor.

7. Go to File Manager, select the drive on which the new spool directories will be created and then create the directories on the drive defined in each of the printer's Registry value SpoolDirectory. For example, if in the Registry under SpoolDirectory the value "F:\SPOOL\PRINTQ1" was entered, then a directory called SPOOL would need to be created on the F: drive and then a subdirectory under SPOOL called PRINTQ1 would need to be created.

8. If the new directories are located on an NTFS drive, please assign the appropriate permissions to the spool directories. Q137503 describes the appropriate entries.

9. Stop and Restart the Spooler service in the Services section of Control Panel.

   spool directory(s) on the appropriate drive. Then open an application,
   like Write, with a document over 100Kbytes in size. print the document
   and, while printing, immediately press ALT-TAB to move back to the File
   Manager window. There should be two files now appearing on the right
   hand side  window under the spool directory. They should have extensions
   of .SHD and .SPL. Once the print job is completed these two will be
   deleted by NT. If no files appear, try printing a larger file. Then
   verify Registry settings and NTFS permissions (Q137503) if spool
   directory resides on NTFS partition.

An actual directory name needs to be specified; specifying only the root directory (for example: "C:\") won't work. Instead, you must use C:\<directory>, where "<directory>" is the name of the directory you want to use. If you do specify the root directory as the default spool location, spooling reverts back to the %systemroot%\system32\spool\printer directory.

The Windows NT Resource Kit documentation does not indicate this nor does it explicitly state that only a directory will work (see p.226 & pp.637- 640).