What is MINSP?

[WMIKED]

My Win Millenium system occasionally compains that "Minsp" should be increased. (A parameter in SYSTEM.INI apparently, although there is no default shown there!)
1.What is its function?
2.What should it be set to?
3.Is the setting dependent upon memory available and tasks running?

Ta

[YODA74]

Question: Occasionally after I boot up my computer and my desktop comes up, the screen turns blue and I get this message: "Windows: There are no spare stack pages. It may be necessary to increase the setting of MinSPs in SYSTEM.INI to prevent possible stack faults. There are currently 5 SPs allocated. Press any key to continue."

After I press a key, the desktop returns and I am able to proceed. I haven't a clue as to what stack pages are or how to increase the setting of MinSPs in SYSTEM.INI or even what that is. Can you enlighten this computer novice?

S.M., Garland


Answer: I've read enough about it to explain it, but it's one of those things where I just nod my head and say, "Oh yeah, stack pages. I know what those are ..."

This problem is addressed in Article 149083 in the Microsoft Knowledge Base.

Apparently, stacks are 4-kilobyte chunks of memory reserved by Windows for device drivers.

If the driver uses more than 4KB, a stack overflow condition occurs.

Windows sets aside a number of "extra" memory chunks for temporary use to keep the system from crashing because of the overflow.

The default number of spare chunks is two.

Windows is telling you that it has used all the spare memory chunks and that if any more device drivers overflow their stack, bad things will happen.

Windows is warning you to set aside some more stack space, a good thing.

All right. Enough about stacks. You want to know how to fix this problem.

You need to modify your System. ini file. Do this by clicking on the Start menu and selecting Run. Type msconfig and click the OK button.

Click on the System.ini tab and click once on the [386Enh] folder and click the New button.

Type MinSP=8 and click OK. Say yes when the system asks if you want to save the changes.

Notice that I set the stack number to eight. Microsoft says to keep the number in multiples of four.

For the total scoop on this, go to support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/Q149/0/83.asp.

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W/Me (memory eater)
Me Help (http://www.webtechgeek.com/center_Frame_win_me_tips.html)

[This message has been edited by YODA74 (edited 10-10-2001).]