Windows successfully diagnosed a low virtual memory condition - then VM locks up

Question

So my VM occasionally freezes up, and requires a hard reboot. I went back to look at the event logs, and noticed just before the computer locked up, the following messages appeared:

Log Name: System

Source: Microsoft-Windows-Resource-Exhaustion-Detector

Date: 2/18/2024 8:38:32 AM

Event ID: 2004

Task Category: Resource Exhaustion Diagnosis Events

Level: Warning

Keywords: Events related to exhaustion of system commit limit (virtual memory).

User: SYSTEM

Computer: JAXTFS01.crowley.com

Description:

Windows successfully diagnosed a low virtual memory condition. The following programs consumed the

most virtual memory: spoolsv.exe (2816) consumed 2049429504 bytes, PrinterInstallerClient.exe (3964)

consumed 1644208128 bytes, and ccSvcHst.exe (3152) consumed 490479616 bytes.Any idea what might be going on here?

Answer 1

Hello

Thank you for posting in Microsoft Community forum.

The event log you shared indicates that your VM is running out of virtual memory, which is likely causing the freezes. The programs listed are consuming the most virtual memory:

spoolsv.exe (the print spooler service) consumed 2049429504 bytes.

PrinterInstallerClient.exe consumed 1644208128 bytes.

ccSvcHst.exe (a component of Norton AntiVirus) consumed 490479616 bytes.

Here are a few suggestions to address this issue:

Increase the amount of virtual memory: You can do this by increasing the size of the paging file on your VM. This is essentially a space on your hard disk that Windows uses as if it were RAM.

www.lifewire.com

Check for memory leaks in the listed programs: Sometimes, programs don’t release memory back to the system after they’re done using it, which can lead to low virtual memory. If possible, try updating these programs to the latest version, or if they’re not necessary, consider uninstalling them.

Find a Memory Leak - Windows drivers | Microsoft Learn

Add more physical memory (RAM) to your VM: If your VM is consistently running out of memory, it might be necessary to add more RAM.

Best Regards,

Wesley Li

Answer 2

I notice there is a discrepancy between the values mentioned in the message and the actually added virtual memory.

The paging file has a size of 32Gb

Physical memory is 132 Gb

Actual use of physical memory at alert time: 17%

Message from event log:
Windows successfully diagnosed a low virtual memory condition. The following programs consumed the most virtual memory: process-a.exe (13856) consumed 34171723776 bytes, process-b.exe (24104) consumed 33957273600 bytes, and process-c.exe (24096) consumed 21911867392 bytes.

I find it strange that these 3 processes can consume more virtual memory than available at that point in time.

How should interpreted this message.