Error: Not Enough Space on C Drive

Over the past few weeks, I’ve had quite a few people call or email into our support line about getting this message “Not Enough Space on Drive C:” when trying to save their project and Revit then crashing.  Everyone says that they have “a ton of space” available, so there’s no way there isn’t enough space on the C.  And besides, we’re saving to the Network!

I did a little investigating and contacted Autodesk about the message.  It turns out that the message is not quite worded correctly!  What it apparently means is that there isn’t enough Virtual Memory available to complete the task, so Revit needs to close.  So, the message is somewhat technically correct, Virtual Memory is usually on the C drive, but the message makes you think there isn’t enough actual disk space available, even though you are saving to the network.

Up to this point, we’ve usually been able to limit the message from popping up by cleaning out the Windows TEMP folder, but even then it didn’t help eliminate it.  So, how do you fix it/adjust your virtual memory and what should I use for values?  First off, the value(s) for Virtual Memory according to Autodesk should be at least 1.5X the installed RAM.  So, if you have 4GB of RAM installed, the virtual memory should be at least 6GB.  Here’s a screen shot of how I get to change my Virtual Memory settings on my Window 7 x64 laptop…

One thing to note about this…you may need to talk to you IT person in order to change these values if anything is grayed out.  You will also need to restart your computer before these chance take affect.

As you can see in the Performance Options dialog, my virtual memory was initially set to the installed RAM (8GB of RAM = 8191 MB).  I went ahead and unchecked the “Automatically manage the paging…” in the Virtual Memory dialog, then hit the “Custom size” radio button.  I set my “Initial size (MB)” to be 1.5x my installed RAM (8191*1.5) to get the 12286.  I then set my “Maximum size (MB)” to be 2x my installed RAM (8191*2) to get the 16382.

Changing this value should alleviate the error message of not having enough space on the C drive.  Granted, if you are working on a 32bit PC, have 4GB of RAM installed, you’re Virtual Memory still may not be able to handle very large Revit projects/files.  Definitely check out the Revit  Model Performance Technical Note from Autodesk for more info on RAM and Virtual Memory.

Happy New Year and Personal Update

For those of you who still actually follow my blog, I need to first off say Thank You! and sorry for not posting since mid Sept. (I can’t believe it’s been that long!) This past year was an interesting year…work was up and down (mostly up and busy) and I really started getting into photography The latter, is the main reason why I haven’t been posting this past fall and winter. As much as I wanted to post about Revit and BIM, photography just kept pulling me aside and taking up much more of my time during my off-work hours. In the new year though, I will be posting much, much more to this blog and my Navisworks blog…I promise!

Now, speaking of photography…I need to also share some great news. This past fall I took pictures of an area Freshman football team and had a blast. I stumbled upon a national photo contest from Canon called “Why Do You Love Football?” and decided to submit a few pictures. Much to my surprise, one of my pictures was selected as a finalist in the contest! I could not believe it. The photo below was selected as 1 of 7 finalist in the Adult Action category…

This is where I need to ask for a little favor/help. There is a public voting period that ends on January 7, 2011 and I need your help! If my photo is selected as the winner in the Adult Category, the picture will be unveiled and hung in the Pro Football Hall of Fame! Not only that, but anyone who votes is entered into a drawing to win a Canon T2i camera kit.

To vote, you can go to http://www.nfl.usa.canon.com/vote/photoContest.html When you enter the voting, you will first vote for your favorite Teen Action, then Teen Feature, then your favorite of those two. After this, you will get to the Adult Action category, this is where my picture is. You’ll then do the same as the Teen categories. The name of the picture is “Determined”. After all of your voting, you’ll need to enter your information…this is to enter your votes and yourself into the drawing for the camera.

Again, thank you for still keeping an eye on my little area of the blog-world and I look forward to bringing much more information in 2011. I hope everyone had a safe and great New Years! (And yes, thank you in advance for anyone that votes for my picture)

Dwane Lindsey

::Update on Contest - My photo finished in 2nd place in the Adult Action Category! Thank you to anyone/everyone who voted, it is very much appreciated!