The default memory size for a virtual machine varies based on the guest operating system configured for the virtual machine. Depending upon the kinds of applications you are running in the virtual machine, the other virtual machines that will be contending with this virtual machine for memory resources, and the applications you are running on the host operating system, you may want to change the amount of memory allocated to this virtual machine. You can change the memory size in the Configuration Editor.
To configure the memory for a virtual machine:
Memory size is restricted to multiples of 4 megabytes. The maximum possible size is based on the amount of physical memory on the host. Unless you disable the 'Enable memory limits' option, you are not allowed to set the virtual machine's memory size to the total size of host memory because the host requires some memory to operate properly. To ensure smooth overall performance, you should not run a virtual machine whose memory requirements exceed that of the host and other applications.
Warning: When selecting the memory size, be careful not to assign too much memory to a virtual machine because it can adversely affect the performance of other applications on the host, including other virtual machines. In particular, host operating systems do not behave well when they run low on free memory.
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