c++ program and the use of memory

[prog]

Hi all,
my c++ program uses pointers to dynamically allocate memory. I run it on Windows and I'm trying to understand why even if the process uses 30Mb of memory (as swhon from the Windows Task Manager), the page file size (PF Usage) grows from 755Mb (when my program is not running) to 2.9Gb when the process is calculating the complex algorithm.

Why there is so much difference between the memory actually used by the process and the page file?
What could cause this issue?

Thanks in advance for any suggestion!

[writetonsharma]

did you check it has no memory leaks?

[prog]

it shouldn't: the algorithm taks many hours to complete and the memory allocation does not explode.
However I didn't check it using a memory leak detector... The code has been compiled with VS C++ 6, do you think I should use some tool to identify memory problems? If yes, any suggestion?

However I still don't understant why I have the page file so big (2.9Gb from a starting point of ~700Mb) compared to the memory allocated by the process (~30Mb)...

[writetonsharma]

Its difficult to tell anything with this much information. But as the memory is increasing even if when the program is not doing anything, it would be good if you check it for memory leaks.

For windows the easiest way would be to download boundschecker and compile with it and run it. You may get a trial version I think.