Fix Ran out of memory 0x8007000E in Hyper-V

While starting a virtual machine I got the error Ran out of memory 0x8007000E. The full-blown error was “Not enough memory in the system to start the virtual machine win10. Could not initialize memory: Ran out of memory (0x8007000E).

Understanding what the error is is 1 thing, but taking the right action is just as important. In this post, I explain what the cause is and how you can determine this. Finally, I describe the best solutions step by step.
If you are only interested in 0x8007000E solutions, you can go there immediately. It is not a requirement to also read the cause and analysis.

Cause of error Could not initialize memory: Ran out of memory 0x8007000E

Outdated computers, laptops, or just consumer equipment: these types of PCs are usually equipped with minimal memory. 4GB is fairly standard, 8GB is already luxury. With this amount of RAM, it is a challenge to run virtual machines on a Windows 10 machine.
The cause of 0x8007000e must be linked to the internal memory of your PC. It is seldom related to a ramdisk.

Analysis of Not enough memory in the system to start the virtual machine

To determine that internal memory is the problem, Task Manager is your most user-friendly help. You can immediately see here how much RAM you have, and which applications use the most.

How much memory is free?

1. Right-click your taskbar -> click Task Manager
   
2. Click on the Performance tab
   

Here you can see how much memory is being used. In my case, this is 5.3 out of 7.9 GB.
Apparently, my virtual machine requires more than 2.6 GB of memory (7.9 – 5.3) to start.

How much memory does the virtual machine need?

You can adjust how much RAM a virtual machine can use. Of course, you should not allocate too little, because this results in a very slow virtual machine. But too much can result in error Ran out of memory 0x8007000E and often has no positive effect on performance.

1. Go to Hyper-V Manager
2. Right-click on the virtual machine and click Settings…
   
3. Click on Memory. You see that in my case the memory is at 4096MB. This is 4 GB, and therefore explains why I could not start my VM. I only had 2.6 GB of memory available.
   

Why is there so much memory in use?

We can go one step further to find out why so much memory is being used.

1. Click on the Details tab
2. Click on the Memory column header to sort by memory usage
   

You can see that the top processes use a lot of memory. In my case: Teams.exe, chrome.exe and MicrosoftEdgeCP.exe
In your case, these are of course other programs.

Solutions for Ran out of memory 0x8007000E

Based on the analysis, we can now concentrate on the solution:

• Allocate less memory to the VM
• Close applications
• Buy more memory

Below I will explain the solutions in more detail.

Allocate less memory to the VM

The fastest solution is to lower the Minimum RAM. By adjusting the 4096MB (4GB) to 2048 MB (2 GB) I could start my VM. This may be accompanied by a lower performance within the VM. Don’t go any lower than 2048 MB of RAM, as it slows down your VM noticeably. It may even cause the VM to not boot at all.

Close applications

As we have seen in the Analysis, several programs use a lot of memory. By closing this, you free up extra memory so that you can start the VM. The performance of the VM remains guaranteed.
Once your VM has started, you can start the applications again. The VM often uses the most memory at startup. As soon as you are logged in to Windows 10, memory usage decreases a little.

Buy more memory

A final option is to purchase additional memory. If you have 4 GB of memory, this is almost your only option. Performance in Windows 10 is saddening when allocating 2GB (2GB for your PC and 2GB for your VM).
When buying memory, pay close attention to the type of memory, and whether you still have a slot free for additional memory. Do you find this too difficult? Ask a friend with IT knowledge or visit your local computer store.