Problem description:
--------------------

I use python pandas to read a few large CSV file and store it in HDF5 file, the resulting HDF5 file is about 10GB. 
**The problem happens when reading it back. Even though I tried to read it back in chunks, I still get MemoryError.**

Here is How I create the HDF5 file:
-----------------------------------

```
import glob, os
import pandas as pd

hdf = pd.HDFStore('raw_sample_storage2.h5')

os.chdir("C:/RawDataCollection/raw_samples/PLB_Gate")
for filename in glob.glob("RD_*.txt"):
    raw_df = pd.read_csv(filename,
                         sep=' ',
                         header=None, 
                         names=['time', 'GW_time', 'node_id', 'X', 'Y', 'Z', 'status', 'seq', 'rssi', 'lqi'], 
                         dtype={'GW_time': uint32, 'node_id': uint8, 'X': uint16, 'Y': uint16, 'Z':uint16, 'status': uint8, 'seq': uint8, 'rssi': int8, 'lqi': uint8},
                         parse_dates=['time'], 
                         date_parser=dateparse, 
                         chunksize=50000, 
                         skip_blank_lines=True)
    for chunk in raw_df:
        hdf.append('raw_sample_all', chunk, format='table', data_columns = True, index = True, compression='blosc', complevel=9)

```

Here is How I try to read it back in chunks:
--------------------------------------------

```
for df in pd.read_hdf('raw_sample_storage2.h5','raw_sample_all', chunksize=300000):
    print(df.head(1))

```

Here is the error message I got:
--------------------------------

```
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
MemoryError                               Traceback (most recent call last)
<ipython-input-7-ef278566a16b> in <module>()
----> 1 for df in pd.read_hdf('raw_sample_storage2.h5','raw_sample_all', chunksize=300000):
      2     print(df.head(1))

C:\Anaconda\lib\site-packages\pandas\io\pytables.pyc in read_hdf(path_or_buf, key, **kwargs)
    321         store = HDFStore(path_or_buf, **kwargs)
    322         try:
--> 323             return f(store, True)
    324         except:
    325 

C:\Anaconda\lib\site-packages\pandas\io\pytables.pyc in <lambda>(store, auto_close)
    303 
    304     f = lambda store, auto_close: store.select(
--> 305         key, auto_close=auto_close, **kwargs)
    306 
    307     if isinstance(path_or_buf, string_types):

C:\Anaconda\lib\site-packages\pandas\io\pytables.pyc in select(self, key, where, start, stop, columns, iterator, chunksize, auto_close, **kwargs)
    663                            auto_close=auto_close)
    664 
--> 665         return it.get_result()
    666 
    667     def select_as_coordinates(

C:\Anaconda\lib\site-packages\pandas\io\pytables.pyc in get_result(self, coordinates)
   1346                     "can only use an iterator or chunksize on a table")
   1347 
-> 1348             self.coordinates = self.s.read_coordinates(where=self.where)
   1349 
   1350             return self

C:\Anaconda\lib\site-packages\pandas\io\pytables.pyc in read_coordinates(self, where, start, stop, **kwargs)
   3545         self.selection = Selection(
   3546             self, where=where, start=start, stop=stop, **kwargs)
-> 3547         coords = self.selection.select_coords()
   3548         if self.selection.filter is not None:
   3549             for field, op, filt in self.selection.filter.format():

C:\Anaconda\lib\site-packages\pandas\io\pytables.pyc in select_coords(self)
   4507             return self.coordinates
   4508 
-> 4509         return np.arange(start, stop)
   4510 
   4511 # utilities ###

MemoryError: 

```

My python environment:
----------------------

```
INSTALLED VERSIONS
------------------
commit: None
python: 2.7.3.final.0
python-bits: 32
OS: Windows
OS-release: 7
machine: x86
processor: x86 Family 6 Model 42 Stepping 7, GenuineIntel
byteorder: little
LC_ALL: None
LANG: None

pandas: 0.15.2
nose: 1.3.4
Cython: 0.22
numpy: 1.9.2
scipy: 0.15.1
statsmodels: 0.6.1
IPython: 3.0.0
sphinx: 1.2.3
patsy: 0.3.0
dateutil: 2.4.1
pytz: 2015.2
bottleneck: None
tables: 3.1.1
numexpr: 2.3.1
matplotlib: 1.4.3
openpyxl: 1.8.5
xlrd: 0.9.3
xlwt: 0.7.5
xlsxwriter: 0.6.7
lxml: 3.4.2
bs4: 4.3.2
html5lib: None
httplib2: None
apiclient: None
rpy2: None
sqlalchemy: 0.9.9
pymysql: None
psycopg2: None

```

Edit 1:
-------

**It took about half an hour for the MemoryError to happen after executing read\_hdf(), and in the meanwhile I checked taskmgr, and there's little CPU activity and total memory used never exceeded 2.2G.** It was about 2.1 GB before I execute the code. So whatever pandas read\_hdf() loaded into the RAM is less than 100 MB *(I have 4G RAM, and my 32-bit-Windows system can only use 2.7G, and I used the rest for RAM disk)* 

**Here's the hdf file info:**

```
In [2]:
hdf = pd.HDFStore('raw_sample_storage2.h5')
hdf

Out[2]:
<class 'pandas.io.pytables.HDFStore'>
File path: C:/RawDataCollection/raw_samples/PLB_Gate/raw_sample_storage2.h5
/raw_sample_all            frame_table  (typ->appendable,nrows->308581091,ncols->10,indexers->[index],dc->[time,GW_time,node_id,X,Y,Z,status,seq,rssi,lqi])

```

**Moreover, I can read a portion of the hdf file by indicating 'start' and 'stop' instead of 'chunksize':**

```
%%time
df = pd.read_hdf('raw_sample_storage2.h5','raw_sample_all', start=0,stop=300000)
print df.info()
print(df.head(5))

```

The execution only took 4 seconds, and the output is:

```
<class 'pandas.core.frame.DataFrame'>
Int64Index: 300000 entries, 0 to 49999
Data columns (total 10 columns):
time       300000 non-null datetime64[ns]
GW_time    300000 non-null uint32
node_id    300000 non-null uint8
X          300000 non-null uint16
Y          300000 non-null uint16
Z          300000 non-null uint16
status     300000 non-null uint8
seq        300000 non-null uint8
rssi       300000 non-null int8
lqi        300000 non-null uint8
dtypes: datetime64[ns](1), int8(1), uint16(3), uint32(1), uint8(4)
memory usage: 8.9 MB
None
                 time   GW_time  node_id      X      Y      Z  status  seq  \
0 2013-10-22 17:20:58  39821761        3  20010  21716  22668       0   33   
1 2013-10-22 17:20:58  39821824        4  19654  19647  19241       0   33   
2 2013-10-22 17:20:58  39821888        1  16927  21438  22722       0   34   
3 2013-10-22 17:20:58  39821952        2  17420  22882  20440       0   34   
4 2013-10-22 17:20:58  39822017        3  20010  21716  22668       0   34   

   rssi  lqi  
0   -43   49  
1   -72   47  
2   -46   48  
3   -57   46  
4   -42   50  
Wall time: 4.26 s

```

Noticing 300000 rows only took 8.9 MB RAM, I tried to use chunksize together with start and stop:

```
for df in pd.read_hdf('raw_sample_storage2.h5','raw_sample_all', start=0,stop=300000,chunksize = 3000):
    print df.info()
    print(df.head(5))

```

Same MemoryError happens. 

I don't understand what's happening here, if the internal mechanism somehow ignore chunksize/start/stop and tried to load the whole thing into RAM, how come there's almost no increase in RAM usage (only 100 MB) when MemoryError happens? And why does the execution take half an hour just to reach the error at the very beginning of the process without noticeable CPU usage?