A method of assigning virtual memory to physical memory in a data processing system allocates a set of contiguous physical memory pages for a new page mapping, instructs the memory controller to move the virtual memory pages according to the new page mapping, and then allows access to the virtual memory pages using the new page mapping while the memory controller is still copying the virtual memory pages to the set of physical memory pages. The memory controller can use a mapping table which temporarily stores entries of the old and new page addresses, and releases the entries as copying for each entry is completed. The translation lookaside buffer (TLB) entries in the processor cores are updated for the new page addresses prior to completion of copying of the memory pages by the memory controller. The invention can be extended to non-uniform memory array (NUMA) systems. For systems with cache memory, any cache entry which is affected by the page move can be updated by modifying its address tag according to the new page mapping. This tag modification may be limited to cache entries in a dirty coherency state. The cache can further relocate a cache entry based on a changed congruence class for any modified address tag.