During the drive phase of the operation of a flux‐limited multipath core the flux change produced in the driven branch is the irreversible flux available to that branch plus a certain amount of reversible flux. Most of this flux will return through the shortest path in that part of the magnetic circuit of the core which constitutes the load for the driven branch. It is shown, however, that if the irreversible flux of some branch of this path saturates, the additional flux from the driven branch will produce an irreversible flux change in the next shortest path. This flux change reappears as noise during the reset phase. This fact leads to the surprising result that under some circumstances a greater flux change occurs in the longer branch of the load structure of a three‐rung laddic than in the shorter. This source of noise may in many cases be circumvented by reducing the cross section of the driven branch. These ideas are applied to explain the existence of optimum hold currents in the general laddic. A modification of the geometry of the three‐hole memory core which improves the signal‐to‐noise ratio in inhibited‐flux operation is described.