RAM-Disk and Windows Vista performance

By +Tantawi
in Microsoft (Windows)

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Grand Master

+Tantawi Subscriber²

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Hi all,

I've got an email from a friend of mine, which is really interesting, he used one of the programs which make a virtual disk drive out of a reserved space from the RAM. aka RAM Disk, like this program for example: http://www.cenatek.com/product_page_ramdisk.php

What made me open this thread is that while I think it's a great feature, and I know it was available in early versions of Windows, what do you think the impact of this if used as a ReadyBoost drive (yes it can), or to hold a portion of the pagefile?

For sure, I know ReadyBoost and Pagefile shouldn't be a part of the RAM to begin with, and putting them on RAM will deface their purpose (making more free RAM available to applications). But what you say if someone has 4GB or 8GB of RAM or more? by dedicating 1GB for ReadyBoost on a RAM drive, and like another 1GB for an additional pagefile plus the main he has on the HDD, I think the PC should see a SIGNIFICANT performance increase specially when dealing with disk I/O intensive applications.

(Image is provided by Amano)

post-49195-1179609031_thumb.jpg

What's your opinion? :)

Grand Master

Linkinfamous

Posted
Posted

Completely Useless.

A pagefile (Readyboost) is for when Windows doesn't want to use RAM. You're just going to hurt system performance by dumping stuff that Windows doesn't want to keep in RAM in RAM.

Someone with 4gb or 8gb or memory is not going to see any benifit from Readyboost anyway.

Grand Master

+Tantawi Subscriber²

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Completely Useless.

A pagefile (Readyboost) is for when Windows doesn't want to use RAM. You're just going to hurt system performance by dumping stuff that Windows doesn't want to keep in RAM in RAM.

Someone with 4gb or 8gb or memory is not going to see any benifit from Readyboost anyway.

ReadyBoost is not a pagefile, it's some cached files from the pagefile, and you'll hurt system performance sure if you have 1GB or even 2GB of RAM, but say with 4GB,8GB+, u never use that amount all the time, so why not put them for another use (instead of using the HDD for the same stuff).

And BTW, if Pagefile is located in RAM, ReadyBoost will be completely useless then.

Proficient

stockwiz

Posted
Posted

I just like to use the page file for temporary internet files.. take a hundred megs of the 4 gigs that way everything downloaded to the cache gets wiped on shutdown and is securely wiped at that. I wish windows would have included a ramdrive option that's easy to use with vista, it can be quite useful for some applications.

Experienced

lil_psc

Posted
Posted

maybe off-topic

but since im an organised person i dont need to use vista index fast search feature so i turned it off and guess wot

vistas performance is now on xp pro sp2 level :D

brief specs:

northwood 3.0ghz

1gb generic ddr400 ram

WD sata 120gb, WD sata2 120gb (vista is on sata)

...

Grand Master

+Fahim S. MVC

Posted
  • MVC
Posted

Surely Windows only writes to swap when it can't do something in RAM?

Therefore to move some of the RAM to swap would mean that you have less RAM available for normal use which would mean you'd end up moving to swap that much quicker...

I can't see how this is going to improve performance at all... :huh:

  • 1 year later...
Neowinian

bjd223

Posted
Posted

Readyboost does not cache any pagefile information. It is a 2nd level cache for the hard drive. The reason it works, is because it has superior random access compared to a typical hard drive. It is purely a cache to reduce random IO. This is especially useful on laptops, as it helps with battery consumption (it greatly reduces the amount of hard disk activity). Readyboost also uses 2:1 compression which helps increase performance (as long as your CPU can handle the overhead, which it can).

The pagefile is virtual memory located on any other storage device, that is not system memory. The pagefile is the 'last resort', and the main reason it exist is because many applications will crash if they are unable to allocate memory.

Windows Vista will preload as many applications as possible. If you rarely run an application it may never be preloaded. Typically anything that you use on a daily basis will eventually become a preloaded application.

Typically Vista will preload apps up to 75% of your total RAM, and as you load applications that are not preloaded, it will unload used memory so you always have available memory for the applications you are loading. If you load an app that is preloaded, it does nothing and launches it.

I do not recommend placing Readyboost on a RAMdisk unless you have a lot of Ram. It will place information on there that typically takes a long time to seek, and that you use regularly, it is not a duplicate pagefile. This is usually information on the far side of each platter that you typically seek to randomly. Like IE cache. RAM disks are especially good for cache and other temporary system files. Photoshop recommends placing the scratch on a RAM drive if you have enough memory to support it.

I personally have 8 GB of RAM, and have a ramdrive that stores system TIF and cache folders. I have tried Readyboost on it and it works as well or better than a flash based NAND device. Windows Vista has never, never, never preloaded more than 5 Gb of data for me. Readyboost will work well on any device that has seek times lower than your hard drive. This includes many NAND flash devices, and every RAM drive probably ever.

  • 10 months later...
Grand Master

AltecXP

Posted
Posted
Why the **** are you using Vista Its the biggest peice of **** I know even MAC IS BETTER! And thats a really big insult

Don't speak unless you're spoken to, you're obviously are NO authority.

Grand Master

Brandon Live Veteran

Posted
  • Veteran
Posted

Do not try any to this.

ReadyBoost cannot be used with RAM drives. You wouldn't want to. It's a stupid idea. ReadyBoost caches volatile (i.e. the disk can be unplugged at any time) copies of data already stored in RAM or the page file. By putting ReadyBoost data into RAM (if it were possible) you'd be wasting RAM, adding a ton of unnecessary overhead, and significantly reducing system performance.

Do not put a page file on a RAM drive. Again this is idiotic. The page file is where pages go when there's no room for them in RAM. If you had a page file backed by RAM, you'd be telling the system "when half my RAM is gone, start swapping those pages with the other of half of my RAM." You still have the same amount of RAM available as before, but now using it incurs a ton of pointless overhead. You'll end up making copies of data from one RAM chip to another in order to make room in the first one, for data that normally would have just been put directly into the second chip.

Do not make configuration changes to your system without understanding how your system works. If you think for a second that either of these things could possibly be a good idea, then you clearly do not know enough to be making such a decision. I'm not saying you're stupid for not being an expert in systems architecture, but you are if you start changing things like this without being one. You wouldn't go rearranging wires and hoses in your car's engine bay if you didn't have a complete understanding of what they were for and how they worked. I don't see why your computer is any different.

  • 3 weeks later...
Neowinian

Quantum Soul

Posted
Posted

I have to disagree in some circumstances. Since I do not wish to upgrade to a 64 bit operating system yet, I'm limited to 4 GB, I have 8 GB or Ram Installed in my system, I was planning on upgrade to 64 bit so I got the extra RAM but I'm waiting to purchase Windows 7 64 bit due to financial issues.

So in the mean time I have 4 extra GB of ram installed but doing nothing.

Since I have the OEM version of Vista Ultimate I do not have the 64 bit version on my disk nor can I get a copy from Microsoft.

In cases like this doesn't it make sense to package my extra ram into a RAM drive and dole it out as Page file, Ready boost (HDD cache), and Temporary Internet Files? Wouldn't I be a fool not to?

I could use some recommendations on software that can assist me in this.

Thanks!

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