RAM Disks?

[risingsun]

Just Wondering if anyone has used any sort of RAM Disks? I'm stuck on the Intel 945 chipset, so my max ram is 3.3gb's. So i was thinking about getting some extra ram and putting the SWAP into a ram disk (not the i-ram). However, I've seen mixed reviews about it, just wanted to see if anyone had tried it or any insight anyone has.

[ghettogeddy]

just get anew mobo cpu combo will be cheaper and better in the long run

then again i have no clue what your talking about with ram disks
are you talking ssd's
maybe a link will help me

[Neuromancer]

ram disk is a software based VHD (virtual hard drive). Increases performance to memory speeds rather than HDD or even SSD limited speeds.

[nd4spdbh2]

i run a ramdisk on my netbook. i use it for windows TMP and TEMP directories, as well as firefox cache as well as the pagefile and it has made things quite nice.

I couldnt see using it on a desktop, but on the netbook its a godsend.

[Jayws]

I use it on my desktop for tmp, firefox cache, and paging. I like it because it is quick at what it does and it reduces drive writes to my SSD which happens to be MLC flash.

[vlaszlo]

I use also. Browser cache, temp, pagefile.

[nd4spdbh2]

i guess if i was running a 64bit os with the ability to run 4gb+ of ram a 1gbish ram disk for browser cache tmp and PF usage would be feesable.

[Jayws]

i guess if i was running a 64bit os with the ability to run 4gb+ of ram a 1gbish ram disk for browser cache tmp and PF usage would be feesable.

Oh the perks of having Win 7 Pro x64 :P I just upgraded to 6gb at the same time and it's great.

[visbits]

Yep, win 7 pro 64 runs great on 8gb. I've been using 64bit for 4 or so years now, 0 issues.

[Mr Alpha]

What's the point of having the pagefile in the RAM? Doesn't windows dump to pagefile what doesn't fit in memory? So when you use RAM for your pagefile you just end up moving stuff from outside the pagefile in RAM to inside the pagefile in RAM.

[Monty_Python]

I have 6gb of ram.....I run NO page file(0 mb), no issues.

Vista-64

[nd4spdbh2]

What's the point of having the pagefile in the RAM? Doesn't windows dump to pagefile what doesn't fit in memory? So when you use RAM for your pagefile you just end up moving stuff from outside the pagefile in RAM to inside the pagefile in RAM.

alot of programs store stuff to the pagefile regardless if there is still ram available... putting the PF on a ramdisk essentially forces the program to strictly use ram.

[vlaszlo]

i use ramdisk since 1 year in non adressable memory space on XP 32bit.

Unmanaged Memory

With PAE-mode enabled, all 32-bit Windows editions can potentially access up to 64 GB of main memory. Nonetheless, different Windows editions limit the amount of main memory they support to 2, 3.25 or 4 GB.

SuperSpeed's RamDisk Plus 9.0 features support to utilize main memory that Windows does not.



What is unmanaged memory?

We call the main memory that Windows does not use or manage "Unmanaged Memory", or UM. On a machine running 32-bit Windows XP SP2 or Vista with 4 GB of main memory installed and with PAE mode enabled, Windows limits the amount of main memory available to a maximum of 3.25 GB. This leaves 0.75 GB of main memory unused or unmanaged by Windows.

With RamDisk Plus 9.0, that 0.75 GB of main memory unused or unmanaged by Windows (Unmanaged Memory, UM) can now be put to work! What's more, UM can be used right along with the physical memory that Windows manages. In the case described above, RamDisk Plus 9.0 can create a RAM disk as large as 3.5 GB! On a machine running 32-bit Windows XP SP2 or Vista with 8 GB of main memory installed and with PAE mode enabled, a RAM disk up to 7.5 GB can be created!



I have much less hard disk trashing with pagefile in memory, and cant live without it anymore ...

[nd4spdbh2]

how does one enable PAE?

so what ur saying is i could keep my beloved windows xp pro 32bit run 4gb of ram (4x1gb) and use 2gb for a ram disk and 2gb for normal ram?

[KTE]

Yeah, I use a 2GB RAMDisk since just over 2 years now. 2002 is when I first started using this method though, on practically every desktop I use. I mainly use it as a cache along with another method, i.e. http://picasaweb.google.co.uk/KTEALIN/RAMDisk#

[nd4spdbh2]

what program u use to create the ram disk?

[vlaszlo]

what program u use to create the ram disk?

SuperSpeed RamDisk Plus 10

[risingsun]

It's on a laptop, so upgrading the mobo - quite a problem. Also, the expanding the memory on a 32 bit operating system just uses paging, and its not the best approach. All it does is create a larger page table in the ram and it pages to the extra address spaces, this eats up a small amount of CPU time each time it pages which adds up.

Also I was wondering if anyone has any benchmarks on the situation, as I've heard putting the swap into the ramdisk also conusumes cpu, but not much. I've heard it can have a reverse affect because of the way a system allocates paging, or somthing similar.

Any thoughts?

[vlaszlo]

It's on a laptop, so upgrading the mobo - quite a problem. Also, the expanding the memory on a 32 bit operating system just uses paging, and its not the best approach. All it does is create a larger page table in the ram and it pages to the extra address spaces, this eats up a small amount of CPU time each time it pages which adds up.

Also I was wondering if anyone has any benchmarks on the situation, as I've heard putting the swap into the ramdisk also conusumes cpu, but not much. I've heard it can have a reverse affect because of the way a system allocates paging, or somthing similar.

Any thoughts?

Every executed instruction consumes cpu time 'no matter' what it does. If ramdisk is really paging to ram, that must be faster than reading and writing to hdd sequentially. (5000-10000 MB/s vs 50-100 MB/s that is 100x difference)

It is reverse in effect becouse of theory of pagefile operation (to free up more ram). But if you put your ram disk into space between 3.3 and 4 GB wich windows 32bit cant use anyway it has positive effect.

[vlaszlo]

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[SuperMiguel]

not bad