Gigabyte i-RAM (OcUK has it in stock)

Is there really any point in putting your OS on a RAM drive? the only thing you will improve is startup time which is only a matter of seconds anway. You could just suspend to ram instead of powering down completely. If you have enough system ram, most of the OS will stay in the RAM in any case.
 
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Burned_Alive said:
Doesnt an XP install take up more than 4gb after formatting anyway?

Plus, you cant leave your pc off without power for more than 24 hours otherwise itll lose the install
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Current still flows through the motherboard provided the PSU is connected and plugged in. When you shutdown your computer, it still draws power from the socket. On my motherboard an LED stays on to show this.
 
Burned_Alive said:
Doesnt an XP install take up more than 4gb after formatting anyway?

Plus, you cant leave your pc off without power for more than 24 hours otherwise itll lose the install
Click to expand...

18 hours so i heard!!!(so pray that you dont get a power cut) An OS install is all this would be good for, although obviously fast. A mate of a mate has tried one, and apparently putting an OS on can be a tad awkward.

That said im still intrested in one, if the price drops
 
Foehammer2003 said:
18 hours so i heard!!!(so pray that you dont get a power cut) An OS install is all this would be good for, although obviously fast. A mate of a mate has tried one, and apparently putting an OS on can be a tad awkward.
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Why would it be any more awkward than installing an OS on a 4gig HDD?

My last fresh install of windows took up just over 2gig, 4 gig is plenty.
 
Burned_Alive said:
Doesnt an XP install take up more than 4gb after formatting anyway?

Plus, you cant leave your pc off without power for more than 24 hours otherwise itll lose the install
Click to expand...
most PSU's these days still draw power and supply power to the mobo as long as they're plugged into the socket (hence why some optical mice still stay powered up dispite the pc being turned off.)
the only way your going to lose data on these is if you have a SERIOUS powercut that lasts about 20 hours... and lets be honest, that rarely ever happens (infact the longest i remember is about 12ish).

mosfet said:
What are you complaining about? This is always the way, if you want the latest high-performance device, you have to pay a premium.
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i'm not sure if thats aimed at me, or athe guy who made the comment about having to sell everything he owns to do with his pc to afford it.
personally, i'm only complaining about UK pricing. yes this is brand new stuff, yes its high end, high performance hardware we're dealing with. and yes, there has always been a divide betwee UK/US pricing... but when your talking about us paying over double the US price... its a little ridiculous.
an american competitor has these for $80 on release (of course not including shipping), whilst OcUK sold them for almost £180 on release.

again, this isn't really a dig at OcUK - more of the annoying price of hardware/goods in the UK compared with elsewhere.
 
nikebee said:
most PSU's these days still draw power and supply power to the mobo as long as they're plugged into the socket (hence why some optical mice still stay powered up dispite the pc being turned off.)
the only way your going to lose data on these is if you have a SERIOUS powercut that lasts about 20 hours... and lets be honest, that rarely ever happens (infact the longest i remember is about 12ish).



i'm not sure if thats aimed at me, or athe guy who made the comment about having to sell everything he owns to do with his pc to afford it.
personally, i'm only complaining about UK pricing. yes this is brand new stuff, yes its high end, high performance hardware we're dealing with. and yes, there has always been a divide betwee UK/US pricing... but when your talking about us paying over double the US price... its a little ridiculous.
an american competitor has these for $80 on release (of course not including shipping), whilst OcUK sold them for almost £180 on release.

again, this isn't really a dig at OcUK - more of the annoying price of hardware/goods in the UK compared with elsewhere.
Click to expand...

Don't forget that American prices in stores or any other place do not include tax.
Tax can be different depending on on what state, county....
I wanted to buy a sound card over there and by the time tax was added it came to nearly the same as over here.
Add shipping to that and most times it's not worth it
 
Ice Tea said:
£176.19

That can't be right the whole idea of the card was it was going to be cheap
and sold worldwide for less than $150.

In the USA they are about $115 wich is about £62

?
Click to expand...
Add tax.
Tax is different in every state and county.
Government tax
State tax
Local tax
When you buy in American stores you have to pay local and state tax.
Even if it is shipped over here.
 
pointless device, unreliable, ONLY suited to a small XP install, might be ok for a HTPC, and again pointless for vista which weighs in at 8 gb (the beta version I have wouldnt fit on a 10gb harddrive, after formatting it was 7.23 something or other, not enough! doh)
 
too small, apart from windows, you couldnt put much else on it
that would then defy the point of getting one if you had to put games and media on a hard drive.

Would be an awsome page file drive though. :)
 
nikebee said:
i'm not sure if thats aimed at me, or athe guy who made the comment about having to sell everything he owns to do with his pc to afford it.
personally, i'm only complaining about UK pricing. yes this is brand new stuff, yes its high end, high performance hardware we're dealing with. and yes, there has always been a divide betwee UK/US pricing... but when your talking about us paying over double the US price... its a little ridiculous.
an american competitor has these for $80 on release (of course not including shipping), whilst OcUK sold them for almost £180 on release.

again, this isn't really a dig at OcUK - more of the annoying price of hardware/goods in the UK compared with elsewhere.
Click to expand...

I don't agree with the pricing of the iRAM in this country. We get ripped off in general, especially with this product.

Regardless of the price of the iRAM, however, even if it was free, the cost of 4x1gig sticks of DDR RAM is a lot of money for essentially a fast hard disk.
 
mosfet said:
What are you complaining about? This is always the way, if you want the latest high-performance device, you have to pay a premium.
Click to expand...


It's not so much the cost of the i-ram its the cost of memory for 4GB that scares me. I have been in fairly early in the past when in comes to cd/dvd writers. I still have my plextor scsi cdrw that cost £250 & two scsi dc roms at £70 each back in 2000. My first BTC 2X writer cost me about £250 also. I bought a 1GB flash drive when everyone elase at 256mb. Trust me when there is a big benefit I do buy into technology just not right near the start. I want one of those i-ram Solid State drives now but I have seen technology improve so fast in the past I will wait for ddr2 at least and maybe 16MB capacity. £117 for the card isn't that steep I just will wait for larger capacity. My 1GB usb drive will be replaced with a 4 or 8 GB drive, after years of buying cd/dvd writers then a year later buying another I want at least 4 times more storage. Who bought a 12X dvd writer? better to replace your 8X with a 16X. My first post was meant in sarcasm. :)
 
What's the point in a DDR2 version? The iRAM is limited by being connected to the PCI bus which has 133Mb/sec max bandwidth. The iRAM will be fighting with other PCI devices for access to the bus. HDD controllers were moved off the main PCI bus in around 1999 (Intel Hub architecture on the i800 series) to free up PCI bandwidth.

An iRAM that uses PCI express is a different matter. As is SATAII because then there might be a device that can actually used the available bandwidth!
 
So will this work on my asus socket a mobo? I remember a review site was saying something about the different pci voltages, can anyone help me out here? Also what sort of memory can I put in it? Anything?
 
MagicBoy said:
What's the point in a DDR2 version? The iRAM is limited by being connected to the PCI bus which has 133Mb/sec max bandwidth. The iRAM will be fighting with other PCI devices for access to the bus. HDD controllers were moved off the main PCI bus in around 1999 (Intel Hub architecture on the i800 series) to free up PCI bandwidth.

An iRAM that uses PCI express is a different matter. As is SATAII because then there might be a device that can actually used the available bandwidth!
Click to expand...

I think you got it wrong, it's only using the pci to get juice, the actually data goes through the sata controller.
 
i am really tempted by one of these but cant justify the cost with it being limited by the SATA bandwidth.

i'll wait for the 2nd version with SATA2/DDR2 etc.

hopefully the 3rd gen will use PCI-E bandwidth. that will be a real performance leap.

imagine a 16GB boot drive with memory latency and bandwidth of 8/900 MB/sec :D
 
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