http://memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk
anyone here use this or have any info on it?
anyone here use this or have any info on it?
RamDisk
- Thread starter APM
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I use a ramdisk for compiling code. Have done for several years now. I also went through a phase of running my operating system from a ramdisk.
It's appealing for compilation because all the generated data is inherently temporary - there's no loss when you reboot and it all evaporates.
For an operating system, updates and installing software are a hassle since the changes are thrown away on reboot. But equally, if you pick up a virus, that gets thrown away too. The compensation is that it the user experience is spectacular - everything happens immediately.
I don't however use that ramdisk - I appended something like the following to /etc/fstab for the compiler disk and jumped through a lot of hoops for the OS variant:
Windows can't do this sort of stuff out of the box, but a virtual machine containing Windows can be put on a ramdisk without any hassle and works very, very well.
It's appealing for compilation because all the generated data is inherently temporary - there's no loss when you reboot and it all evaporates.
For an operating system, updates and installing software are a hassle since the changes are thrown away on reboot. But equally, if you pick up a virus, that gets thrown away too. The compensation is that it the user experience is spectacular - everything happens immediately.
I don't however use that ramdisk - I appended something like the following to /etc/fstab for the compiler disk and jumped through a lot of hoops for the OS variant:
Code:
tmpfs ~/dev tmpfs size=12G 0 0Windows can't do this sort of stuff out of the box, but a virtual machine containing Windows can be put on a ramdisk without any hassle and works very, very well.
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Works fairly well in my experience.
Pretty easy to setup. Install, reboot. Setup Ramdisk size, set other details, like to create a new one every boot, restore from disk, save to disk on shut down, etc.
Personally, I use it for video recording, image manipulation, photoshop scratchdisk, VM's, development, sensitive data handling, and certain games (where they update lots or for better loading times if it's found to help). But one of the drawbacks of this particular software Ramdisk is that at larger sizes, it slows down more than some other Ramdisk software. So a 32GB Ramdisk for example that goes at 1600Mhz DDR3, may only produce 3-6GB transfer speeds compared to a 4GB or less Ramdisk using the same software that will be between 8-12GB transfer speeds. (Although admittedly, I doubt anyone can really tell the difference between 4GB transfer speed vs 12GB transfer speed)
For most people, probably not worth the effort, as you won't have enough RAM to make a Ramdisk of worthwhile size.
4GB is certainly not going to be big enough for most games, and may be too small for certain projects. Although everyone can certainly get this for free with this software assuming you have the RAM to spare.
8GB will be workable in many cases for more professional pursuits, but gaming might be tough for more modern games. But most systerms with 12-16GB RAM probably will be better served with an extra SSD in comparison to costs of more RAM to make a small Ramdisk.
16GB+ size Ramdisks (24GB total RAM or more in the system) is probably where you'd want it to be if you want to include gaming. But again, in all these cases, a SSD can probably take place of the Ramdisk without any major drawback in comparison. Especially when price is factored in. Unless they have a very specific use for the Ramdisk that only it can provide (usually security related I would imagine).
Pretty easy to setup. Install, reboot. Setup Ramdisk size, set other details, like to create a new one every boot, restore from disk, save to disk on shut down, etc.
Personally, I use it for video recording, image manipulation, photoshop scratchdisk, VM's, development, sensitive data handling, and certain games (where they update lots or for better loading times if it's found to help). But one of the drawbacks of this particular software Ramdisk is that at larger sizes, it slows down more than some other Ramdisk software. So a 32GB Ramdisk for example that goes at 1600Mhz DDR3, may only produce 3-6GB transfer speeds compared to a 4GB or less Ramdisk using the same software that will be between 8-12GB transfer speeds. (Although admittedly, I doubt anyone can really tell the difference between 4GB transfer speed vs 12GB transfer speed)
For most people, probably not worth the effort, as you won't have enough RAM to make a Ramdisk of worthwhile size.
4GB is certainly not going to be big enough for most games, and may be too small for certain projects. Although everyone can certainly get this for free with this software assuming you have the RAM to spare.
8GB will be workable in many cases for more professional pursuits, but gaming might be tough for more modern games. But most systerms with 12-16GB RAM probably will be better served with an extra SSD in comparison to costs of more RAM to make a small Ramdisk.
16GB+ size Ramdisks (24GB total RAM or more in the system) is probably where you'd want it to be if you want to include gaming. But again, in all these cases, a SSD can probably take place of the Ramdisk without any major drawback in comparison. Especially when price is factored in. Unless they have a very specific use for the Ramdisk that only it can provide (usually security related I would imagine).
Ok,
thanks for that guys,
a nice introduction to a tech I was previously unfamiliar with but as I'm only running 8GB RAM now I can't see there being too much benefit in playing about with it.
Maybe I'll return after I move up to 16GB.
What's the best version to try?
thanks for that guys,
a nice introduction to a tech I was previously unfamiliar with but as I'm only running 8GB RAM now I can't see there being too much benefit in playing about with it.
Maybe I'll return after I move up to 16GB.
What's the best version to try?
Unless you have a very specific need (usage case), there really isn't any need. It was a interesting tech a few years ago when SSDs were expensive and RAM relatively cheap, and there are a few usage cases now when raw IO and security are paramount, but if you don't know what they may be, it's only going to be a novelty.
I use it.
I have 48GB in my main Intel and 32 in my main AMD and in both cases games are not any faster at all.
Maybe I might get a second or so improvement, but if you are hoping for a speed increase, you wont get it and if you do, then its because your HD is too slow.
What I do think its giving me a nice benefit of, is that I have a seperate HD purely for my torrents, and since the HD is thrashing itself like hell, I find it a little better to actually download my torrents into the RAMDISK and then when they have finished downloading, they then get stored to the NAS for seeding.
Other than that, I dont really know what use it would be?
I have 48GB in my main Intel and 32 in my main AMD and in both cases games are not any faster at all.
Maybe I might get a second or so improvement, but if you are hoping for a speed increase, you wont get it and if you do, then its because your HD is too slow.
What I do think its giving me a nice benefit of, is that I have a seperate HD purely for my torrents, and since the HD is thrashing itself like hell, I find it a little better to actually download my torrents into the RAMDISK and then when they have finished downloading, they then get stored to the NAS for seeding.
Other than that, I dont really know what use it would be?
Any application where fast read and writes are required like photo and video editing. With games loading faster it's not a case of your hard drive being too slow as much as your other components being too slow to make the hard drive a bottleneck in loading times.
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Of course, I suppose, if you are working on an app that only takes the section it needs from Disk, then having the video held on RAMDISK would be beneficial, and so you copy the file from HD to the RAMdisk, work on it, then copy it back when done, would I suppose be neneficial in many ways.
If the entire video is copied to RAM however, then the RAMdisk would not be better.
Im only thinking, in that with the amount of RAM that most of us have, is more than enough ram to have the entire video completely held in RAM, and that will remove the need of having a RAMdisk completely!
I suppose its down to the particular app that is used perhaps?
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The only issue is, not all apps will leave files in memory even when you have loads of it. Whether it's because of the OS not doing this, or the application itself not doing so. Whilst it's certainly possible to upgrade all required OS/apps, sometimes it's just easier to slap on a Ramdisk if it's viable instead and let everything be writable somewhere as well as being accessible that way (if you need to copy and paste over to other projects such as in big video projects as suggested).