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Any post on this forum about Readyboost

S

Siliconbits

Junior Member
I was looking to get a bit more info from you guys regarding RB. The best link I've got from Google is http://blogs.msdn.com/tomarcher/archive/2006/06/02/615199.aspx. I want to know if there are anyone out there who tickled with it and what are the real world performance increases. Thanks

PS: Also is there any website which has published a list of compatible storage devices. I've heard that the PNY Attache drives can't be used. I was also looking forward to know whether mini 1.8-inch drives might be used - although that might defeat the actual purpose of RB.
 
From what I've read the case is that pretty much any USB flash drive can be used, the higher the storage capacity the greater the benefit. I'm intersted too and I'll be picking up Vista early (seeing as I'll get it at a knock-down price) to see what it's like and if readyboost gives the kind of performance increase they make it out to be.
 
Anandtech should definitely do a writeup on this one. I wonder what 4+4+4+4+4 would give. Four Cores, Four GB memory, Four GB flash, Four Hard drives in Raid0+1 and Four graphics core in SLI ;-)...
 
I'm using a 2gb Compact Flash drive in the side of my Dell monitor. I can't give performance benefits though because it's been there since I installed Vista.
 
Based on the general R/W speed of flash memory, it would probably be better than swapping to a hard drive but worse than having more DRAM installed. Response time should be good, but most flash drives are only something like 30MBps (about 1/100th the STR of RAM, and about half that of a 7200RPM hard drive).
 
I've seen some benches. The performance was bery meager. In many cases, things actually got slower.

It's better to invest in more ram in my opinion. Plus, using flash memory in such a capacity would probably kill the drive in a few years tops.

Not all drives can be used. Only sufficiently fast ones.
 
Originally posted by: Matthias99
Based on the general R/W speed of flash memory, it would probably be better than swapping to a hard drive but worse than having more DRAM installed. Response time should be good, but most flash drives are only something like 30MBps (about 1/100th the STR of RAM, and about half that of a 7200RPM hard drive).
Click to expand...

ReadyBoost does not move the swap file to the flash drive. It uses the flash drive for file caching.
 
I don't the RB is really supposed to give large performance boosts on machines that are already pretty fast and have a decent amount of RAM. It's mainly intended for folks with other machines as an alternative to opening up the box and putting in more memory, as far as I can tell. I know you'll definitely see a larger benefit on a machine with less memory than one with more...
 
Originally posted by: MrChad
Originally posted by: Matthias99
Based on the general R/W speed of flash memory, it would probably be better than swapping to a hard drive but worse than having more DRAM installed. Response time should be good, but most flash drives are only something like 30MBps (about 1/100th the STR of RAM, and about half that of a 7200RPM hard drive).
Click to expand...

ReadyBoost does not move the swap file to the flash drive. It uses the flash drive for file caching.
Click to expand...

I thought they were using it as extra RAM swap space as well. In any case, it's going to be worse than installing more RAM, but better than having to pull data straight from the HD.

Although for really big bulk transfers of data, it may be better to go straight from the HD (since STR is usually significantly better on a modern 7200RPM HD than on a USB flash drive).
 
Originally posted by: zephyrprime
I've seen some benches. The performance was bery meager. In many cases, things actually got slower.

It's better to invest in more ram in my opinion. Plus, using flash memory in such a capacity would probably kill the drive in a few years tops.

Not all drives can be used. Only sufficiently fast ones.
Click to expand...

besides which

Like all flash memory devices, flash drives can sustain only a limited number of write and erase cycles before failure. Mid-range flash drives under normal conditions will support several hundred thousand cycles, although write operations will gradually slow as the device ages. This should be a consideration when using a flash drive to run application software or an operating system.
Click to expand...

 
I plugged in my external HDD into Vista the other day and it asked me if I wanted to use ReadyBoost on it. I just kind of chuckled and said 'No'. Sorry, but why would I want ReadyBoost on a USB (480MB/s theoretical max) HDD to cache files from a SATA1 (1.5GB/s theoretical max) Raptor...? Although the max speeds are never really reached (I usually see sustained speeds of 30-40Mb/s which is only 240-320MB/s), there's still no point in going from one drive to another (especially when the raptor is a faster drive).
 
I bought a 4GB flash stick (150X speed) to try Readyboost with...I'm hoping it might help improve performance a bit with games. Considering I already have 2 gigs of RAM though, it may be worthless. Oh well...just $50. Upgrading to 4 gigs of RAM would have cost me about $250 at the current inflated DDR2 prices.
 
Windows Vista can only use one flash drive at a time for ReadyBoost. Here's one that's specially optomized for RB: 1GB Corsair TurboFlash, $20

I think the best showcase for ReadyBoost would be systems that are running Vista on 1GB of RAM or less, perhaps with slow hard drives too. Plug in the flash drive, assign it to ReadyBoost duty, done. No need to open the case, pick the right RAM, worry about dual-channel, etc. For a novice, plugging in a USB drive is more in their comfort zone.
 
Originally posted by: Matthias99
Originally posted by: MrChad
Originally posted by: Matthias99
Based on the general R/W speed of flash memory, it would probably be better than swapping to a hard drive but worse than having more DRAM installed. Response time should be good, but most flash drives are only something like 30MBps (about 1/100th the STR of RAM, and about half that of a 7200RPM hard drive).
Click to expand...

ReadyBoost does not move the swap file to the flash drive. It uses the flash drive for file caching.
Click to expand...

I thought they were using it as extra RAM swap space as well. In any case, it's going to be worse than installing more RAM, but better than having to pull data straight from the HD.

Although for really big bulk transfers of data, it may be better to go straight from the HD (since STR is usually significantly better on a modern 7200RPM HD than on a USB flash drive).
Click to expand...

It's just another level in the cache hierarchy. It holds a subset of the system cache. Files above a certain size are not stored on the readyboost device due to the STR factor that you mentioned. FWIW, I get subjective performance improvements with it enabled on my system with 2GB of RAM. Might be mostly placebo effect but it seems a bit snappier so I'll leave it on when I'm in Vista.
 
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