Is it possible to use GPU ram as a ram disk?

[Makaveli]

It can be done but why? and what about PCI-E latencies?

System RAM is likely faster, cheaper and bigger. Buying a video card for these purposes is complete non-sense.

I don't think OP ment you would buy a videocard and dedicate it to this.

He was just asking about using left over Vram.

 

[Lorne]

I know it can be done ( I did it on a C=128(256k) w/64k vid memory durring the BBS days) Its just finding somone willing to program for it.

 

[00Logic]

I think this is a very good idea and I would use it on the spare VRAM on my dedicated Physx card, as the 1st tier of cache with Primochache.
2nd tier SSD.
3rd tier HDD.
This would give you the space of a HDD with performance on par with or faster than a SSD for often used files.

I dont beleive Primocache and similar apps can outperform MS's prefetcher/fancycache, so don't feel it a good idea to use 3rd party caching software in system ram.

My reason for joining/posting is that there is an app coming that will do this!
https://github.com/x1596357/vramfs-on-Windows

 

[IntelUser2000]

There's no point:
https://regmedia.co.uk/2015/10/23/intel_nvme_2.jpg?x=648&y=331&infer_y=1

Look at the last two bars. You'd be limited absolutely by PCI Express interface and software latency. In a few months NVMe Optane drives will do the same thing.

 

[00Logic]

There's no point:
https://regmedia.co.uk/2015/10/23/intel_nvme_2.jpg?x=648&y=331&infer_y=1

Look at the last two bars. You'd be limited absolutely by PCI Express interface and software latency. In a few months NVMe Optane drives will do the same thing.

I don't have an Optane Drive... You?
Will I be able to afford an Optane drive, or, more likely IMHO, MRAM? Probably not.
(MRAM: 800MT/sec/in, 1.6 billion IOPS, already shipping...)

This is about using what I do have to improve on the std tiered caching in most machines:

I do have dedicated PhysX card with 2 GB of VRAM, which means that 1.5+ gigs of available RAM is sitting idle in my machine
The VRAM Disk speed in the Linux Version:

Its already and wont cost anything to implement as another tier in my L1 - L2 - L3 - DRAM - SSD (RAID 0) - HDD caching scheme.
So, after DRAM:
My most used files will be available @ ~2GB/s
My 2nd most used files will be available at 890 MB/s (2 OCZ Vertex 4s in RAID 0)
Everything else on the HDD/s.
ie: I should end up with a ~1.5 GB/s (averaged), 2TB ''drive with this caching scheme, for no extra cost... except for a bit of research and thought!

 

[Headfoot]

I don't have an Optane Drive... You?
Will I be able to afford an Optane drive, or, more likely IMHO, MRAM? Probably not.
(MRAM: 800MT/sec/in, 1.6 billion IOPS, already shipping...)

This is about using what I do have to improve on the std tiered caching in most machines:

I do have dedicated PhysX card with 2 GB of VRAM, which means that 1.5+ gigs of available RAM is sitting idle in my machine
The VRAM Disk speed in the Linux Version:

Its already and wont cost anything to implement as another tier in my L1 - L2 - L3 - DRAM - SSD (RAID 0) - HDD caching scheme.
So, after DRAM:
My most used files will be available @ ~2GB/s
My 2nd most used files will be available at 890 MB/s (2 OCZ Vertex 4s in RAID 0)
Everything else on the HDD/s.
ie: I should end up with a ~1.5 GB/s (averaged), 2TB ''drive with this caching scheme, for no extra cost... except for a bit of research and thought!

This is cool and all, but software development is very, very far from free. Maybe if this guy ports it over and tests it across many machines on his own, but I doubt it.

 

[00Logic]

This is cool and all, but software development is very, very far from free. Maybe if this guy ports it over and tests it across many machines on his own, but I doubt it.

I think the Primocache and Fancycache etc guys will be more than happy to get into the software side of things, if they knew about it...
They cant compete with Superfetch and Prefetch etc in main RAM with their Block Caching and they know it.
So while they may have fooled some with running HDD/SSD benchmarks on a Ramdisk essentially; many are turned off by this ruse.
ie: An easily available and cheap alternate source of RAM is what there are or should be praying for...
I will get around to writing them probably, but don't want to end up paying them for 'my' idea.

There is no shortage of beta testers available!