SSD and Ramcaching

[Sion 1]

Hi

Asus x79 Deluxe Mobo
3930k cpu
G Skill 32gb ram
Samsung 840pro 250gb SSD
Sapphire Vapour- X Ghz HD 7970 6gb

Can anyone advise.Is it possible/advisable or even necessary to use Intels ISRT Technology to manage a Ramcache 16GB married to my SSD.

I intend to put my Windows 7 os onto the ssd along with various other programmes , Archicad being one of them.

Firstly is it possible.I guess I would have to set Raid in the bios prior to proceeding with the installation? Then load windows os and ISRT drivers.Make a Ramcache using RAMDISK or similar.And then open the ISRTY configurator and select the two drives to "merge"

As I understand it ,ISRT would then reload/manage the most often used programmes onto the cache when booting up windows?

One drive would be seen ?

Any advantages? Will it work?

Comments please.?http://forums.anandtech.com/images/smilies/familiar/whistling.gif

 

[Cerb]

Let Windows handle your spare RAM. If you need or want one big partition, use SRT. If your performance-critical data and the OS can all fit on the SSD, then do a typical C:/D: setup, instead.

With SRT, yes, you end up with one logical drive. With Ramcache, you assume that the OS is really really bad at its job, and depending on configuration, reduce the reliability of your system, wrt to data integrity after an unexpected power loss. But, Windows Vista and up are pretty good at using your RAM, so let them. Loopy benchmarks can make a RAM drive look really good, but it typically takes very specific workloads for it to really be useful, especially when the OS will cache data very well.

With 32GB of RAM, and a Samsung 840, you will be fine.

 

[Sion 1]

Hi Cerb

Firstly thanks for the reply.

Can you tell me what "depending on configuration], wrt to data integrity after an unexpected power loss" means?

I assume it means that any data temporarily stored on the ram would be lost if the machine crashes/freezes?

Typically Archicad writes to a locatable crash backup folder every 5 minutes, if that were the case presumably if one was operating the archicad ap through a ramcache the memory back up write would still occur back to the ssd.?

Also you mention configuration and imply that a stable system may be possible and reliable?

Thks

 

[Cerb]

Pretty much. It's one more thing to fail, if used more as a RAM drive.

While the RAM cache lets you choose to prefer certain data in RAM, if you can come anywhere near using it all, Windows will have most of it in RAM, anyway. If you use the same stuff over and over again, the default settings for Superfetch will pre-fill it, even, when you log on. Windows generally does a really good job of it, and 32GB should offer plenty of headroom, most of the time.

Windows has been using free RAM for caching for a long time, now, and has been doing it well for systems with lots of RAM since Vista.

If your working set can't fit in the SSD, RST could help speed things up a good bit, by caching for the HDD (unlisted in OP). When it is on, you'll just have a single visible drive, the size of the HDD (unlisted in OP).

http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/foru...xtreme-socket-2011-motherboard-review-18.html
Also, curiously, this has been the only benchmark I've found for it, and it's not even done correctly, missing the obvious real benchmark to compare to: the SSD-only case.