• We’re currently investigating an issue related to the forum theme and styling that is impacting page layout and visual formatting. The problem has been identified, and we are actively working on a resolution. There is no impact to user data or functionality, this is strictly a front-end display issue. We’ll post an update once the fix has been deployed. Thanks for your patience while we get this sorted.

Using flash dive (thumb drive) as Ram

P

praveentech

Junior Member
hi all
i have doubt , can we use thumbdrive as RAM as it is faster than the hardisk. normally windows uses hardisk as virtual memory .

can we usse thumbdrive as addtional to ram ?

anyone tried it ?

thanks

regards

praveen
 
I don't think you can actually use one as RAM, but you may be able to assign a Windows page file to it. It wouldn't be any faster though, in fact, it would likely be much slower.

A USB 2.0 interface has a maximum speed of 480 Mbps. If my math is right, that works out to just shy of 58 MB/sec. That's in the ball park of most drives' sequential transfer rates, but much slower than their burst rates. But the real problem is that flash drives generally read/write much slower than 480 Mbps anyway.

Check out the read/write speeds of this flash drive: Link
As you can see, it can only write at 9 MB/sec. A hard drive is much faster than that. Forget about comparing it to RAM speeds, not even remotely close.

Basically, you are better off just investing in more RAM.
 
You are certainly better off investing in more RAM. As I recall though, this feature was, at one time, touted to be supported in Windows Vista...
 
Taken from http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/features/foreveryone/performance.mspx

Windows ReadyBoost
Adding system memory (RAM) is often the best way to improve your PC's performance. More memory means applications can run without needing to access the hard drive. However, upgrading memory is not always easy. You need to know what type of memory you need, purchase the memory, and open your computer to install the memory?which sometimes can invalidate your support agreement. Also, some machines have limited memory expansion capabilities, preventing you from adding RAM even if you are willing to do so.

Windows Vista introduces a new concept in adding memory to a system. Windows ReadyBoost lets users use a removable flash memory device, such as a USB thumb drive, to improve system performance without opening the box. Windows ReadyBoost can improve system performance because it can retrieve data kept on the flash memory more quickly than it can retrieve data kept on the hard disk, decreasing the time you need to wait for your PC to respond. Combined with SuperFetch technology, this can help drive impressive improvements in system responsiveness.

Windows ReadyBoost technology is reliable and provides protection of the data stored on your device. You can remove the memory device at any time without any loss of data or negative impact to the system; however, if you remove the device, your performance returns to the level you experienced without the device. Additionally, data on the removable memory device is encrypted to help prevent inappropriate access to data when the device is removed.
Click to expand...

@Rat - USB 2.0 flash drives have hit real world benchmarks of 27 MB/s (read) and 24 MB/s (write) with seek times as low as 0.5 ms. SATA-II HD's right now hit anywhere between 35 MB/s and 70 MB/s in sustained operations (not in a RAID) with a seek time of just under 6ms on the 10k drives. I'd say that, in certain applications, an external USB 2.0 flash drive may be faster than using the pagefile.
 
just as an FYI related to this topic, flash memory has a LIMITED number of writes that it can handle. so using it in this area, while possible, would most likely be inpractical.
 
Originally posted by: shader
just as an FYI related to this topic, flash memory has a LIMITED number of writes that it can handle. so using it in this area, while possible, would most likely be inpractical.
Click to expand...

Each cell in the flash memory has a limited number of read/write cycles. I think it's something in the range of 10,000 or 100,000. So if you re-wrote to one cell 100k times in a row, it would probably die. However, flash controllers mitigate this by writing to many different cells, not the same set over and over again. So, while flash memory still will wear out eventually (and probably faster than a hard disk or RAM), it's not as bad as it sounds.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Back
Top