Invisible Memory

[sigi]

The 3.3GB/3.4GB I quoted are from memory only, having read that Vista-32 cannot use more that that.

VSuite Ramdisk's "Options" screen shows "OS Invisible Memory: 1020MB".
Windows Task Manager shows "Physical Memory total: 3069MB".
Adding the two together gives 4089MB, not the 4096MB I am supposed to have.

I created a second Ramdisk with 508MB, together with the first one with 512MB that adds up to 1020MB.
How can I make sur that I am only using "OS Invisible Memory"?
(As a test, I added a third Ramdisk with 1024MB, again requesting "Use OS Invisible Memory", and VSuite created it without complaining that there is no "OS Invisible Memory" left!)

And if any of the Ramdisks is using Vista-32 usable memory, the size of which of the two Ramdisk do I have to reduce?

[Support]

4089MB shall be ok, because IM size is aligned when detecting IM,

You can view IM usage by checking the ramdisk's properties. In property mode, it shall display "IM size: xx MB". If the value is 0MB, then that ramdisk is not using IM.

when you tick "Use OS Invisible Memory" option, the ramdisk always tries to use IM at first. For eg, in your case, you have 1020MB IM and you can create a ramdisk of 2000MB with "Use OS Invisible Memory" option ticked. The ramdisk will at first to check the available IM size, and if it finds no enough IM it will use visible memory for the insufficient part. here it will use 980MB visible memory.

You can use Windows Task Manager to monitor the "Available Physical Memory" item before/after a ramdisk is created. If the ramdisk is using IM, this value shall not be reduced. If using visible memory, this value shall be changed.

[sigi]

I like very much the idea that OS Invisible Memory, a resource wasted so far by Vista-32, can be put to good use as a Ramdisk.

To insure that the Ramdisk does not use any Vista usable memory, I created one with only 992MB (which is also aligned on a 32MB boundary).

I have directed the four temp folders of the Environment variables to the Temp folder of the Ramdisk. The temp files use only a very small portion of the 992MB.

I specified to Vista that it can use the Ramdisk for the pagefile. No usage shown so far for it, as I kept a large pagefile on another disk.
Question: how do I tell Vista to use the Ramdisk first?

Then I directed the Firefox browser.cache.disk.parent_directory to the Ramdisk. But this also uses only a very small portion of the 992MB.

Two questions:
- the Vista ReadyBoost function seems to be a good candidate for the Ramdisk;
how do I tell Vista to direct ReadyBoost to the Ramdisk?
- the Vista Superfetch function seems to be a good candidate for the Ramdisk;
how do I tell Vista to direct Superfetch to the Ramdisk?

And a final question on VSuite: how do I select or deselect Overlapped IO Support
(http://www.romexsoftware.com/main/suppo ... ature.html)
and which one should I select for the above configuration?

Thanks.

[Support]

To enable Readyboost on the ramdisk, you can right-click the drive icon of the ramdisk in the "My computer", and then click the "Properties" in the popped-up menu. There is a tab named "Readyboost" in the "Properties Dialog". You can set it up then.
(on Vista, SCSI ramdisk may not support ReadyBoost in current release. On Windows 7, SCSI ramdisk can support ReadyBoost. We are checking this issue. And of couse, the size of a ramdisk to support ReadyBoost needs over 250MB size.)

We don't think SuperFetch is a good candidate for the Ramdisk. SuperFetch monitors which applications you use the most and preloads these into the system memory. So if applications/program files are located on the physical harddisk, then ramdisk can do nothing with it.

Regarding Overlapped IO feature, we suggest that you deselect Overlapped IO Support for your configuration.

Thank you.

[sigi]

On the "ReadyBoost" tab, I selected "use this device", then "apply" and "OK".
But when I go back there, the "ReadyBoost" screen again shows "do not use this device".
In other words, Vista did not accept the Ramdisk for the ReadyBoost function.
Is this because I choose "Direct IO Disk" for my Ramdisk, and, if so, should I use "SCSI Disk"?

Also, on the Vsuite Ramdisk screen, "Overlapped IO Support" is grayed out.
Is this because I choose "Direct IO Disk" for my Ramdisk, and, if so, should I use "SCSI Disk"?

[Support]

Will check and fix this ReadyBoost issue on Vista

Overlapped IO Support feature is enabled in the Server Edition. Other edtions don't support this feature.

[sdr]

hello, I have a very basic question, but I couldn't find the answer anywhere:

if I have 4GB RAM and my WinXP32bit sees only 3GB,
should I create RAMdisks for all the 4GB RAM and set it all as a directory for the pagefile?

[or should I keep some RAM not as RAMdisks? also, should I create separate RAMdisks for visible and invisible memory?]

what is the best solution here?

another quick question is: should I set the minimal pagefile size low or high? does it make any difference?

[Support]

Please note that a ramdisk, like other programs, employs system RAM. So user shall create a ramdisk with spare RAM.
Normally WinXP runs at 1GB level and you also reserve some RAM for other programs.

So if you create RAMdisks with all available RAM, then other programs may encouner insufficient RAM. Programs may fail or cause frequent paging swap, degrading computer's performance very much.

You can combine invisible and visible memory. It depends on your needs.

Pagefile:
minimum: initial size of the paging file. Windows will increase pagefile's size if it is too low.
maximum: highest size that a paging file can be increased.
You may search the internet for more information about pagefile, or ask Microsoft.

[sigi]

"Will check and fix this ReadyBoost issue on Vista"

Thank you very much.

Do you have an idea when you could have this fixed and the fix distributed?

Seeing how little activity there is for the Temp files, for the Firefox browser cache and the page file (still none!), ReadyBoost seems to be the only justification for having the RamDisk.

[Support]

really sorry, so far we have no idea when it will be fixed. However we are trying out best to fix it in the next release which is planned at the end of this month.

Thank you.