Ramdisk

On Fri, 20 Dec 2019 17:54:40 -0500, "Mayayana"
wrote:

I'm doing this on XP but that group seems to be rather quiet
these days.

Trying to set up ramdisk swap file on 32 bit. Have
16 GB RAM. Gavotte version didn't seem to work. ImDisk
worked fine. But there's a catch. Virtual memory settings
show that I set up 3 GB virtual memory on the ramdisk,
drive R, but there's now a pagefile.sys on C drive that's
taking up 3 GB. Settings show no swap file for C drive.

Have you tried measuring speed? CrystalDiskMark shows quite
impressive numbers for RAMDisks. If it's a faux RAMDisk, numbers will
be much lower.

What does this mean? Did it fail? Or is C:\pagefile.sys
just a quirk that can't be avoided when setting up a
ramdisk swap file?

I have the same problem. Can't use anything above the 4GB
limit.
Currently using the last free version of SoftPerfect RAM
Disk(v 3.4.8) for my browser profile folder. It's very fast, saves the
image at shutdown, pretty stable (1 crash in 6 months, but I keep
backups).
I don't use it for a swapfile because I rarely need more than
1GB swap on XP.
If you ever find something that works above the "limit",
please post.
[]'s

PS X-posted to the XP group. Just in case someone there has a
working setup.
--
Don't be evil - Google 2004
We have a new policy - Google 2012

Shadow wrote:
On Fri, 20 Dec 2019 17:54:40 -0500, "Mayayana"
wrote:

I'm doing this on XP but that group seems to be rather quiet
these days.

Trying to set up ramdisk swap file on 32 bit. Have
16 GB RAM. Gavotte version didn't seem to work. ImDisk
worked fine. But there's a catch. Virtual memory settings
show that I set up 3 GB virtual memory on the ramdisk,
drive R, but there's now a pagefile.sys on C drive that's
taking up 3 GB. Settings show no swap file for C drive.

Have you tried measuring speed? CrystalDiskMark shows quite
impressive numbers for RAMDisks. If it's a faux RAMDisk, numbers will
be much lower.
What does this mean? Did it fail? Or is C:\pagefile.sys
just a quirk that can't be avoided when setting up a
ramdisk swap file?

I have the same problem. Can't use anything above the 4GB
limit.
Currently using the last free version of SoftPerfect RAM
Disk(v 3.4.8) for my browser profile folder. It's very fast, saves the
image at shutdown, pretty stable (1 crash in 6 months, but I keep
backups).
I don't use it for a swapfile because I rarely need more than
1GB swap on XP.
If you ever find something that works above the "limit",
please post.
[]'s

PS X-posted to the XP group. Just in case someone there has a
working setup.

Dataram RAMDisk Driver
V4.0.4.2
Dataram RAMDiskVE Driver
Dataram, Inc.

RAMDiskXP.sys 62,464 bytes

Dataram_RAMDisk_v4_0_5_RC0.msi 5,567,488 bytes
SHA1: 95F123AF724206B9C8DD61DD76BF388098FE9B54

AFAIK, 4GB max size, for free. Even if the file versions
don't match, it's still a fine addition to a WinXP system
that has too much RAM.

*******

I have a single reference to that file in my Sent folder.
It goes as follows.

Dataram_RAMDisk_v4_0_5_RC0.msi

5,567,488 bytes
MD5 = 1c9c709c647d979b1277f6d756dce265
SHA1 = 95f123af724206b9c8dd61dd76bf388098fe9b54

Try here.

http://filehippo.com/download_ramdisk/tech/14475/

[Actually, try here. Took me a while to find this! Immediate download...]
https://filehippo.com/download_ramdisk/14475

The one "RAMDisk 4.0.5 RC0 (Windows) http://ramdisk.en.uptodown.com"
is corrupted. Looks like RAID array damage, 256KB
chunks of zeros in the file. So don't use that, until
someone reports it and they fix it.

Always check the checksums. The SHA1 is safer, if one is
available. If I start using SHA256, there would be more
whining from people attempting to check. You can always upload
a file to virustotal and they can calculate a SHA256 for you,
but the upload on virustotal is "pure flaky pastry".

So what you do with that, is install it, use the Configuration
Utility, then go to the Advanced tab to see your "freebie"
license limit and how much RAM the machine has.

https://i.postimg.cc/W1ZbJKjV/Advanced-tab.gif

As far as I know, if you purchase a license, it applies
to specific versions. My purchased license is for a later
version that doesn't do PAE. Which is fine, because that
machine has a better setup anyway. The above version
is specifically to get "more than your moneys worth"
from WinXP :-)

HTH,
Paul

"Paul" wrote

|
| http://filehippo.com/download_ramdisk/tech/14475/
|
| [Actually, try here. Took me a while to find this! Immediate
download...]
| https://filehippo.com/download_ramdisk/14475
|

Thanks. That seems to have worked. What a lot
of confusion! That's the first option I've found that
actually has instructions. ImDisk and Gavotte provided
no instructions at all. Dataram provides full instruction,
recognized the installed RAM, and specifically provided
an option to put the ramdisk above 4 GB.
Gavotte also didn't work but did bluescreen a couple of
times before I got it installed, only to see no ramdisk
and no explanation. ImDisk worked, showed a ramdisk,
but didn't know enough to put the swap file above 4 GB
in RAM.

I had to clear all swap and reboot in order to set
it up, but once I did that I was able to delete
C:\pagefil.sys.

It's funny how often the best programs are not
even on anyone's top ten list. Dataram seems to
say that they only allow 1 GB on the free version,
but I didn't find that. I had to go back to v. 3.5 to
get XP support *and* avoid the mess of installing
..Net 4. (And to skip the version you warned about.)
So maybe that's why there was no limit. It tried to
go lonline once during install, but aside from that
it now seems to be fine. I'll have to edit some giant
images and see how it works.

On Fri, 20 Dec 2019 20:00:10 -0500, Paul
wrote:

On Fri, 20 Dec 2019 17:54:40 -0500, "Mayayana"
wrote:

I'm doing this on XP but that group seems to be rather quiet
these days.

Trying to set up ramdisk swap file on 32 bit. Have
16 GB RAM. Gavotte version didn't seem to work. ImDisk
worked fine. But there's a catch. Virtual memory settings
show that I set up 3 GB virtual memory on the ramdisk,
drive R, but there's now a pagefile.sys on C drive that's
taking up 3 GB. Settings show no swap file for C drive.

...............


AFAIK, 4GB max size, for free. Even if the file versions
don't match, it's still a fine addition to a WinXP system
that has too much RAM.

*******

Dataram_RAMDisk_v4_0_5_RC0.msi

5,567,488 bytes
MD5 = 1c9c709c647d979b1277f6d756dce265
SHA1 = 95f123af724206b9c8dd61dd76bf388098fe9b54


[Actually, try here. Took me a while to find this! Immediate download...]
https://filehippo.com/download_ramdisk/14475


Always check the checksums.

I always do. They match...


Thanks for the info Paul. Dataram up and running.
I posted a few notes to Mayayana, which might help. I don't
see how using a swapfile in RAM will speed things up much for me,
since my system rarely uses it, but it certainly speeds the system up
if used for browser cache or TEMP folders ....
The only downside is Windows takes a little longer to shutdown
because it saves the image, so I use a small 128 -- 256MB image.

HTH,

It did, very much so...
Paul
[]'s
--
Don't be evil - Google 2004
We have a new policy - Google 2012

"Shadow" wrote

| I don't
| see how using a swapfile in RAM will speed things up much for me,
| since my system rarely uses it, but it certainly speeds the system up
| if used for browser cache or TEMP folders ....

It should reduce wear on SSDs, since the swap file seems
to be used even when it's not needed.

"Paul" wrote

| Dataram RAMDisk Driver
| V4.0.4.2
| Dataram RAMDiskVE Driver
| Dataram, Inc.
|

An update and warning on this:

I installed v. 3.5.130 for XP support. The most recent
versions don't support XP and a bit further back they
switched to .Net v. 4, which I prefer to avoid. It all
worked very well from the start and continues to work
well.

Except.... When I opened Visual Studio 6 I was getting
errors. It appears that the Dataram author is talented
with low-level operations but somewhat ignorant of
GUI programming. The program uses several ActiveX
controls, unnecessarily. And the installer makes an
unforgiveable mess of Registry settings. It actually
changes some specific interface settings without
registering the controls. I had to unregister and
re-register the system versions of those controls. It
was an amazingly messed up installer. And when I uninstall
I'll need to remember to watch out for corruption again.

The only thing
I can think of is that maybe the MSI was made by
a very messed up MSI maker. The only clue is that the
program used to make the MSI, as listed in the Summary
Info, is "Windows Installer Editor Standalone". I'm not
sure if that's an actual program or a default value used
when someone sets up their own MSI using something
like Wix.

At any rate, beware of all versions. The author clearly
doesn't know how to do a proper software install. There
could also be problems with the .Net version. I was going
to send them a note but they seem to be very evasive.
There's no email listed on their website. There's only an
option for paying customers to get a "support ticket".

Weird. But it works when nothing else did.

On Sat, 28 Dec 2019 15:50:09 -0500, "Mayayana"
wrote:

"Paul" wrote

| Dataram RAMDisk Driver
| V4.0.4.2
| Dataram RAMDiskVE Driver
| Dataram, Inc.
|

An update and warning on this:

I installed v. 3.5.130 for XP support. The most recent
versions don't support XP and a bit further back they
switched to .Net v. 4, which I prefer to avoid. It all
worked very well from the start and continues to work
well.

I installed https://filehippo.com/download_ramdisk/4.0.0.5.-1/
as recommended by Paul.
Only thing that annoys me is I can't make it into a
"removable" drive, i.e. I get RECYCLER and System Volume Information.
No crashes so far.
(See below)

Except.... When I opened Visual Studio 6 I was getting
errors. It appears that the Dataram author is talented
with low-level operations but somewhat ignorant of
GUI programming. The program uses several ActiveX
controls, unnecessarily. And the installer makes an
unforgiveable mess of Registry settings. It actually
changes some specific interface settings without
registering the controls. I had to unregister and
re-register the system versions of those controls. It
was an amazingly messed up installer. And when I uninstall
I'll need to remember to watch out for corruption again.

The only thing
I can think of is that maybe the MSI was made by
a very messed up MSI maker. The only clue is that the
program used to make the MSI, as listed in the Summary
Info, is "Windows Installer Editor Standalone". I'm not
sure if that's an actual program or a default value used
when someone sets up their own MSI using something
like Wix.

At any rate, beware of all versions. The author clearly
doesn't know how to do a proper software install. There
could also be problems with the .Net version. I was going
to send them a note but they seem to be very evasive.
There's no email listed on their website. There's only an
option for paying customers to get a "support ticket".

Weird. But it works when nothing else did.

You can use lessMSI to "look inside" the installer and even
extract files:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/lessmsi.mirror/files/

It's written in VB6.(DataRam I mean).
Maybe it installed old libraries?
[]'s
--
Don't be evil - Google 2004
We have a new policy - Google 2012

"Shadow" wrote

| I installed https://filehippo.com/download_ramdisk/4.0.0.5.-1/
| as recommended by Paul.
| Only thing that annoys me is I can't make it into a
| "removable" drive, i.e. I get RECYCLER and System Volume Information.
| No crashes so far.

I also found no problems at all and appreciate the
good docs. It's exactly what I wanted. The only
problem is the installer. The version you have is using
..Net, so it may be OK. But be warned. The author
doesn't seem to know anything about proper software
installation methods.


| You can use lessMSI to "look inside" the installer and even
| extract files:
|
| https://sourceforge.net/projects/lessmsi.mirror/files/
|

I'm familiar with that. It's actually one of the few MSI
unpackers that actually works. But I daresay my own
is arguably the best. (As Walter Brennan used to say
in an old 70s cowboy show, "No brag, just fact."

http://www.jsware.net/jsware/msicode.php5#unpackx

______________________________________________

* Lessmsi: A wrapper around the MS Wix libraries, which
are an unnecessary wrapper around the system file,
msi.dll, which has all the functionality for handling MSIs.
(MSIs are so poorly designed, and so monstrously
complicated, that few people can work with them. So
Microsoft actually created a software package called
Wix, to deal with their software package for making
installers. Wix is also made with .Net, so it's a bloated,
unnecessary wrapper around Microsoft's incredibly
bloated installer calamity.)

Lessmsi also requires .Net 4 or higher. That's OK if you
already need .Net 4. I don't. So I'd be installing a lot
of useless bloat to do a simple job. Lessmsi + Wix + .Net 4.
____________________________________________

* jsMSIx: My own version. Uses msi.dll functions directly
and incorporates functionality to unpack CAB files. It's a
total of 200 KB, with no extra dependencies and no need
to install.

jsMSIx not only unpacks an MSI but also writes a log
detailing the file list, Registry entries... basically everything
that the MSI will do when it's run.

For anyone who's interested, at my webpage there are
also VBScript versions, which also use msi.dll directly.
And there are various tools for working with MSIs, as
installers or as handy databases. (I use several. One is
a database to store all my old email in a searchable
format.)
I also have an MSI editor, made as an HTA, that allows
one to see the table view and add, delete, edit tables,
rows and columns.

I started working with MSIs in the early days because
I was working on text-to-speech software for a blind friend.
I needed SAPI5 speech support to do it. It turned out that
the only way to get that was to download 100 MB of SAPI
"merge modules" and then build an MSI installer that would
use about 6 MB of that slop. When I set about doing as
Microsoft advised I quickly realized that MSIs were a ridiculously
complex way to build a software installer. I would have spent
more time on the installer than on the software. But SAPI5
support wasn't available in a normal system update package.
So I had to figure out how MSIs worked, in order to get the
SAPI5 support separate from the MSI mess. That led to all the
tools I made. Included among those tools are also VBScript
tools to automate a non-MSI setup from an MSI installer.
I had to write that to get at sapi.dll and the handful of Registry
settings I needed for my own software.

Lessmsi has become well known because it's so-called
open source. But it you look at the code you'll see that
there's not actually much of it there. It just calls Wix
to do the job. But that doesn't stop the author from
adding a lot of legalese at the top of every file, claiming
that you can't use his code unless you include his
copyright notice and give him credit.

As you may have guessed, I don't have a lot of sympathy
for people who write a few lines of common wrapper code
and then make a big deal about how it's their personal
masterpiece. There are far too many people out there
hoarding code, and most of them hardly even know how
to write it.

It reminds me of the Monty Python skit about the scientist
who goes on TV to explain his new theory about dinosaurs.
The scientist clears his throat, repeatedly announces that he
has a theory, and generally wastes time with fanfare. Finally,
with the talk show host at the limit of his patience, the
scientist graces us with his amazing theory:

"The brontosaurus is small at one end, quite large in the middle,
then small again at the other end... That's my theory. Which is
mine. Which is my theory. Which belongs to me."

| It's written in VB6.(DataRam I mean).
| Maybe it installed old libraries?

I explained it already in my earlier post.
Using my own MSI unpacker I was able to see the
Registry settings that the installer changed. I'm not
sure that it used older controls but what it did do,
which is crazy, unacceptable behavior, was to change
only some CLSID keys for the specific functionality it
was using. Then it also wrote a bogus value so that
it could reverse the damage whem unistalled. It was
operating as though it were the only program that would
ever use ActiveX controls!

Example: The Microsoft common controls OCX is a
main system file that provides a number of GUI items:
listview, treeview, tabstrip, slider, progress bar, and
so on. The Dataram installer altered only the COM
settings for specific items it was using. For instance,
it might change the path of the tabstrip but leave the
path of the listview! That behavior is wrong and unstable
in numerous ways. The installer should have checked
whether the file was present, then checked whether
the present version was older, then installed the new
version *only* in that case and *only to the system folder*.
Then the file should have been registered. The whole thing.
It should have been told to register itself.
Instead, what Dataram did was to edit the registration
settings selectively in the Registry, without doing any
registration.

The way that works, in case anyone's curious and
doesn't know, is that COM libraries are self-registering.
If you call mscomctl.ocx to register itself then it will add
dozens, maybe hundreds, of settings into HKCR. Those
settings are necessary for it to work. Typically
there's a ProgID entry, like
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\MSComctlLib.TabStrip

That key then points to a key under HKCR\CLSID. That key
has numerous subkeys that point to such things as the
path of the file containing the tabstrip functionality,
as well as pointing to the path of the type library. It's
fairly complicated. The Dataram installer was going in
and changing only the file path, from system32 to the
Dataram folder. That was breaking things in other software.

I've never seen such a harebrained hack. Even just
registering the controls in its own folder would have been
against the rules of proper software installation. To essentially
hack the Registry settings for system libraries is worse.

On Sun, 29 Dec 2019 14:43:58 -0500, "Mayayana"
wrote:

"Shadow" wrote

| I installed https://filehippo.com/download_ramdisk/4.0.0.5.-1/
| as recommended by Paul.
| Only thing that annoys me is I can't make it into a
| "removable" drive, i.e. I get RECYCLER and System Volume Information.
| No crashes so far.

I also found no problems at all and appreciate the
good docs. It's exactly what I wanted. The only
problem is the installer. The version you have is using
.Net, so it may be OK. But be warned. The author
doesn't seem to know anything about proper software
installation methods.


| You can use lessMSI to "look inside" the installer and even
| extract files:
|
| https://sourceforge.net/projects/lessmsi.mirror/files/
|

I'm familiar with that. It's actually one of the few MSI
unpackers that actually works. But I daresay my own
is arguably the best. (As Walter Brennan used to say
in an old 70s cowboy show, "No brag, just fact."

http://www.jsware.net/jsware/msicode.php5#unpackx

______________________________________________

* Lessmsi: A wrapper around the MS Wix libraries, which
are an unnecessary wrapper around the system file,
msi.dll, which has all the functionality for handling MSIs.
(MSIs are so poorly designed, and so monstrously
complicated, that few people can work with them. So
Microsoft actually created a software package called
Wix, to deal with their software package for making
installers. Wix is also made with .Net, so it's a bloated,
unnecessary wrapper around Microsoft's incredibly
bloated installer calamity.)

Lessmsi also requires .Net 4 or higher. That's OK if you
already need .Net 4. I don't. So I'd be installing a lot
of useless bloat to do a simple job. Lessmsi + Wix + .Net 4.
____________________________________________

* jsMSIx: My own version. Uses msi.dll functions directly
and incorporates functionality to unpack CAB files. It's a
total of 200 KB, with no extra dependencies and no need
to install.

jsMSIx not only unpacks an MSI but also writes a log
detailing the file list, Registry entries... basically everything
that the MSI will do when it's run.

For anyone who's interested, at my webpage there are
also VBScript versions, which also use msi.dll directly.
And there are various tools for working with MSIs, as
installers or as handy databases. (I use several. One is
a database to store all my old email in a searchable
format.)
I also have an MSI editor, made as an HTA, that allows
one to see the table view and add, delete, edit tables,
rows and columns.

I started working with MSIs in the early days because
I was working on text-to-speech software for a blind friend.
I needed SAPI5 speech support to do it. It turned out that
the only way to get that was to download 100 MB of SAPI
"merge modules" and then build an MSI installer that would
use about 6 MB of that slop. When I set about doing as
Microsoft advised I quickly realized that MSIs were a ridiculously
complex way to build a software installer. I would have spent
more time on the installer than on the software. But SAPI5
support wasn't available in a normal system update package.
So I had to figure out how MSIs worked, in order to get the
SAPI5 support separate from the MSI mess. That led to all the
tools I made. Included among those tools are also VBScript
tools to automate a non-MSI setup from an MSI installer.
I had to write that to get at sapi.dll and the handful of Registry
settings I needed for my own software.

Lessmsi has become well known because it's so-called
open source. But it you look at the code you'll see that
there's not actually much of it there. It just calls Wix
to do the job. But that doesn't stop the author from
adding a lot of legalese at the top of every file, claiming
that you can't use his code unless you include his
copyright notice and give him credit.

As you may have guessed, I don't have a lot of sympathy
for people who write a few lines of common wrapper code
and then make a big deal about how it's their personal
masterpiece. There are far too many people out there
hoarding code, and most of them hardly even know how
to write it.

It reminds me of the Monty Python skit about the scientist
who goes on TV to explain his new theory about dinosaurs.
The scientist clears his throat, repeatedly announces that he
has a theory, and generally wastes time with fanfare. Finally,
with the talk show host at the limit of his patience, the
scientist graces us with his amazing theory:

"The brontosaurus is small at one end, quite large in the middle,
then small again at the other end... That's my theory. Which is
mine. Which is my theory. Which belongs to me."

| It's written in VB6.(DataRam I mean).
| Maybe it installed old libraries?

I explained it already in my earlier post.
Using my own MSI unpacker I was able to see the
Registry settings that the installer changed. I'm not
sure that it used older controls but what it did do,
which is crazy, unacceptable behavior, was to change
only some CLSID keys for the specific functionality it
was using. Then it also wrote a bogus value so that
it could reverse the damage whem unistalled. It was
operating as though it were the only program that would
ever use ActiveX controls!

Example: The Microsoft common controls OCX is a
main system file that provides a number of GUI items:
listview, treeview, tabstrip, slider, progress bar, and
so on. The Dataram installer altered only the COM
settings for specific items it was using. For instance,
it might change the path of the tabstrip but leave the
path of the listview! That behavior is wrong and unstable
in numerous ways. The installer should have checked
whether the file was present, then checked whether
the present version was older, then installed the new
version *only* in that case and *only to the system folder*.
Then the file should have been registered. The whole thing.
It should have been told to register itself.
Instead, what Dataram did was to edit the registration
settings selectively in the Registry, without doing any
registration.

The way that works, in case anyone's curious and
doesn't know, is that COM libraries are self-registering.
If you call mscomctl.ocx to register itself then it will add
dozens, maybe hundreds, of settings into HKCR. Those
settings are necessary for it to work. Typically
there's a ProgID entry, like
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\MSComctlLib.TabStrip

That key then points to a key under HKCR\CLSID. That key
has numerous subkeys that point to such things as the
path of the file containing the tabstrip functionality,
as well as pointing to the path of the type library. It's
fairly complicated. The Dataram installer was going in
and changing only the file path, from system32 to the
Dataram folder. That was breaking things in other software.

I've never seen such a harebrained hack. Even just
registering the controls in its own folder would have been
against the rules of proper software installation. To essentially
hack the Registry settings for system libraries is worse.

RAMDisk.exe is actually a VB6 executable. The Microsoft Visual
C# / Basic.NET / MS Visual Basic 2005,7 and 10 files appear to be the
registration routine.

According to SoftOrganizer, the installer made 567 changes to
the registry so yes, very badly implemented. The author does not
believe in the KISS doctrine..(maybe he did in the later versions,
don't know).

As to the programs you mentioned, I have HTA and scripting
disallowed(security), and didn't manage to download jsMSIx. I use wget
for downloads, so I can keep a log of where I got each file.

Your page seems to have mistaken it for a download manager.
[]'s
--
Don't be evil - Google 2004
We have a new policy - Google 2012

-
"Shadow" wrote

| Have you tried measuring speed? CrystalDiskMark shows quite
| impressive numbers for RAMDisks. If it's a faux RAMDisk, numbers will
| be much lower.

See my post to Paul. I got it set up. Then I tried
Crystal, which I'd never seen before. I don't know
how to interpret it. The ramdisk had only 94 MB free
so I tested a run of 64 MB. The result was 10 times
higher than read/write to a normal partition. I don't
know what that means. Maybe I'd need to set up a
folder on the ramdisk that's not swap in order to test
it.

Mayayana wrote:
-
"Shadow" wrote

| Have you tried measuring speed? CrystalDiskMark shows quite
| impressive numbers for RAMDisks. If it's a faux RAMDisk, numbers will
| be much lower.

See my post to Paul. I got it set up. Then I tried
Crystal, which I'd never seen before. I don't know
how to interpret it. The ramdisk had only 94 MB free
so I tested a run of 64 MB. The result was 10 times
higher than read/write to a normal partition. I don't
know what that means. Maybe I'd need to set up a
folder on the ramdisk that's not swap in order to test
it.

You can use HDTune free version to test the
"whole surface" of your RAMDisk in read mode.
You don't need to test write mode particularly,
as there's no reason for read versus write to
vary. There's no "physical process" involved here.

My HDTune read is a flat line at around 4GB/sec, which
isn't really all that good of a result. The best
results I can get in the room, are around 7GB/sec.
And this is nowhere near what a Streams benchmark
should be reporting, especially on the other machine.

When you work out the bandwidth claimed based on
the memory numbers, the results on the RAMDisk won't
even be close. You get what you can from it.

I discovered one other anomaly, which is that performance
is more consistent on OSes like Windows 10, if you set
the Power schema to "High Performance" and jam the CPU
to the nominal clock. That'll help if your graph line isn't
flat, when HDTune testing. You'll get stairsteps
in the graph, if the machine is running the "Balanced"
schema. I reported a previous result for Windows 10,
where HDTune didn't seem to be returning the right
numbers on Windows 10, and perhaps this latest
discovery of the schema setting, might help with
that too.

Paul

"Paul" wrote

| You can use HDTune free version to test the
| "whole surface" of your RAMDisk in read mode.
| You don't need to test write mode particularly,
| as there's no reason for read versus write to
| vary. There's no "physical process" involved here.
|
| My HDTune read is a flat line at around 4GB/sec, which
| isn't really all that good of a result. The best
| results I can get in the room, are around 7GB/sec.
| And this is nowhere near what a Streams benchmark
| should be reporting, especially on the other machine.
|
I suppose the real test is with RAM use. As it is,
things on my XP box are pretty much instant. I like
the idea of ramdisk to reduce writes to the SSDs.
I also see value for big operations. There's not really
any other reason it would matter.

Maybe I'll try to set up some tests, like applying
filters in Paint Shop Pro to gigantic images. If the
ramdisk is working as expected then it should be
able to do those operation nearly instantly, on
operations where my other XP box will show a progress
bar and take some number of seconds to complete
the operation.

On Fri, 20 Dec 2019 21:59:50 -0500, "Mayayana"
wrote:

-
"Shadow" wrote

| Have you tried measuring speed? CrystalDiskMark shows quite
| impressive numbers for RAMDisks. If it's a faux RAMDisk, numbers will
| be much lower.

See my post to Paul. I got it set up. Then I tried
Crystal, which I'd never seen before. I don't know
how to interpret it. The ramdisk had only 94 MB free
so I tested a run of 64 MB. The result was 10 times
higher than read/write to a normal partition. I don't
know what that means.

It means it's a real RAMDisk.


Maybe I'd need to set up a
folder on the ramdisk that's not swap in order to test
it.

Yes, just temporally move your swapfile to c:\ (or whatever),
reboot, and format the RAMDisk before you test it.
[]'s

--
Don't be evil - Google 2004
We have a new policy - Google 2012

"Shadow" wrote

| See my post to Paul. I got it set up. Then I tried
| Crystal, which I'd never seen before. I don't know
| how to interpret it. The ramdisk had only 94 MB free
| so I tested a run of 64 MB. The result was 10 times
| higher than read/write to a normal partition. I don't
| know what that means.
|
| It means it's a real RAMDisk.
|

No, I mean it was 10 times higher number. It took
10 times as long.

| Yes, just temporally move your swapfile to c:\ (or whatever),
| reboot, and format the RAMDisk before you test it.

Formatting at boot to FAT-32 is part of the deal.

But I did try Paul's suggestion of HDTune. I'm
getting an average about 120 MB/sec with the SSD,
showing a line that looks like Donald Trump hooked
up to a lie detector. The ramdisk, as Paul noted, is
almost a straight line, at about 2300 MB/sec. It looks
like I'm in business. And it was all very simple, with
clear directions, to use the Dataram option. I'm glad
I asked here. I was wasting a lot of time doing
research online and reading chat groups where no
one seemed to quite know what they were talking
about.

On Sat, 21 Dec 2019 09:23:19 -0500, "Mayayana"
wrote:

"Shadow" wrote

| See my post to Paul. I got it set up. Then I tried
| Crystal, which I'd never seen before. I don't know
| how to interpret it. The ramdisk had only 94 MB free
| so I tested a run of 64 MB. The result was 10 times
| higher than read/write to a normal partition. I don't
| know what that means.
|
| It means it's a real RAMDisk.
|

No, I mean it was 10 times higher number. It took
10 times as long.

The result is in MB/s
Try an earlier version, the latest is not "guaranteed" to work
on XP.
Here's the"old" portable version:

http://c3sl.dl.osdn.jp/crystaldiskma...kMark6_0_2.zip

(that's the official mirror)


| Yes, just temporally move your swapfile to c:\ (or whatever),
| reboot, and format the RAMDisk before you test it.

Formatting at boot to FAT-32 is part of the deal.

But I did try Paul's suggestion of HDTune. I'm
getting an average about 120 MB/sec with the SSD,
showing a line that looks like Donald Trump hooked
up to a lie detector. The ramdisk, as Paul noted, is
almost a straight line, at about 2300 MB/sec. It looks
like I'm in business. And it was all very simple, with
clear directions, to use the Dataram option. I'm glad
I asked here. I was wasting a lot of time doing
research online and reading chat groups where no
one seemed to quite know what they were talking
about.

I just spent a couple of hours uninstalling my SoftPerfect
RAMDisk and installing Dataram_RAMDisk_v4_0_5_RC0.

Here's a test result:

https://postimg.cc/HcDC4L1H

Here's some notes I made:
1) Block DataRam from phoning home. It attempts to reach out to
memory.dataram.com and
license.dataram.com

No idea why it needs to check the license, I'm using the free
version, but the configuration window takes up to 4 minutes to appear
while it waits for a reply.
I unplug my cable whenever I install anything new.
So - firewall that.

2) Don't choose "Unformatted" in that first window, or Windows Disk
Manager won't see it. Choose "FAT32". Once it's up, you can format to
NTFS, and change the letter(I used "Z" so it doesn't interfere with my
pendrive-backup scheme).
DataRam will remember the drive letter and format(I save the
image, since I'm using it for my Palemoon profile).

3) I now have a lot more "total" RAM, so Dataram DOES use memory above
4GB, unlike the other offerings I tried.

4) I had tried Dataram previously, but it crashed a lot. Not the
version recommended by Paul though. So I'm going to keep track of the
TBC(time between crashes). Softperfect only corrupted the image file
once in 6 months, but required re-installing the driver and copying my
browser profile from a backup.

PS You can use OSFMount
https://www.osforensics.com/tools/mo...sk-images.html

For XP(not listed)
https://www.osforensics.com/download..._v1.5.1018.exe

to mount Dataram images. Choose "Partition type" not "whole file"
because of the offset.
HTH
[]'s
--
Don't be evil - Google 2004
We have a new policy - Google 2012