Using RAMdisk is not a good solution for a SSD in windows 7

[Tech^Geek]

From my research, I have found that using RAMdisk for SSD in Windows 7 doesn’t work fine. Windows 7 and Windows XP need RAM to store the temporary data. Also to make the RAMdisk drive persistent, one has to keep an image of the drive ready which will keep writing the data in the image as soon as the drive on computer is updated. One of the main properties of RAMdisk is that it reduces write cycles in the system. But Windows 7 needs to keep maintaining cache which requires having write cycles. Also Windows 7 and XP need to maintain a paging file which is utilized by the games and many applications. These paging files cannot be stored in SSD. To have a SSD in one’s system with Windows 7 or Windows XP, one needs to have a big RAM, maybe around 8 GB. What do other people think about it?

[Vicky Woodley]

The only purpose RAMdisk serves in Windows 7 and XP is to store the cache data of internet surfing generated by a browser. If you want to use another application that will need the RAMdisk of the SSD along with the browser and the amount of RAM in your PC is low, then you can redirect the location at which the cache data must be stored. This function is only provided by Google Chrome. I haven’t found such function in other browsers like Mozilla Firefox and Internet explorer by default. One benefit of the RAMdisk is for video editing and 3D softwares. These softwares need to have scratch disks for storing temporary data. If the RAMdisk is assigned as scratch disk, it is found to boost the processing speed of rendering events in these softwares. As said that Google Chrome can redirect its cache files, one can also redirect them to the RAM,
C:\Users\user_name\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\Application\chrome.exe -user-data-dir="X:\Chrome_cache" -start-maximized"
This code should be placed in shortcut target entry.

[Pinlunk]

RAMdisks are best for storing the cache data of the web browser if being used for desktop purpose only. They provide a better performance than the temporary drive which is used by default by every browser. When browsing internet, one visits multiple pages at a single time. Also the page is frequently changed, so this lads to excessive use of the SSD leading to over exertion. If the storage of internet cache is redirected to RAM, then this trouble for SSD is saved and its efficiency increases. The amount of cache increases when streaming any video, more cache is generated if any live event is being streamed. Storing this temporary cache in SSD not only just reduces amount of free space in SSD but also adds clusters of unfragmented data in the SSD. I use Fancycache by Romex to control the amount of cache being generated in SSD. If viewed from free block preservation standpoint, the cache won’t be controlled and it can extend up to the size in terabytes. I have set my SSD to store the frequently accessed cache data in a different volume than the temporary cache is stored. RAMdisks add more flexibility in use of SSDs in Windows. Many third party applications are also available on internet to enhance the performance of SSD.

[JErastus]

High end RAMdisks are useful for al purpose, gaming, video editing and also 3D rendering. This is possible because of high bandwidth it provides for data transfer between CPU and memory. If the cache is stored in RAM, then reading some file downloaded over internet will be impossible. As it will be stored in RAM, it might get replaced too soon as new temporary data is available. To avoid this, a large amount of RAM would be required. Also Ram has lower amount of latency when accessed if compared to SSDs. I know that Windows paging files has its own drawbacks along with its advantages. If it is stored on SSD then it will unnecessarily keep the SSD running and use up large amount of space even if not needed, Even if writing of paging file is restricted on SSD, many applications that need to store them and retrieve them for later use will face problem. This all will make the SSD extremely unstable and lead to frequent crashing.

[Naq]

There is misconception among many people that Windows uses RAM dynamically. I say that this concept is partially right. Windows works using a Superfetch service, which if disabled will keep the RAM memory completely free instead of using it. As said that to use SSD, one should have a huge RAM as one cannot completely depend on RAMdisk. I say that RAM can be partitioned to work along with RAMdisk. But for this a large RAM is needed. For example, it is possible to partition a 16 GB RAM can be partitioned to have 8 GB for operating system and 8 GB for RAMdisk. This can be done in DDR3 RAMs with two controllers. I have a PC at my work place which completely works on RAMdisk storage. It has 256 RAM slots and 4 fibrechannel ports which are connected to a large backup battery. It gives best performance than all the other machines that work on RAM in our office. The major drawback of this system is that, if it loses power than it will also lose all the data that was stored in the RAMdisk. Also data loss is possible if memory module fails. So my opinion is that one should use RAMdisk in combination of RAM as it provides a support in case of failure. You can try this combination by playing a game in such a system. The load time will be so low that you can easily notice it. If you want to have the best RAMdisk, then OCZ Revodrive is the answer. It provides a high rate of bandwidth as it uses PCI-Express x16 lane and NAND Flash. PCI-Express x16 lane provides transfer speed of about 300 gbps with memory controller at 750MHz.

[chuck28]

If someone doesn’t need information stored in crash dumps, then page files won’t be necessary for them. Many software developers nowadays have started adopting their applications according to the system of SSDs. That means they have reduced the use of page files. Many people think that page file system of Windows is similar to page swap in Linux, but they are wrong. These two things are completely wrong. The softwares developed for Windows 98 and Window XP were specifically designed to use the page file technique, but nowadays this technique is not used. If any software needs to have page file and it cannot find dedicated place to store them, usually in SSDs, then it is transferred directly into RAM. In Windows XP, page file monitoring was introduced. This system was eliminated in Windows 7. A computer which is used by many people and is shutdown and switched on frequently will have great benefit from RAMdisk system. This shows that concept of page file is useless in operating systems released after Windows XP. Still it can be explicitly called to use if needed. Many software testers who need to test the crash frequently and need to debug it many times, they use the page file to store the previous results of debugging to call it when needed. I have started using Dataram RAMDisk software which helps in proper management of cache in RAMdisk. I have reserved a partition of 1 GB NTFS for storing the cache. Using it I have disabled ‘make a backup’ and ‘save on shutdown’. I have enabled the ‘load at startup’. Now on clicking the ‘start RAMdisk’ option, it formatted the 1 GB NTFS drive that I have reserved for strong the cache. Now I redirected the cache of Google Chrome and Opera at this folder. This results in creation of folders in that drive which store the cache memory. So now whenever I start my system, all the cache is gone. This has resulted in faster startup of my computer.

[Dannai7]

OCZ has designed the Revodrive such that it pushes the extents of the flash memory to its fullest. This is achieved by connecting the Revodrive to lane with high bandwidth. If you observe the concept behind the architecture of a RAM and SSD, then it is almost same. The difference is that the hardware that is used brings the difference in its use and purpose. If the architectural differences are to be listed, then a RAM uses 1-3 transistor connection and SSD uses SSD uses 6-transistor latch-type connections. Due to this architecture, RAM is always faster than SSD. This difference of speed can be double if proper bandwidth lane is provided. I can program the RAMdisk to store data efficiently without losing it. First thing that I did was to manually configure the Windows disk management and then create its backup in form of image and store it by name Ramdisk.img on my SSD. This helps to save the directory structure and maintain it. It will make no difference if the root of the drive is used to store the data. So again the RAM will be used in this case, a comparison between two RAMs cannot be made in this situation as it will not make any difference. RAM has completely zero latency and compression is one thing that will not create an issue. When using the image to help RAMdisk store the data will need it to be started in the computer. It will not be shown in device manager or My Computer. It will be displayed as raw drive by some partition editing software. Windows will also store drive’s name, label and other details too. This is done to help the user find and identify the partitioned drive quickly. To set up the RAMdisk properly so that it updates itself from time to time, I use Dataram tool and open the Ramdisk.img file through it. Now it will start updating itself every time you modify the drive without using the regeneration script. It will also have options to have the options for compressing the NTFS drives that you have created. But I recommend that you don’t compress the NTFS partitions unless it is too large.

[phunsuk]

I only use Fancycache these days. It helps to maintain the stability and consistency of larger fresh block pool and helps reducing the need for GC time. With faster drives releasing in market every day, I think that RAMdisks will gain popularity as it provides great throttling than SSDs and hard drives. They are even good for maintenance as the controllers are good for data recovery if it is lost in any case. The main drawback of the RAMdisk is that one with small storage space is almost useless as it keeps replacing the data from time to time as new data will be available for writing. So if one needs to recover some data regularly, then need RAMdisk of larger storage space. Saving it on the disk and recovering it on start-up is not much convenient. It also needs a large amount of resources for recovering data. Also if the storage space is large, then loading time will increase as it will need to recover the data, stabilize itself, configure and restore the settings. RAMdisks aren’t fully developed yet, but when they will be developed enough, they will take the computing world by storm. RAM disks will be good if they are built according to the SandForce architecture. The current RAMdisks that are available aren’t worth for running games and large and heavy applications.

[fflygirl]

An SSD with large SSD raid will never beat the performance of the RAM that is currently available in market. Till now a 4G RAMDisk is only available to use in the PC, but such a high amount of SSD space is still not practical to have. In many cases it is not used, due to large space, it takes a good amount of time for simple loading. Also if any anti-virus is scanning it, it will take enormous amount of time. Also no software has yet been developed that generates data that can fill it. RAM not just stores the temporary data but also speeds up the computer. Also if compared to RAM, RAMdisk and SSDs are very expensive and I don’t think that much of the people will be able to afford it. Many of the games developed in current times don’t have functionality to support SSDs and RAMdisks. The only use of RAMdisk that I have found is in the systems which have to be kept switched on 24X7. Due to its high loading time, t is almost useless for small jobs. Imagine if someone is installing multiple softwares and he wants to restart computer many times. It will be a headache to keep waiting for PC to restart. The only selling point of RAMdisk is its long life. Some applications and processes in Windows 7 create a huge sized page file, so at this moment it is not so useful.