pagefile on Expresscard SSD

[Jeff]

I have a laptop with one hard drive and no room for more. The disk access
seems to be the bottleneck for performance most of the time (big surprise, I
know). I'd like to do something to split up the I/O. I'd like something I
can keep in my machine. I've tried some fast flash cards (I have a
multi-reader), but it must run off the usb stack because I can't put a
pagefile on there (xp lets you set it up, but won't create the file).

I think Vista features would really help, but don't want to go there.

Last thing that might work is Expresscard memory -- some call it an
Expresscard SSD. There are a couple out there that say they use the pci bus
(ie. - NOT the usb path thru the expresscard). I would like to know if a
pagefile can be setup on an expresscard like this. I understand the
performance swap (fast access, slow read/write vs. hard drive). I think it's
worth a try.

the big question is: will xp let me put a pagefile on an expresscard
"drive" if it is using the pci interface and NOT the usb?

I've checked the web and the windows boards. There is some speculation out
there, but no definitive answers.

Thanks.

 

[Gurpreet Singh]

XP will not allow pagefile on a disk marked removable media. You can move
your data to a removable disk and make more room on the disk for page file.
Moreover, if you have a good system performance, you can try compressing the
drive to add some more room.

 

[Jeff]

I appreciate your reply, but let me clairify: I have plenty of free space on
my current harddrive (126G free on 146G drive). I have no more room in my
laptop for another (second) harddrive.

Any way to get around the "removable media" issue?

I know Vista can pre-fetch/cache hardrive data to an Expresscard (with
SuperFetch and ReadyBoost), but that is not available in XP. It seems to me
that the pagefile is not TOO much more critical than reliance on a harddrive
cache (either way I assume the machine is probably going down). It seems
reasonable to me that MS could make XP accept an Expresscard as a fixed drive.

 

[Jim]

Replies inline--

I appreciate your reply, but let me clairify: I have plenty of free space
on
my current harddrive (126G free on 146G drive). I have no more room in my
laptop for another (second) harddrive.

Any way to get around the "removable media" issue? For us poor users - No

I know Vista can pre-fetch/cache hardrive data to an Expresscard (with
SuperFetch and ReadyBoost), but that is not available in XP. It seems to
me
that the pagefile is not TOO much more critical than reliance on a
harddrive
cache (either way I assume the machine is probably going down). It seems
reasonable to me that MS could make XP accept an Expresscard as a fixed
drive.

Perhaps they could. MS has put XP on life support. They won't add new
features.
Jim

 

[Gerry]

Jeff

How much RAM does the laptop have?

Try Ctrl+Alt+Delete to select Task Manager and click the Performance
Tab. Under Commit Charge what is the Total, the Limit and the Peak?

Normally one does not want the system to make a lot of use of the pagefile.
Why are you pursuing this point? Also USB is generally slower than accessing
the hard drive so why do you think this might improve performance?

What is your pagefile setting?

--


Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Ray Luca]

I know Vista can pre-fetch/cache hardrive data to an Expresscard (with
SuperFetch and ReadyBoost), but that is not available in XP. It seems to me
that the pagefile is not TOO much more critical than reliance on a harddrive
cache (either way I assume the machine is probably going down). It seems
reasonable to me that MS could make XP accept an Expresscard as a fixed drive.

But you're not the person commanding the center that writes the code.

How it "seems" to you really doesn't matter.

 

[Jeff]

Gerry,
I'm not trying to improve the pagefile, I'm trying to off-load the IO from
my harddrive. I/O is the performance bottleneck. I wrote a detailed message
that was lost in cyberspace and just don't want to spit it all out again.

I have 2G RAM; played with the pagefile and settled on 3G. Tried setting
it low to force memory use, but it almost seemed to increase paging activity.
Didn't work on it too hard because there doesn't seem to be a paging problem.

I appreciate your interest and comments. If you have any suggestions for
spreading out I/O or reducing it somehow (like reduce pagefile usage), please
let me know. My drive is defragged. I have most of the space free; so, it
isn't really fragmented anyway.

Thanks again for your comments.

Jeff

 

[Jeff]

Ray,
Your comment is a little bizarre in this forum. I'm looking for
technical help, not situational commentary.

Besides, you are wrong -- it matters to me.

 

[Gurpreet Singh]

Hi Jeff,
If you are having too many applications running on your laptop and your
system has to increase paging/IO then you shouldnt really be using a laptop.
Having said that we need to remember that the system automatically adjusts
the paging requirements. Like many other systems around are continously
evolving, Windows also is evolving based on the requirements of the users.
Sometimes it is not feasible to rewrite the code entirely for memory
management and paging hence we cant blame MS to bring all capabilities into
the same OS. Vista is a pretty stable OS with many features/Changes which
have evolved out of customer feedbacks.

 

[Jeff]

Gurpreet,
I understand what you are saying. That is reality.

Thanks for your comment.
Jeff

 

[Bob Harris]

I doubt that XP is that flexible, and MS is unlikely to "upgrade" XP to be
more like Vista. As for Windows 7, we can only hope.

However, you might be able to get XP to use one of those new solidstate
disks that attaches via SATA. In theory these look like a normal hard drive
to the BIOS and thus to the operating system. These are much more expensive
per Gig than a magnetic hard drive, but then you probably do not need more
than a few Gig for a page file. If you do, then you should really consider
a 64-bit operating system that can address more than 4 Gig of RAM, since
even a solid state disk is no match for modern RAM.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solid-state_drive

http://www.storagesearch.com/ssd-top10.html

http://www.newegg.com/Store/SubCategory.aspx?SubCategory=636&name=Solid-State-Disks

 

[Jeff]

The answer to this is "yes," you can set up the pagefile with this type of
PCI device. There are a couple of ExpressCard SSD drives recently release
that (finally) utilize the PCI interface within the expresscard slot (instead
of the USB bus). The card really acts like an SSD hard drive and is quite
affordable. Furthermore, the performance is very good, 60+Mbs/sec write,
100+ Mb/s read.

Wintec Filemate 48gig Ultra Expresscard on Amazon. Another company sells
what looks like the exact same card. I believe Filemate is the maker, Wintec
is the seller. Had mine about 6 weeks and very impressed. Also has mini-USB
port on card so you can take out of the expresscard slot and use as USB flash
drive (slower performance, but handy too).

Jeff