Computer Advice/Pagefiling

[IronMole]

Originally Posted by Skitrel

Ironmole, this is the 4th time you've been offensive to me on the forum while adding absolutely nothing. I've not risen to it, I'm not going to, you're going on the ignore list if you can't offer any suitable arguments and reasoning, maturely.

Most points have been stated by Basti, but it does seem that you're an ATI Fanboy (take it as you want).

Difference between ATI and NVIDIA drivers is that ATI rush theirs hence loads of releases as NVIDIA release theirs pretty much monthly which is miles more stable. Also, SLI is 10x than Crossfire currently. More doesn't equal better.

I've owned both ATI and NVIDIA because I buy what's best for the price/performance.

Another thing about the RAM. Your logic is silly, telling people to hold off buying more RAM. DDR3 is currently dirt cheap so it's a good time to buy, regardless if it's useless or not. You do know what happened to DDR2 prices don't you?

When buying PC's, you want it bang for buck and future proof.

[Skitrel]

Originally Posted by basti

The Pagefile isnt just used when you run out of ram. Windows uses the Pagefile anyway. Theres literally no way around it, unless you completly disable the page file, but that causes issues.
Thats why you put your pagefile on a ramdisk.
On top of that, if you usually keep your system running, or just want to not stress your Hard disk to much, you can put a game on the ramdisk. That means virtually no loading times.


The reason why Ati had more driver updates is simple: they need to fix the crap they do. With every driver update, Ati fucks something up. Every single time. Next update they fix it, and fuck something else up.
There have been performance hits up to 40% sometimes on a few games. Fact is, ATI got a clue about GFX cards, but they dont have a clue at all about drivers.

Cant provide you with writeups. This all comes from plenty of years of expirience. I build PCs, not just for myself, but for a bunch of people. And in 36 of 47 occasions where someone wanted a Ati card, something fucked up in the end. I saw those things going up in smoke already. Plenty of times, their drivers just caused massive issues, and every now and then i get a call from one of my guys hat they have strange image effects. Turns out its artys, GPU went bust, for no good reason.

Trust me, ATI is crap. Dont use them. I still use my OCed and Bios edited GTX280. I clean it every few month, and fixed its heatbug. I dont see me upgrading anytime soon, as it still got plenty of power for todays games. Before that, i had a Geforce 6800, OCed to the max and unlocked pipes. I still have that card, the only issue i ever had was the Fan breaking.
On the other hand, i had a 9800 Pro that broke after half a year, a X800 that broke after 3 Weeks (and took me 2 month to get replaced via ATI. Replacment died after a year). Not to mention all the hassle i had with their damn drivers...

The 16mb of pagefile windows is using isn't going to show any performance change on a ramdisk versus not.

If what you're suggesting is somehow tricking windows into using a ramdisk presumably with software then that's just silly too. The kernel already performs in-memory caching of I/O. The purpose of doing something like that is to provide a second-level cache in the form of another device. Tricking Windows into using a RAM disk instead is pointless as it is already performing in-memory caching and the RAM disk is just wasting space that could have been used by that first-level cache.

A second-level cache is only used for I/O that is known to be random in nature (not sequential). Whereas the proper first-level in-memory I/O cache that is maintained by the kernel is useful for both random AND sequential I/O. It is just better in all ways. So being a ding bat and thinking it's clever in setting up on a RAM disk is silly. It's not clever at all. It's actually just wasting memory and needlessly encumbering the kernel with having to service a second-level I/O cache when it isn't actually going to achieve any benefits... You wouldn't achieve any speed changes at all.

Don't get me wrong, a second level cache isn't a bad thing, up to like a gig, as I said before, it'll give you performance boosts, not in that manner though. I presume you're suggesting something like readyboost to achieve this.

Essentially, if you've got enough RAM 4gb is more than enough, 6gb max will push your pagefile to completely unnecessary. You'll first load anything through the nice fast load of your SSD and windows will appropriately cache absolutely everything you need to your RAM from there on.

Even if what you suggest works, it would only work first load. Not that it would work, without some serious messing further messing than suggested, you're fucking with system level stuff though and you're going to break other stuff in the process. I can see disabling pagefile working as a way to trick the system, but plenty of stuff won't work AT ALL without pagefile enabled.

Unless I'm COMPLETELY off base and you're suggesting something entirely different.

Ironmole, sure thing it's dirt cheap, cash is cash though, if it's not necessary it's not necessary. 5 years from now the entire architecture of computing is going to start changing as qubits come into use anyway. All of what we're talking about is going to be obsolete as we move to quantum computing.

EDIT: As I said though Basti, benchmarks. If you've got benchmarks or a writeup showing benchmarks, I'd change my mind pretty fast.

[Skitrel]

My thread! I do what I waarrnt.

Seriously though, if Basti wants he can merge these posts out into a new topic and we'll continue there, I don't mind. I'm interested in understanding what he's on about if I've got the wrong end of the stick, or if I'm somehow missing something here. Understanding pagefile isn't really all that complicated though.

[Bonius]

Originally Posted by Skitrel

The 16mb of pagefile windows is using isn't going to show any performance change on a ramdisk versus not.

If what you're suggesting is somehow tricking windows into using a ramdisk presumably with software then that's just silly too. The kernel already performs in-memory caching of I/O. The purpose of doing something like that is to provide a second-level cache in the form of another device. Tricking Windows into using a RAM disk instead is pointless as it is already performing in-memory caching and the RAM disk is just wasting space that could have been used by that first-level cache.

A second-level cache is only used for I/O that is known to be random in nature (not sequential). Whereas the proper first-level in-memory I/O cache that is maintained by the kernel is useful for both random AND sequential I/O. It is just better in all ways. So being a ding bat and thinking it's clever in setting up on a RAM disk is silly. It's not clever at all. It's actually just wasting memory and needlessly encumbering the kernel with having to service a second-level I/O cache when it isn't actually going to achieve any benefits... You wouldn't achieve any speed changes at all.

Don't get me wrong, a second level cache isn't a bad thing, up to like a gig, as I said before, it'll give you performance boosts, not in that manner though. I presume you're suggesting something like readyboost to achieve this.

Essentially, if you've got enough RAM 4gb is more than enough, 6gb max will push your pagefile to completely unnecessary. You'll first load anything through the nice fast load of your SSD and windows will appropriately cache absolutely everything you need to your RAM from there on.

Even if what you suggest works, it would only work first load. Not that it would work, without some serious messing further messing than suggested, you're fucking with system level stuff though and you're going to break other stuff in the process. I can see disabling pagefile working as a way to trick the system, but plenty of stuff won't work AT ALL without pagefile enabled.

Unless I'm COMPLETELY off base and you're suggesting something entirely different.

Ironmole, sure thing it's dirt cheap, cash is cash though, if it's not necessary it's not necessary. 5 years from now the entire architecture of computing is going to start changing as qubits come into use anyway. All of what we're talking about is going to be obsolete as we move to quantum computing.

EDIT: As I said though Basti, benchmarks. If you've got benchmarks or a writeup showing benchmarks, I'd change my mind pretty fast.

It's all dependant on what you're trying to accomplish. Using RAM-discs to gain a few more FPS in a game is completely pointless, seeing as the price-to-performance ratio is just plain out stupid. Sure it's fun to see your OS read/write things at speeds of 4+ gb/s, but when all you're doing is storing cookies from you're browser, you'd have to rethink why you're doing it.

If you're heavy into photoshop, programming, rendering, video editing or any other read/write intensive line of work, RAM-discs are your cup of coffee. This is the only situation where the price-to-performance ratio is feasible, in any other situation they're a complete waste of system resources.

PDF with a few benchmarks: http://fiehnlab.ucdavis.edu/staff/ki...benchmarks.pdf

Life is good when you can apply filters to a 300mb image file in < 1 second.

[xXGumpXX]

I have the amd bulldoser FX 4100 black edition , i'm considering getting the 8 core amd bulldoser , i would like to know if this cpu would be good enough to run a gtx 680 and two running in SLI without any problems like bottle neckng

[Goku]

Originally Posted by xXGumpXX

I have the amd bulldoser FX 4100 black edition , i'm considering getting the 8 core amd bulldoser , i would like to know if this cpu would be good enough to run a gtx 680 and two running in SLI without any problems like bottle neckng

You are going to have a bottleneck even with the octo core part. I suggest instead of investing in that picking up a good Z77 board and a 3570K IB when they are released in the next few weeks or so.

Here is a review of a 2500K vs 8150 (FX 8 Core) with GTX 580 SLI. The 8150 is already bottlenecking the 8150, the bottleneck will be even worse due to the 680 being more powerful then a 580.

[IronMole]

Gump, just for you;

i5 760 @ 4.2ghz
8GB RAM
GTX 460 - 850MHz/1700MHz/2100MHz

[xXGumpXX]

Originally Posted by IronMole

Gump, just for you;

i5 760 @ 4.2ghz
8GB RAM
GTX 460 - 850MHz/1700MHz/2100MHz

might need an upgrade there or you will find you will lose some fps lol

[xXGumpXX]

Originally Posted by Goku

You are going to have a bottleneck even with the octo core part. I suggest instead of investing in that picking up a good Z77 board and a 3570K IB when they are released in the next few weeks or so.

Here is a review of a 2500K vs 8150 (FX 8 Core) with GTX 580 SLI. The 8150 is already bottlenecking the 8150, the bottleneck will be even worse due to the 680 being more powerful then a 580.

i have a good motherboard and i'm sure these new amd bulldosers will have no problem running a gtx 680 or two in sli , maybe if it was an old amd processor then yes you might bottleneck

[IronMole]

Originally Posted by xXGumpXX

might need an upgrade there or you will find you will lose some fps lol

I still own everyone with 20fps.

[duomaxwl]

Originally Posted by xXGumpXX

i have a good motherboard and i'm sure these new amd bulldosers will have no problem running a gtx 680 or two in sli , maybe if it was an old amd processor then yes you might bottleneck

The bulldozer cpu's aren't as good as you seem to think they are.

[Goku]

Originally Posted by xXGumpXX

i have a good motherboard and i'm sure these new amd bulldosers will have no problem running a gtx 680 or two in sli , maybe if it was an old amd processor then yes you might bottleneck

The 8150 is the best bd out ATM. You won't see anything better from amd till way later this year. That still probably wont drive your setup properly. I highly suggest moving to intel. Having a good mobo doesn't make up for having a low end CPU with the highest end VGA out there.

[Vancha]

Can we at least try to keep the red vs green bullshittery out of this forum? It doesn't help anyone. I mean, we hit page 2 and poor ol' Gump was none the wiser.

Gump, if you have the money to spend on a sheer extravagance like two 680s, then I really suggest moving over to intel. Can you not sell your AMD mobo/CPU?