Vista's External Memory Device technology will boost demand for Flash first. It allows the system to grab USB-connected storage as system memory, using the addition capacity as a half-way house between a true RAM disk and the hard drive. Vista copies over apps and data it anticipates the user will want, allowing them to be subsequently read into RAM far more quickly than they would from the hard drive.
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2005-11-14
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Since the NAND flash is faster than the harddrive and slower than system RAM, it only really makes sense to use this feature on machines that does not have enough memory. It could be useful on laptops and on on other portable devices, where its very costly to upgrade the amount of memory. At least when we are taliking general perfomance.
Storing system files on the flash device naturally allows you to boot faster. But using a 1GB flash device for faster booting is a little overkill in my opinion.
So for most stationary PCs it would not make too much sense, say for some older PCs who are just about adequately specīd to run Vista.
I have serious doubts however, that this will really boost the sales of NAND flash as much as the MP3 player sales. Seems a bit like wishful thinking to me.
Edited 2006-02-14 18:13
Member since:2006-01-05
It's a horrible idea. Flash can be read lot's of times, but writing to flash gives you a limited life span.
Now something I have been thinking about is putting the core OS(kernel, drivers) on basically a read only mounted system on a flash disk. This would be great for speeding up boot times, and overall system security as updates. Linux/BSD/OS X can do this now with relative ease, Windows I don't know enough about the internals but it should be able to as well. I wouldn't put apps in there though. IE/Firefox don't belong on a drive like that. That would be a simple way to increase security. Like using a Knoppix live cd. if you do get infected a reboot restores most of your system so you can update everything securely.
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You're right about it not being a new idea.
It's basically the Flash equivalent of IBM's PS/1 "Rapid Resume" feature from 1992. My PC would boot in 5-10 seconds, along with every windows-related glitch and memory leak it had stored from the last shutdown.
There are some important things achieved from a reboot... especially when running MS Windows (XP included). I don't see that fact disappearing anytime soon even with Vista on the horizon.
Member since:2006-01-03
Member since:2005-11-14
No way. The last thing you want to do is save the state of the last boot after a crash. And as mentioned, flash has a limited number of writes. Flash memory is a bad bad place to have as a non-volatile cache. Flash is also much much slower than even the slower ram.
As someone else pointed out this would be most useful for old systems that don't have much ram. These same old systems would be bad candidates for windows vista at all.
So if someone could find a legitamte real life use for this 'gosh lookee here' technology, let's hear it!
Member since:2006-01-06
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Translation: we still haven't solved the problem of not getting your desktop usable the moment it appears.
All this is doing is shaving some time off the precaching XP and OS X already use, without addressing the underlying problem with XP's implementation of it.
Reread Thom's summary. What isn't being advertised is a Flash startup cache (i.e. instant startup) but merely an improvement to application/data precaching. What's missing from the article is an explanation of the actual lives of that Flash memory and what happens when it dies.
According to the article the idea's imitating CPU caching. It remains to be seen whether this adds a real boost to performance and moreover what happens when malware or bugs corrupt the cache.
Member since:2005-07-06
Member since:2005-07-06
In some cases, it'll be cheaper, and in most cases more convienient that a stick of RAM. It's really not aimed at replacing RAM upgrades anyway, but is aimmed at decreasing latency when data must be moved in and out of RAM.
RE: Theft
Do you mean theft of data or theft of the devices. If it's devices, the solution is simple -- unplug the devices and take them with you when you're done using the computer if you're in a public setting. If you mean data theft, the data is encrypted before being transferred to the device.
Edited 2006-02-14 18:07
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I remember talks years ago about putting some kind of non-volatile solid-state memory on hard drives in order to keep a cache of commonly-accessed things.
The description of "system memory" is somewhat incorrect, as it doesn't actually add any more available memory to your system -- it just acts as a persistant cache for commonly-accessed files and applications. I imagine that this is to alleviate the performance penalty of seeking around for hundreds of small files. Flash memory can do random accesses much faster than a regular hard drive, but when it comes to sequential transfers, hard drives are still king.
Member since:2005-07-06
It existed years ago.
When I was an ASIC engr at Quantum in late 90's, the Solid State ver of our SCSI drives used bat backed DRAM and a special controller.
It was a very niche market for large servers so sales volumes were never high and ultimately we dropped out of the market.
The HDD business has the lowest margins relative to the technology even in the best of times.
Such HDDs probably won't happen again unless it can be highly commoditized and alas that takes the like of MS to drive the market.
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2005-08-19
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I can just see it now, people running out to buy a 2gb flash stick and load Quake 4 into it(plus few mods).
Honestly tho, I would rather see SATA-based FDD's come out so I can load it up with the OS/Distro of my choice plus key apps for it(Productivity, Communications, and basic Multimedia apps), and just buy a ultraquiet 250gb drive for storage and games. When that happens, we'll see a whole new set of distros specializing in that environment. Imagine Gnome loading in less than 10 seconds.
Member since:
2006-01-03
It would be used as a cache for very rarely changing data, such as fonts, executables and DLLs. Most of the C:Windows directory could be copied there, along with most of the C:Program Files, because they hardly ever change. It's a good idea. I've been recently seeing 1GB flash drives for around $40. Many people would definitely buy a few gigs to put their frequently used applications on it, if it means faster boot/launch times. The only times it would be written is when you install a new application, which happens less than million times a year, so the memory stick won't go wrong, I guarantee that. It's not a cache for frequently chaning data, you can bet on it.
Member since:
2005-06-29
This feature will probably shine if non-continuous reads from hard drives... As HDs have VERY different read times depending how the data is storage, and how close the data is... Flash Memory doesn't have this problem.
MS and Seagate (IIRC) was working in some hybrid HDs with build-in flash memory for performance proposes. This feature's probably related to this technology too.
Member since:
2005-11-05
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2006-01-24
wow I can save valuable 30 seconds of my life, give in to impulsive, impatitent cravings and install vista (a snapshot of my future thought train if this superduperniftyomgicreamedmypants feature gets incorporated into vista). Infact to make very good use of this superduperniftyomgicreamedmypants feature I will reboot my pc every 5 minutes. This will make me so happy, I will be able to see my pc boot as faster than it takes NASA space shuttles to malfunction (thats freaking fast).
on a sidenote, I do not reboot my machine for weeks, even months. This feature is trivial to me and to anyone who knows what patience means.
Member since:
2006-02-15
This feature doesn't have anything to do with booting. Its more like a swap file on a RAM disk.
It also doesn't occur, at least in the BETA, automatically, you need to specifiy the device is used as memory in the device properties. You can also specify the amount of space put aside for this use.
