Speed up your Windows 7 using Readyboost feature.
Jun 22, 2009 Featured Article, Windows
I recently bought one HP Mini Netbook with 2GB RAM and installed Windows 7 RC on it. After a while, I realized more memory is required for smooth running of Windows 7 RC with many applications got installed on it. While RAM upgrade is not possible in my HP Mini Netbook, the next best option for me was to use Flash memory (USB flash drive) with Readyboost feature in Windows 7. Flash memory is non-volatile, cheaper and can service random reads up to 10 times faster than a typical hard disk, whereas physical hard disk Random Disk IO is still a bottleneck. As per Windows 7 Team Blog ” Windows 7 will disable Superfetch, ReadyBoost, as well as boot and application launch prefetching on SSDs with good random read, random write and flush performance”. HP mini netbook does not come with SSD, so it does not help me much but to go with Readyboost using Flash Drive.
ReadyBoost will leverage the flash memory storage devices by creating an intermediate caching layer on them that logically sits between memory and disks.Windows ReadyBoost relies on the intelligent memory management of Windows SuperFetch feature and can significantly improve system responsiveness.
Configuring Windows ReadyBoost is as easy as booting your OS, but many people are not discovering this hidden feature. When a removable memory device such as a USB flash drive or a secure digital (SD) memory card is first inserted into a port, Windows 7 checks to see if its performance is fast enough to work with Windows ReadyBoost. If so, you are asked if you want to use this device to speed up system performance. You can choose to allocate part of a USB drive’s memory to speed up performance and use the remainder to store files. See the screen captures below which explains the steps you go through while enabling ReadyBoost.
- Select ‘Use this Device” and decide how much RAM you want to allocate. The maximum space from one Flash Drive can be allocated for Readyboost is 4GB. So use multiple Flash Drives for Readyboost if you want more than 4GB.
- Once Readyboost is done, you will see a Readboost Cache file as shown below in the figure.
You can measure the performance using perfmon utility – choose “Readyboost Cache” object . As can see in the below screen capture, I have used two flash memories for readyboost and allocated 6GB in total (in Red) and used space is 2gb at that moment (in Green). First flash drive has been allocated with 4GB, and remaining for data store. In the second one, I have allocated 2 GB and remaining for data store. I feel faster now working on my netbook than without having it.
You may find the new laptops in the market are now comes with “Turbo Memory” feature which is actually an internal flash memory fit inside the laptop. This can be used for ready-boost without dangling memory sticks.
Tags: HP Mini Netbook, Readyboost, SSD, Turbo Memory, Windows, Windows 7, Windows Superfetch
One correction.
In Windows 7, Readyboost is not actually limited to 4GB. Instead, that limitation comes from the FAT32 filesystem.
If you reformat a larger flash card with exFAT or NTFS, it can create and use larger cache files. I’m currently using all of an 8GB card. I’ve got a fast 32GB card on order. Supposedly you can use up to 256 GB spread across multiple drives. I suspect even with my disk- and memory- intensive usage patterns, 32GB even is overkill.
My subjective experience is also that my system is much faster. But until recently I was running Vista, and some may just be improvements to Windows 7, especially Superfetch. But SOMETHING is caching data so that Google Chrome can come up Really Amazingly Quickly.
2 days ago, I found a 1GB thumb-drive in my drawer, a freebie from attending an IT security seminar some time ago.
So, I go about ReadyBoost-ing it on my Win7 desktop. Really noticed the improvement during after logging in.
Good info, I have developed an interest in readyboost after getting a netbook, although my msi L2100 is fast, faster and more efficient wouldnt hurt
I did notice a faster load time and snappier feel when testing a 1GB usb drive on my desktop with 2GB ram. Im glad because I thought I would need something more like a 16GB ssd through mini pci-e on the netbook to keep it discrete and practical but instead 4GB SD is what I got and in the slot I will rarely ever use if that is much better. Now the pci-e slot will go to a HD decoder
Windows 7 and Vista only use ReadyBoost if there is 512MB or less system RAM installed.