Max performace settings (swap/cache) with 256/512 mb ram?

Ron Martell wrote in
:

"Anorack Ted" wrote:

Check out :- http://www.outertech.com/index.php?_charisma_page=index


Cacheman is pure unadulterated crapware that is totally incapable of
performing any beneficial function for any computer under any
circumstances.


Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada

Apparently you haven't used it or used it incorrectly. With some time and
effort I was able to turn my crawling Win98SE PIII/700 machine into a
machine that runs nearly as fast as as my WinXP Pro 2.5Ghz. Both have 512MB
of RAM.

Ron Martell wrote in
:

"Anorack Ted" wrote:

Check out :- http://www.outertech.com/index.php?_charisma_page=index


Cacheman is pure unadulterated crapware that is totally incapable of
performing any beneficial function for any computer under any
circumstances.


Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada

Apparently you haven't used it or used it incorrectly. With some time and
effort I was able to turn my crawling Win98SE PIII/700 machine into a
machine that runs nearly as fast as as my WinXP Pro 2.5Ghz. Both have 512MB
of RAM.

98 Guy wrote in :

Buffalo wrote:

With your limited knowledge, you shouldn't be in charge of
the project you are doong.

Everything I've read points to one thing:

Real memory + Virtual memory = total available memory (TAM).

None of the documents that have been posted so far have said that TAM
ever needs to be more than a few hundred mb.

If TAM = 512 mb, and if Real Memory = 512 mb, then Virtual Memory = 0.

I'll run some Sandra tests with and without virtual memory turned on
and see if it makes a difference.

But I think many of you out there are just plain in the habbit of
keeping virtual memory turned because "it's always been that way". If
you've got 128mb ram, yea, ok, you probably need virtual memory turned
on. But if you've got 256? 512? no way. Win-98 is hardly ever,
perhaps never used as a server. So you can't tell me it's memory
needs are significant once you've given it 256 mb of real RAM.

Don't come back and cry, if you get 'burned' real bad.

And just how would I get "burned real bad" if I run a pc with Virtual
memory turned off?

Don't load a heap of FUD on me. Give me information - not FUD.

It's strongly recommended to not disable the swap file. You can do this
briefly for diagnosis or tuning. Some applications require the presence of
the swapfile and if it's not found may result in your system hanging. Here
is an excerpt from Microsoft:

Caution Completely disabling virtual memory might cause the computer to stop
operating properly. You might not be able to restart the computer, or system
performance might be degraded. Do not disable virtual memory unless
instructed to do so by a product support representative.

Source:

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/d...all/reskit/en-
us/part5/wrkc26.mspx

I used Cacheman to optimize my Win98SE system when I went from 128MB to
512MB. Initially it was actually performing worse with more memory. After
some monitoring and tuning it runs great. Note that during monitoring I
never actually saw my swap file get used. I still run with a minimum size of
128MB to prevent fragmentaion if it ever actually get's used and have not
specified a maximum size.

Microsoft even mentions Cacheman he

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-GB;835645

I don't recommend running the automatic memory recovery option. Simply use
it to monitor and adjust your settings. Once you are happy with the results
Cacheman no longer needs to be run at all.

98 Guy wrote in :

Buffalo wrote:

With your limited knowledge, you shouldn't be in charge of
the project you are doong.

Everything I've read points to one thing:

Real memory + Virtual memory = total available memory (TAM).

None of the documents that have been posted so far have said that TAM
ever needs to be more than a few hundred mb.

If TAM = 512 mb, and if Real Memory = 512 mb, then Virtual Memory = 0.

I'll run some Sandra tests with and without virtual memory turned on
and see if it makes a difference.

But I think many of you out there are just plain in the habbit of
keeping virtual memory turned because "it's always been that way". If
you've got 128mb ram, yea, ok, you probably need virtual memory turned
on. But if you've got 256? 512? no way. Win-98 is hardly ever,
perhaps never used as a server. So you can't tell me it's memory
needs are significant once you've given it 256 mb of real RAM.

Don't come back and cry, if you get 'burned' real bad.

And just how would I get "burned real bad" if I run a pc with Virtual
memory turned off?

Don't load a heap of FUD on me. Give me information - not FUD.

It's strongly recommended to not disable the swap file. You can do this
briefly for diagnosis or tuning. Some applications require the presence of
the swapfile and if it's not found may result in your system hanging. Here
is an excerpt from Microsoft:

Caution Completely disabling virtual memory might cause the computer to stop
operating properly. You might not be able to restart the computer, or system
performance might be degraded. Do not disable virtual memory unless
instructed to do so by a product support representative.

Source:

http://www.microsoft.com/resources/d...all/reskit/en-
us/part5/wrkc26.mspx

I used Cacheman to optimize my Win98SE system when I went from 128MB to
512MB. Initially it was actually performing worse with more memory. After
some monitoring and tuning it runs great. Note that during monitoring I
never actually saw my swap file get used. I still run with a minimum size of
128MB to prevent fragmentaion if it ever actually get's used and have not
specified a maximum size.

Microsoft even mentions Cacheman he

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-GB;835645

I don't recommend running the automatic memory recovery option. Simply use
it to monitor and adjust your settings. Once you are happy with the results
Cacheman no longer needs to be run at all.

98 Guy wrote:


I'm replacing about 1/2 dozen office PC's (each being a P-3, 600 to
850 mhz, 128 mb ram each) to 2.6 ghz Celeron's with 512 mb ram, DVD-rw
(LG 8x) and CD-rw drives, 80 gb Seagate Barracuda drives (very quite),
Zalman copper CPU heatsink AND zalman 400 watt power supply. Very
fast, very quite machines.

They're getting Win 98 (1 master drive is being cloned with Ghost).
Full install of Microsoft office 2000 premium, and all sorts of other
goodies from the MSDN (map point, etc). DVD burning / copying
software (DVD decrypt, DVD shrink, etc).

So based on everything I've read so far, a machine with 512 mb (or
more) of real, honest to goodness RAM will never realistically need to
use virtual memory so it will get turned off.

What's a good setting for vcache? 64 mb? 128?

You are being very foolhardy in at least 3 different ways:

1. Using an out of date and no longer supported operating system on
up to date hardware. Sort of like putting a Ford Model T engine into
a new Ferrari.

2. Disabling virtual memory. Doing so will adversely affect the
performance of these computers and make them more likely to suffer
serious crashes.

3. Using vcache settings that are somewhat appropriate for Windows 95
but not for Windows 98. Windows 98 is designed for and operates best
with a large disk cache. There is very little need to limit vcache
on systems with 512 mb or less RAM, and if such a limit is considered
desirable it should be something in the region of 70% of the total
RAM.

Good luck


Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

"The reason computer chips are so small is computers don't eat much."

98 Guy wrote:


I'm replacing about 1/2 dozen office PC's (each being a P-3, 600 to
850 mhz, 128 mb ram each) to 2.6 ghz Celeron's with 512 mb ram, DVD-rw
(LG 8x) and CD-rw drives, 80 gb Seagate Barracuda drives (very quite),
Zalman copper CPU heatsink AND zalman 400 watt power supply. Very
fast, very quite machines.

They're getting Win 98 (1 master drive is being cloned with Ghost).
Full install of Microsoft office 2000 premium, and all sorts of other
goodies from the MSDN (map point, etc). DVD burning / copying
software (DVD decrypt, DVD shrink, etc).

So based on everything I've read so far, a machine with 512 mb (or
more) of real, honest to goodness RAM will never realistically need to
use virtual memory so it will get turned off.

What's a good setting for vcache? 64 mb? 128?

You are being very foolhardy in at least 3 different ways:

1. Using an out of date and no longer supported operating system on
up to date hardware. Sort of like putting a Ford Model T engine into
a new Ferrari.

2. Disabling virtual memory. Doing so will adversely affect the
performance of these computers and make them more likely to suffer
serious crashes.

3. Using vcache settings that are somewhat appropriate for Windows 95
but not for Windows 98. Windows 98 is designed for and operates best
with a large disk cache. There is very little need to limit vcache
on systems with 512 mb or less RAM, and if such a limit is considered
desirable it should be something in the region of 70% of the total
RAM.

Good luck


Ron Martell Duncan B.C. Canada
--
Microsoft MVP
On-Line Help Computer Service
http://onlinehelp.bc.ca

"The reason computer chips are so small is computers don't eat much."

Ron Martell wrote:

1. Using an out of date and no longer supported operating system
on up to date hardware. Sort of like putting a Ford Model T
engine into a new Ferrari.

Other than the differences between Fat32 and NTFS (and I'll agree that
NTFS is better than FAT32 when it comes to the large hard drives now
available, but that has nothing intrinsically to do with the OS),
there is no practical benefit to the OS migration dance that Microsoft
has everyone doing every 4 to 6 years, and there are real pitfalls to
Win2k and Winxp.

Sure it's close to holloween, but the "no longer supported" bit about
windows 98 doesn't scare me. Win 98 is mature and is stable enough
for the average desk top in a small office situation. Win2k and WinXP
were first and foremost designed to insure continued revenue for
Microsoft and their biggest features were logon security and remote
administration - both of which are extremely important to over-hyped
big-company IT departments. The fact that they came with so many
un-needed services, and those services were turned on "out of the
box", made them a security nightmare and we have the avalanche of
e-mail spam, trojans and virii thanks to $600 dell and gateway
computers that came with XP and quickly became trojans and zombies on
residential hi-speed networks.

I would love to see someone hack Win-98 and give it the ability to
handle an NTFS file system. But as of this writing there isn't a
chip-set, video card, sound board or interface technology that Win-98
can't handle (perhaps not Raid).

2. Disabling virtual memory. Doing so will adversely affect
the performance of these computers and make them more likely
to suffer serious crashes.

Once upon a time, memory was expensive. So virtual memory was
"invented" and it existed on the hard drive - in the form of the swap
file (which, I'm told, is not cached - which would sort of defeat the
purpose, but devoting a little bit of ram to cache the swap would seem
to be a good idea).

I still can't see the logic NOT throwing 512 mb, even 1 gb of ram on a
PC now that ram is so cheap, and doing away with the swap file.

3. Using vcache settings that are somewhat appropriate for
Windows 95 but not for Windows 98. Windows 98 is designed
for and operates best with a large disk cache. There is
very little need to limit vcache on systems with 512 mb or
less RAM, and if such a limit is considered desirable it
should be something in the region of 70% of the total RAM.

70% of total ram being used as the drive cache! Thats insane! Even
as an upper limit!

Some write that setting virtual memory to a constant size (max = min)
results in better performance because Windows doesn't have to work (as
it periodically does) to adjust the size of the swap file up and down
to suit transient conditions. Do you agree? Would the same argument
hold for Vcache?

What about the relationship between Vcache and chunksize?

Ron Martell wrote:

1. Using an out of date and no longer supported operating system
on up to date hardware. Sort of like putting a Ford Model T
engine into a new Ferrari.

Other than the differences between Fat32 and NTFS (and I'll agree that
NTFS is better than FAT32 when it comes to the large hard drives now
available, but that has nothing intrinsically to do with the OS),
there is no practical benefit to the OS migration dance that Microsoft
has everyone doing every 4 to 6 years, and there are real pitfalls to
Win2k and Winxp.

Sure it's close to holloween, but the "no longer supported" bit about
windows 98 doesn't scare me. Win 98 is mature and is stable enough
for the average desk top in a small office situation. Win2k and WinXP
were first and foremost designed to insure continued revenue for
Microsoft and their biggest features were logon security and remote
administration - both of which are extremely important to over-hyped
big-company IT departments. The fact that they came with so many
un-needed services, and those services were turned on "out of the
box", made them a security nightmare and we have the avalanche of
e-mail spam, trojans and virii thanks to $600 dell and gateway
computers that came with XP and quickly became trojans and zombies on
residential hi-speed networks.

I would love to see someone hack Win-98 and give it the ability to
handle an NTFS file system. But as of this writing there isn't a
chip-set, video card, sound board or interface technology that Win-98
can't handle (perhaps not Raid).

2. Disabling virtual memory. Doing so will adversely affect
the performance of these computers and make them more likely
to suffer serious crashes.

Once upon a time, memory was expensive. So virtual memory was
"invented" and it existed on the hard drive - in the form of the swap
file (which, I'm told, is not cached - which would sort of defeat the
purpose, but devoting a little bit of ram to cache the swap would seem
to be a good idea).

I still can't see the logic NOT throwing 512 mb, even 1 gb of ram on a
PC now that ram is so cheap, and doing away with the swap file.

3. Using vcache settings that are somewhat appropriate for
Windows 95 but not for Windows 98. Windows 98 is designed
for and operates best with a large disk cache. There is
very little need to limit vcache on systems with 512 mb or
less RAM, and if such a limit is considered desirable it
should be something in the region of 70% of the total RAM.

70% of total ram being used as the drive cache! Thats insane! Even
as an upper limit!

Some write that setting virtual memory to a constant size (max = min)
results in better performance because Windows doesn't have to work (as
it periodically does) to adjust the size of the swap file up and down
to suit transient conditions. Do you agree? Would the same argument
hold for Vcache?

What about the relationship between Vcache and chunksize?

Windows 98 can handle NTFS, with assistance.
http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/fr...tfswin98.shtml

If you want to stick with FAT32 for those drives, be aware that you will
need an upgraded version of FDISK.
http://support.microsoft.com/default...;EN-US;q263044

Note that it is a very poor idea to GHOST a system drive and expect it to
work OK in the new system.

The 70% recommendation for limiting cache only applies if you have some
reason for doing so. For instance, in some cases writing to CD or DVD with a
large cache can create problems as the system will try to cache data that
is, by definition, only being accessed once. With a decent speed CPU even
this reason becomes unlikely. Unless you have demonstrated that you have a
special case it is best to not apply any limit - there's no point in
installing all that RAM if you aren't going to allow Windows to use it.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)
"98 Guy" wrote in message ...
Ron Martell wrote:

1. Using an out of date and no longer supported operating system
on up to date hardware. Sort of like putting a Ford Model T
engine into a new Ferrari.

Other than the differences between Fat32 and NTFS (and I'll agree that
NTFS is better than FAT32 when it comes to the large hard drives now
available, but that has nothing intrinsically to do with the OS),
there is no practical benefit to the OS migration dance that Microsoft
has everyone doing every 4 to 6 years, and there are real pitfalls to
Win2k and Winxp.

Sure it's close to holloween, but the "no longer supported" bit about
windows 98 doesn't scare me. Win 98 is mature and is stable enough
for the average desk top in a small office situation. Win2k and WinXP
were first and foremost designed to insure continued revenue for
Microsoft and their biggest features were logon security and remote
administration - both of which are extremely important to over-hyped
big-company IT departments. The fact that they came with so many
un-needed services, and those services were turned on "out of the
box", made them a security nightmare and we have the avalanche of
e-mail spam, trojans and virii thanks to $600 dell and gateway
computers that came with XP and quickly became trojans and zombies on
residential hi-speed networks.

I would love to see someone hack Win-98 and give it the ability to
handle an NTFS file system. But as of this writing there isn't a
chip-set, video card, sound board or interface technology that Win-98
can't handle (perhaps not Raid).

2. Disabling virtual memory. Doing so will adversely affect
the performance of these computers and make them more likely
to suffer serious crashes.

Once upon a time, memory was expensive. So virtual memory was
"invented" and it existed on the hard drive - in the form of the swap
file (which, I'm told, is not cached - which would sort of defeat the
purpose, but devoting a little bit of ram to cache the swap would seem
to be a good idea).

I still can't see the logic NOT throwing 512 mb, even 1 gb of ram on a
PC now that ram is so cheap, and doing away with the swap file.

3. Using vcache settings that are somewhat appropriate for
Windows 95 but not for Windows 98. Windows 98 is designed
for and operates best with a large disk cache. There is
very little need to limit vcache on systems with 512 mb or
less RAM, and if such a limit is considered desirable it
should be something in the region of 70% of the total RAM.

70% of total ram being used as the drive cache! Thats insane! Even
as an upper limit!

Some write that setting virtual memory to a constant size (max = min)
results in better performance because Windows doesn't have to work (as
it periodically does) to adjust the size of the swap file up and down
to suit transient conditions. Do you agree? Would the same argument
hold for Vcache?

What about the relationship between Vcache and chunksize?

Windows 98 can handle NTFS, with assistance.
http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/fr...tfswin98.shtml

If you want to stick with FAT32 for those drives, be aware that you will
need an upgraded version of FDISK.
http://support.microsoft.com/default...;EN-US;q263044

Note that it is a very poor idea to GHOST a system drive and expect it to
work OK in the new system.

The 70% recommendation for limiting cache only applies if you have some
reason for doing so. For instance, in some cases writing to CD or DVD with a
large cache can create problems as the system will try to cache data that
is, by definition, only being accessed once. With a decent speed CPU even
this reason becomes unlikely. Unless you have demonstrated that you have a
special case it is best to not apply any limit - there's no point in
installing all that RAM if you aren't going to allow Windows to use it.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)
"98 Guy" wrote in message ...
Ron Martell wrote:

1. Using an out of date and no longer supported operating system
on up to date hardware. Sort of like putting a Ford Model T
engine into a new Ferrari.

Other than the differences between Fat32 and NTFS (and I'll agree that
NTFS is better than FAT32 when it comes to the large hard drives now
available, but that has nothing intrinsically to do with the OS),
there is no practical benefit to the OS migration dance that Microsoft
has everyone doing every 4 to 6 years, and there are real pitfalls to
Win2k and Winxp.

Sure it's close to holloween, but the "no longer supported" bit about
windows 98 doesn't scare me. Win 98 is mature and is stable enough
for the average desk top in a small office situation. Win2k and WinXP
were first and foremost designed to insure continued revenue for
Microsoft and their biggest features were logon security and remote
administration - both of which are extremely important to over-hyped
big-company IT departments. The fact that they came with so many
un-needed services, and those services were turned on "out of the
box", made them a security nightmare and we have the avalanche of
e-mail spam, trojans and virii thanks to $600 dell and gateway
computers that came with XP and quickly became trojans and zombies on
residential hi-speed networks.

I would love to see someone hack Win-98 and give it the ability to
handle an NTFS file system. But as of this writing there isn't a
chip-set, video card, sound board or interface technology that Win-98
can't handle (perhaps not Raid).

2. Disabling virtual memory. Doing so will adversely affect
the performance of these computers and make them more likely
to suffer serious crashes.

Once upon a time, memory was expensive. So virtual memory was
"invented" and it existed on the hard drive - in the form of the swap
file (which, I'm told, is not cached - which would sort of defeat the
purpose, but devoting a little bit of ram to cache the swap would seem
to be a good idea).

I still can't see the logic NOT throwing 512 mb, even 1 gb of ram on a
PC now that ram is so cheap, and doing away with the swap file.

3. Using vcache settings that are somewhat appropriate for
Windows 95 but not for Windows 98. Windows 98 is designed
for and operates best with a large disk cache. There is
very little need to limit vcache on systems with 512 mb or
less RAM, and if such a limit is considered desirable it
should be something in the region of 70% of the total RAM.

70% of total ram being used as the drive cache! Thats insane! Even
as an upper limit!

Some write that setting virtual memory to a constant size (max = min)
results in better performance because Windows doesn't have to work (as
it periodically does) to adjust the size of the swap file up and down
to suit transient conditions. Do you agree? Would the same argument
hold for Vcache?

What about the relationship between Vcache and chunksize?