Jump to content

DOS, Win 3.1,3.11,Win 95,98,ME Ramdrives List and Performance Comparison


98SE

Recommended Posts

1 hour ago, dencorso said:

:)

Do you have a list of any other paid Ramdisk for DOS or 9X/ME?

Why choose this version of CrystalDiskMark 2.2?

Any specific versions or last version number for DOS?  And which versions works in 9X/ME only?

Any way to remove double spacing in your results?

Edited by 98SE
Link to comment
Share on other sites


2 hours ago, 98SE said:

Any way to remove double spacing in your results?

Yes. By hand.

2 hours ago, 98SE said:

Do you have a list of any other paid Ramdisk for DOS or 9X/ME?

No need. The only one one can set to sizes above 512 MiB, while keeping the system able to allow Win 9x/ME to run stably is RLoew's non-XMS Ramdisk.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

16 hours ago, dencorso said:

Yes. By hand.

No need. The only one one can set to sizes above 512 MiB, while keeping the system able to allow Win 9x/ME to run stably is RLoew's non-XMS Ramdisk.

I'm testing DOS and 9X/ME Ramdisks independently.  So any 512MB or under DOS Ramdisks or above 512MB DOS Ramdisks are welcome.

Dencorso it's still taking too much space so reduce the two results into two spoilers.

Or if they were quoted from a link you posted that might be better if you want to post two separate threads and link each individually.

.

.

Two spoiler headers:

Spoiler #1 title

Gigabyte i-RAM 1.5GiB DDR1 memory installed hardware Ramdisk vs. R. Loew's software-only 32-bit Non-XMS RAMDSK32

Add link to the Ramdrives used for Gigabyte i-RAM and the R. Loew on two separate links.

.

Spoiler #1 Contents Header

Computer Motherboard and CPU specs:

OS: Windows 98 SE

Filesystem: FAT32

Your results.

.

.

Spoiler #2 title

Gigabyte i-RAM 1.5GiB DDR1 memory installed hardware Ramdisk vs. Gavotte's software-only NT-only RRAMDISK

Add link to the Ramdrives used for Gigabyte i-RAM and the R. Loew on two separate links.

.

Spoiler #2 Contents Header

Computer Motherboard and CPU specs:

OS: Windows XP SP3

Filesystem: FAT32

Your results.

.

.

.

You should do a Gigabyte i-RAM 4.0GiB DDR1 memory installed hardware Ramdisk vs. R. Loew's software-only 64-bit Non-XMS RAMDSK64 if you have the capability.  Use 98SE DOS to boot up but keep the Config.Sys only with HIMEMEX and no other files.  Keep Autoexec.Bat empty for cleanest state.

In DOS you could do four drive letters for this test.

C: HD OR SSD SOURCE TEST FILES.

D: Gigabyte i-RAM 4GB

Y: RL64 4GB #1

Z: RL64 4GB #2

COPY a 4.0GB FAT32 file size limit FILE FROM C: TO D: mark down time elapsed unless you have some sort of DOS benchmark transfer rate program.

COPY the 4.0GB FILE from D: to Y: mark down the time elapsed in Minutes:Seconds

COPY the 4.0GB FILE from Y: to Z: mark down the time elapsed in Minutes:Seconds

DELETE the 4.0GB file from D: i-RAM

COPY the 4.0GB FILE from Z: to D: mark down the time elapsed in Minutes:Seconds

Post the results.

Edited by 98SE
Link to comment
Share on other sites

A Hardware RAMDisk is not going to run as fast as a Software RAMDisk. It is basically PCI or PCI-E RAM, rather than directly interfaced system RAM.
DOS does not support files larger than  2GiB.
He cannot link to my RAMDisks, only the Catalog page.

Incidentally, I ran some tests. The Dual-Mode RAMDisk will work in a 32-Bit only System. It just assumes 0 Bytes of 64-Bit RAM.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, rloew said:

A Hardware RAMDisk is not going to run as fast as a Software RAMDisk. It is basically PCI or PCI-E RAM, rather than directly interfaced system RAM.
DOS does not support files larger than  2GiB.
He cannot link to my RAMDisks, only the Catalog page.

Incidentally, I ran some tests. The Dual-Mode RAMDisk will work in a 32-Bit only System. It just assumes 0 Bytes of 64-Bit RAM.

You are thinking of the FAT16 2GB file size limitation.  He is using FAT32 that can use up to 2TB partitions but the maximum files size is 4GB using 98SE DOS (4,294,967,294 bytes).

I'm letting him decide what link he wants to post for the hardware and software programs he tested since he knows the rules better on MSFN.  I'm not including any commercial linked pages at the moment in case it causes conflict with linking to commercial stuff that requires purchasing.  Also it is harder for the common user to get every paid Ramdisk so I will focus on freeware Ramdisks first to do the comparisons before moving onto commercial ones if necessary for any final benchmark comparisons unless the author wants to release a testable copy for evaluation or has demo versions I will check those out.

Edited by 98SE
Link to comment
Share on other sites

No. I was referring to the 2GiB File Size limit that most DOS Programs have. Larger Files cannot be opened by the normal INT 21 Calls. I think the extended Calls are needed.

It appears that the COPY Command is one of the exceptions.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, rloew said:

No. I was referring to the 2GiB File Size limit that most DOS Programs have. Larger Files cannot be opened by the normal INT 21 Calls. I think the extended Calls are needed.

It appears that the COPY Command is one of the exceptions.

You're talking about opening up a 2GB DOS File?  What program are you proposing to do this?  That I haven't tried and it would be enormous.  I'm not even sure what program could open such a large file under DOS given its limitations.  But yes the COPY command and probably XCOPY as well should have no problem copying the 4GB file in my Ramdrive proposed speed tests.

However COPY and XCOPY will have differing results so I'm suggesting only the COPY method first in the first preliminary tests.

XCOPY method could be used in a follow up test for comparison.

Some other tests are adding DOS caching software into the mix to see if any benefit is achieved.  There were several of these back in the day that I'll have to try and dig up and I don't think these can be found on the internet that easily.  The most recognized from Microsoft is Smartdrv but from testing on Z170 it will corrupt the partition.  I haven't tested it on the Z77 to see if it had the same effect.

Edited by 98SE
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I wrote a Hex Editor using standard C calls. The _open Call fails if the file is larger than 2GiB.

I already know that SMARTDRV can corrupt a Partition larger than 137GB. It uses Cache keys that are too small.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

2 hours ago, rloew said:

I wrote a Hex Editor using standard C calls. The _open Call fails if the file is larger than 2GiB.

I already know that SMARTDRV can corrupt a Partition larger than 137GB. It uses Cache keys that are too small.

The drive wasn't even larger then 137GB that it corrupted.  I think the test SSD was 16GB.  I think it will corrupt because of the Z170 chipset.  This happened for the XP install in DOS.  So you have to install without smartdrv.  But another problem happens is you can't install XP using this method anymore and only via optical method because of the AHCI slipstream issue.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

24 minutes ago, 98SE said:

But another problem happens is you can't install XP using this method anymore and only via optical method because of the AHCI slipstream issue

That's already true for the Z68... :yes:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 hours ago, dencorso said:

That's already true for the Z68... :yes:

No problem for Z68 and Z77 F6 AHCI XP driver.  Did you not try a USB floppy drive?  Also slipstreaming AHCI and installing XP from DOS folder works.

Read my post to condense your Ramdrive results post into spoilers.

Edited by 98SE
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Update tested:

Franck Uberto Ramdisk v1.9i - 8-12-1998 - XMSDSK.EXE and EMSDSK.EXE

Functionality: Working on Z77

It looks like I had already tested this back in January on a bootable floppy disk.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...