ReadyBoost Works?

<OffTopic>So, I'm trying to get back into the blog, but between my Internet being off, Halo 3, and other stuff, I haven't had a chance to post. So, kicking off a new "ark", I'll discuss my experience with ReadyBoost.</OffTopic>

So I'm sure you've heard about ReadyBoost, Microsoft's answer to the nay sayers that Vista uses to many system resources. Microsoft said that with ReadyBoost, it will be able to act as additional RAM for your system. The recommend a 1:2 ratio for the system:cache.

So how did it fare? Well initially it was a bit difficult to get the feature to work. I had a older USB flash drive with 4GB of space. It took me about 10 reformats to get it to work, on account of Vista wanting a certain allocation space. After all of that, it only worked for a few days, so that was a bust.

I then recently got a new flash drive which claimed to be ReadyBoost capable. I ripped it out of the box and slapped it into my system. I immediately got a message asking if I wanted to use the device for ReadyBoost. Although I only have 1GB of RAM on my test system, Vista recommended I use all 4GB of space on the  USB drive.

I was skeptical about it working since Microsoft initially said a 1:2 ratio was optimal. I agreed and began to use a few programs. Launching apps was a bit faster, but not enough to make a difference. However, when using a open app, things did go considerably faster. I've been testing with different cache sizes, but it seems like 4GB is better than 2.

All in all, this a great but overlooked feature in Vista. Microsoft needs to raise awareness about this feature because it speeds up your system a good bit.

mSeliga