[scottwilkins]

ReadyBoost is misunderstood. Readyboost is only for application launching, and making that task alone faster. It is NOT a replacement for RAM, which seems to be the biggest hoax out there. XP also had application launch caching, but with ReadyBoost, that task can be given a larger effect than before. Today's flash drives are by and far, slow. Very slow if you go and test more than just a few. So, first and foremost, this requires a properly tested and fast Flash Drive. Not to mention a properly setup computer with good USB 2.0 ports. I've seen ReadyBoost fail on systems with USB 2.0 ports, but the ports themselves were not up-to-speed. The biggest change to any system, and one that I did not see tested here, was boot time. The machines I put a good flash drive on will shorten their boot and even their restore from sleep time to about 1/2 the normal without Ready Boost. And, in time faster flash drives will make this even better.

[plsnoholeinjuan]

I recommend that readers go to the real source, or at least to more technically capable reviewers. - Here is what Microsoft says about ReadyBoost:http://download.microsoft.com/download/5/b/9/5b97017b-e28a-4bae-ba48-174cf47d23cd/CPA131_WH06.ppt- Here is what Tom's Hardware says about ReadyBoost:http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/31/windows-vista-superfetch-and-readyboostanalyzed/http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/01/29/xp-vs-vista/-Here is what anandtech says about ReadyBoost:http://www.anandtech.com/systems/showdoc.aspx?i=2917&p=7http://www.anandtech.com/systems/showdoc.aspx?i=2917&p=6-Here is what anandtech says about ReadyBoost:http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2017817,00.asp-Here is what Intel says about ReadyBoost with Robson and Turbo Memory:http://www.intel.com/technology/magazine/computing/robson-1206.htmhttp://www.intel.com/design/flash/nand/turbomemory/index.htm------Merge Doublepost-------Here is simple video that tells the ReadyBoost story a thousand times better that this article:http://video.google.com/videop lay?docid=5902090796342771727

[Gradient]

There seem to be a few people with a chip on their shoulder commenting on this one. I've never really seen a blazing-fast USB flash drive so I can see why there wouldn't be much of a performance boost using them for ReadyBoost, but what if you used an SSD that plugs in to an ExpressCard slot for the SuperFetch/ReadyBoost drive? Would that give the machine a boost?

[MedfordGuy]

The flash drive article misstates the case.As Orwell wrote, "Some animals are more equal than others" So, too, it is with ReadyBoost drives. It isn't enough that a flash drive meet the minimum standards for a ReadyBoost drive. According to Microsoft's ReadyBoost specification the device serves as a form of startup cache and works in conjunction with Vista's new Superfetch cache. Drives that meet the standard have to provide random access (not sequential access) of 5.0MB/sec 4K random reads across the whole device, and 3MB/sec random writes for 512K writes per the Windows Ready Boost Sepecification.I believe from information extracted on the Internet that Apacer currently has the fastest drives in their Handy Steno HA202 and HA203 200X speed ReadyBoost enabled drives. Apacer's published specification calls for up to 30MB/sec reads and 18MB/sec writes. I have two Vista computers each with its own HA202 ReadyBoost drive. I can attest that they provide a noticable boost.

[binaryspiral]

I think most of the critics of this article are missing the obvious point.The tested speed of the flash drive shouldn't determine if it was included in this test.A: Vista tests the speed of each removable drive when you insert it and determines if it's fast enough for ready boost.B: If the device has a "Ready Boost" logo on it, how is your average Joe Sixpack going to argue with that?I've been using ReadyBoost on a laptop with an 80GB 5400RPM hard drive, 2GB of PC5400 DDR, and a P4 1.8Ghz. I added a USB 2.0 SanDisk Cruiser - 2GB for ReadyBoost.I haven't noticed a single instance of speed increase, even at low memory usage during work when I have five or six large applications open.I've actually noticed some file tasks take longer than usual... but I haven't gotten out the stopwatch to verify.So as of today (4 days of using ReadyBoost), I've disabled the feature and will use my USB drive for more useful tasks.

[Tron]

My system has 2Gb RAM and I never noticed any speed boost using ReadyBoost on my 2Gb USB drive.
As a matter of fact it actually slowed down Media Player whilst playing MP3's and MPG's
After removing the ReadyBoost flash drive there was a 100% improvement in Media Players performance!!!

[tech45]

READY BOOST WORKS!
I tried "ready boost" on company of hereos opposing fronts" had a 8600GS video card 256 ram and 2GB system ram. The game performance test showed the system was "poor" and it would crash unless I reduced all video settings. I pluged in a 4mb A data "my flash" USB after formating it to max and ran the program. The game performance went to good and the game ran perfectly at the high settings. Tests are good but the real world is better. Depending on the application depends on how useful this feature is. Just like 4mb ram is worthless if a program can only use 2mb.

[les304usa]

Alan,

With Vista SP1 and newer/faster USB flash drives, do you still hold the same view on ReadyBoost?

Thanks.

[binaryspiral]

les304usa, on 08 November 2008 - 10:03 PM, said:

Alan,

With Vista SP1 and newer/faster USB flash drives, do you still hold the same view on ReadyBoost?

Thanks.

Yep, I do. No change. You really want to increase the speed of Vista - increase the I/O capacity of your disks. RAID0, 15K RPM, SATA 6Gb, Solid State... anything you can do to make hard disk access faster... will make your Vista experience faster.

ReadyBoost is smoke and mirrors.