2 GB SD Card deals for Vista ReadyBoost

Just thought I'd make a quick post about a number of vendors offering cheap SD cards during Black Friday/Saturday.

Office Max has 1 GB SanDisk SD card or USB Drive for $12.99 (NO MIR)
Office Max also has 2 GB SanDisk SD card or 2 GB Verbatim USB drive for $24.99 (NO MIR)
Best Buy and Circuit City both have 2 GB SanDisk SD card for $29.99 (NO MIR)
Office Depot has same 2 GB SanDisk SD card for $29.99 (after $40 MIR)

There are many others I'm sure, but these are some terrific prices (especially the ones without mail-in rebates).

***NOTE: All of these deals are while supplies last, and are 11/24-11/25 only.***

If you're planning to upgrade to Vista when it's available, Vista ReadyBoost is basically a flash memory cache that you can use to speed up read/write performance of frequently accessed data. From my own trials, it works great, especially if you only have 1 GB or less of RAM. On 2 GB RAM systems, unless you run a lot of demanding applications, the effect is less noticeable, although still useful if you can pick up a flash drive at a low enough cost. Both SD cards and USB Drives are supported, though Vista will run a speed test to determine if your drive can read/write fast enough to be used as a ReadyBoost device.

I picked up a 2 GB SanDisk SD card which works great for ReadyBoost. I can't vouch for the other devices listed above, but if you have an SD slot on your notebook then any of the SanDisk SD cards above should work great. Microsoft recommends at least a 1:1 memory-to-ReadyBoost ratio, meaning if your system has 1 GB of RAM you should get at least a 1 GB ReadyBoost drive. Personally, I would go higher, and get a 2 GB card or USB Drive for those prices. You don't have to use all of the space for ReadyBoost. I've used 1.5 GB for Readyboost, leaving around 400 MB for the occaisonal files I want to transfer to another system using the SD card.

Anyway, if anyone has any questions about Vista ReadyBoost post them here, and I'll try to provide any information people want.

 

Hi, i tried a pny 2gb memory stick and it was rejected for ReadyBoost, are memory stick or thumb drives not compatiable with this feature? Said does not have Required Performance Charteristics for use in speeding up your system!! any Suggestions or comments. My system is
core2duo6600, 1gbddr2 6400 ,256mb video 7600gs, 200gbSat a Hdd Vista Ult

 

The data transfer rate probably wasnt fast enough with the card.

 

Yes, likely failed the sustained transfer rate tests. Unfortunately, there are still a number of devices on the market that use a "hybrid" design of a smaller amount of very fast memory and having the rest be considerably slower. The devices write data to the fast memory, then, if it's not accessed soon, move it to the slower memory. This trick works for most uses, but not for ReadyBoost. Pretty much all devices that use that method fail. And having a high "X" rating, means nothing, as it's usually the drives advertised as being the fastest that use the hybrid design.

As an aside, you might try forcing the test to be re-run. Right-click on the drive. Select properties, then ReadyBoost. Select the test option again. It will look like it immediately failed, but the test is really being performed in the background. Don't do anything for 30-45 seconds, and see if it passes. If so, great. If not, try reformatting the drive as FAT32, then following this process to recheck.

 

There really should be some kinda list for memory mfr. Im sure all the flash drive venors will label their memory "Readyboost campatible" or something similar....
I have a kingston 2gb sd card,, i wonder if'll work...i dont have a sd card slow on my sony! i might buy the pcmcia reader or buy a 2gb memory stick pro...
but i dont want to buy the memory stick and not be fast enough for vista!!!

 

id like to know which are compatible as well.

 

i checked the spec on my sd card which is 2gb..it is something like 5mb/sec transfer rate! Im sure its not compatible with vista...mostly the high speed ones will be compatible..but ill try it out..

 

Well, there are some websites that are reporting user submissions on which devices are compatible. There's a thread in the software section here with some links. Personally, I wouldn't go by any of those though. Many of these were reported by users running Pre-RTM versions of Vista, and the compatibility guidelines have changed throughout the beta. Also, device makers may change the memory they use in devices over time, so who knows if your experience will match an earlier report.

Megaman 81 -- I would wait and see if any MS Pro devices come out labeled as ReadyBoost capable first. Also, does your memory stick "drive" show up in windows explorer even when there's no card in it? If not, then good. If it does show up even when empty, it WILL NOT work with ReadyBoost regardless of the device you put in it. This is a major limitation of ReadyBoost. The card reader you use CANNOT show up as a drive when there is no media inserted in it. One reason I recommend against the PCMCIA card reader route for now is that there's no easy way to know whether or not that reader will show up as a drive without media in it.

The easiest way to go with ReadyBoost is a USB drive, because it doesn't require a card reader that also supports ReadyBoost, but for notebooks, having the ReadyBoost media inside the machine is a definite plus.

 

remember, some card readers are probably not fast enough. I was looking at one at Best Buy tonight that claimed only USB 2.0 Full-Speed, not High-Speed.

 

Hello,
I have recently bought a standard Sandisk 2Gb SD Card. I wanted to use the card with Vista's Ready Boost. Having read a few articles I realized that I should have check to see that this card met ready boost random read and write requirements. Yours is one of the few posts that I have read that has mentioned my brand and size of SD card. Just to verify, are you using a STANDARD Sandisk 2Gb Sd card to run ready boost under Vista? ( I'm asking because there are other types of Sandisk SD cards like Sandisk Extreme III for instance.) My card is just a run of the mill card which may be a good thing as apparently some high speed ones are said to be inconsistent and deceptive about there actual sustained and random read write times. If you could confirm that you are using the same SD card as me and it is working great I would really appreciate it.
Thank you
D

 

just a side note

i just did a test on my 64 mb xd card to test if it was fast enough


it said it was 400 mb/s

so that would be fast enough or not? what is the speed necessary?

 

Are these the same cards that fit into a camera will a kodak work?

 

Beginner's Luck.

I just discovered this Windows ReadyBoost thing so I plopped the 2GB SD card out of my camera and stuck it into the SD slot in my Everex Laptop. It seemed to work fine. The Readyboost Tab in the Properties window offered to use only 1650MB since I had a few pictures on it and that's what was left.

It is a Sandisk UltraII 2GB.

 

Yeah, you gotta watch out to meet the basic ReadyBoost demands. The free after rebate cards sometimes don't meet the speed recs. I've been dinged on this once myself .