Can you use an SD card as Extra RAM in a netbook?

I apologize if this is a stupid question but I wanted to find out if I buy like a 4 GB SD memory card if it will be possible to up my netbook's ram that way. I just got a Dell Mini 1018 and want to see if this would be possible. Thanks in advance for the help. It's running win 7 if that matters.

 

The SD memory card is slower than even your hard drive. I don't think it would do much.

 

Dang, too bad. Thanks for the answer on that Trottle! Much appreciated.

 

You can but it won't make a significant difference. It will turn the flash media into Readyboost, if you have a spare one or extras, it won't hurt.

 

Might be worth a try, thanks Tsunade! Might give it a go and see if it works out.

 

The SD card reader uses the USB hub to communicate and thus adds an extra layer of communications that is necessary. Check your SD Card to see what class it is (2,4,6, or possibly 10). The higher the class the faster the card. The numbers correspond to the speed in Mb/s, so a class 4 card can transfer up to 4Mb/s. If you have at least a Class 4, it may be worth a try, so stick it in there and then select on the popup dialogue to use as a ReadyBoost drive. Windows will test it and determine if it is fast enough to be suitable as a Readyboost drive. If not, it won't give you the option to use it as one. You can find out by right clicking the disk icon.

 

25MB/sec vs 6000MB/sec

Hmz

 

it is being used as cache(ReadyBoost). If you are short on RAM(say less than 2GB) and need to regularly use page file, it helps.

Surprisingly, my experience is that an SD card which is faster on random read, slower on write performance give me better performance(feel snappier)than USB flash. So if possible get the fastest random read device and preferably SD instead of USB.

Though try to max out your RAM first(if possible and budget allows) before think about Readyboost.

edit:

BTW, I don't think my SD card goes through the USB layer as there is a seperate SD host controller listed in the device manager. Which may be the reason why it has a lower latency.

 

This is correct. The SD card reader on my laptop is on the pci-e bus.

 

Thanks aardvarksystems! I will check into it, and get a class 4 because I only have 1 GB of Ram in this netbook I just bought.

Thanks for the reply Meaker, not sure what it means though, kinda ignorant when it comes to hz and other computer stuff...

Thank you for the reply and confirmation that this might help my set up run smoother chimpanzee!

 

1GB? You NEED to get more RAM and forget about getting an SD card. Even if you only get 2GB, it will be a major improvement over what you have now.

 

They didn't have a way to upgrade it, I don't think they make it easy to do on our own either, I might be stuck with it as is. I doubt I can get it upgraded. You never know though.

 

at 1GB, a fast SD as readyboost would show significant improvement.

You are effectively having a much faster(in terms of latency) page file which you need. I bought a Transcend 4GB for 5 bucks or so which is a class 10 device.

 

Only few models of netbooks and small/light laptops don't have upgradeable RAM. What is the model of your laptop?

 

Dell 1018, it's not got a access panel on the bottom from what I understand, and would involve disassembling the entire machine to get at it. I could be wrong though, it's not here yet.

That's a great deal chimpanzee! I hope I find a good one too like you did. I will start looking soon, haven't been able to browse Newegg yet, maybe they have something that will work.

EDIT:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...394&cm_re=4_gb_sd_card-_-20-161-394-_-Product

Maybe that one would work well enough.

 

BTW, is your 1018 using SSD ? If yes, you don't need an SD card.

 

No, I don't think it is. It said 160 GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM) so that's not SSD right?

EDIT: It has this though: Secure Digital (SD/SDHC) Memory Card port so that will hold the SD card I linked above just fine right? It was class 10 so I think I will get one of those, and hope it helps since I don't think I'll be able to convince my hubby to open up and upgrade its RAM.

 

it is just HDD. And I am 99% sure that you would feel the difference with a fast SD(comparing with the slow 5400rpm HDD).

The only thing I am not sure though is whether a 4GB is better or 8GB is better. Some said the 4GB Transcend is using faster NAND(SLC?) whereas 8GB+ is using MLC. I cannot confirm that though.

 

I haven't bought it yet, so if someone can confirm that 8GB of a Class 10 would be better using MLC I would really appreciate it before I get a card that won't work as well. Thanks chimpanzee for all your help I really am glad you took time to reply so many times. You and the others here are so knowledgeable, I knew just where to come for an answer to this query.

 

On second thought, may be just get the 4GB from cost effectiveness perspective.

A typical Windows 7 usage seldom exceed 4GB(especially you are on a mini) so it should give you the best bang for the money, the extra 4GB are nice to have cache but the gain would be diminishing. Talking about saving a few bucks

edit:

Just to round this up, below are my device statistics. You can see that it is 'slower' than HDD but what it doesn't show is the latency(< 1ms vs 10ms) which is the key factor for page file(as most read are less than 8KB).


class 10 SD
The device (Unknown Unknown) is suitable for a ReadyBoost cache. The recommended cache size is 3823616 KB. The random read speed is 5519 KB/sec. The sequential write speed is 2024 KB/sec.

usb flash
The device ( USB DISK 2.0) is suitable for a ReadyBoost cache. The recommended cache size is 1906688 KB. The random read speed is 4658 KB/sec. The sequential write speed is 2855 KB/sec.

 

I was making a comparison in bandwidth between ram and an SSD.

Its the amount of data per second that can be shifted to and from the device and is why the SD card cant help with everything.

 

You can upgrade the memory on your laptop. It requires significant disassembly though.

 

Agreed. Service manual is here: Documentation

Michael

 

Not the easiest to upgrade but sure beats those first generation Acer Aspires where you have the gut the entire notebook to upgrade it...

 

Thanks for the link to the documentation on this, I wish Dell would let us just buy one with 2 gb ram...Oh well. We'll see how bad it is on 1 gb and then maybe I can convince hubby to attempt this.

EDIT: He said NO Way is he doing it...Oh well here is a great tutorial on it for people to check out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iy-VaSKEQqg&feature=watch_response

and the reassembly video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TlZVzF2hG8&feature=related

 

I can only recommend using an SD card as ReadyBoost on a netbook, especially if you have a built in reader and less than 2GB RAM! I am using one right now experimentally on my PC, which currently has 4GB ram and whenever there is shortage on RAM and RAM sweeping becomes obvious - the card comes handy and helps!

Yes, it is much slower than my HDD, BUT the Access Time is twice shorter!

Just try it out - it will make a difference, I am sure! Don't expect marvels - it cannot substitute additional RAM! But it does help!

 

Thanks Gracy! I definitely will be giving this a go, also changed my order with Dell because they delayed it, I cancelled the 1018 and reordered but this time got a 1012 so I can upgrade the ram without so much disassembly, just the three screws and the keyboard need to come out and that ram access panel makes it much easier and something I am probably going to do myself. I ended up with a bigger HD and twice the battery I had on the original 1018 order. I hope this will make me happier, because I looked at the video on youtube with the 1018's lack of the RAM access door, and got spooked. LOL!

 

Instead of using the SD card with ReadyBoost, you should be trying eBoostr for a very real performance boost.

Good luck.

 

I am really excited to have a new 1012 in my hot little hands now. I saw the other video Jrinco has on youtube for the 1012 RAM upgrade and it seems easy enough because of the access panel, so I am definitely going to do that instead of getting a card, it just seems like the right thing to do for it. Thank you guys for all the help deciding on the right thing to do!

 

I am interested to know the real life battery life of this device.

 

Pamster,

Real physical RAM is always better than 'substitutes'.

You still owe it to yourself to try eBoostr though - especially if you have a fast (enough) SD card lying around.

Hope you enjoy your new machine.

 

I don't actualy have a SD card that isn't in use so I don't know if I'll buy one for it or just get the ram...Decisions decisions...LOL! I LOVE this machine though, getting used to the new keyboard isn't too easy thouh missing the delete key and the cap lock key is always triggered when I go for the shift it seems, and as there's no indicator light I can only tell when things are capped that I didn't intend. I am sure though I'll get used to it soon enough.

 

imo the SD card won't help whatsoever. max speed if you buy a premium ultra high speed card that would cost you a lot would be around 24mb/s MAX. your HDD is better then that.
you could use a good usb pen drive but then you would be limited to usb 2.0 bus. no go.
so your only faster interface you have is mini pci-e.
there are good mini pci-e SSD's. that's the way to go.
Newegg.com - SUPER TALENT FPM64GLSE Mini PCIe 64GB Mini PCIe (SATA) MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
150MB/s read 100MB/s writte
Newegg.com - Intel 310 Series (Soda Creek) SSDMAEMC080G2C1 mSATA 80GB mSATA (mini PCIe form factor) MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) - SSD
200MB/s read 70MB/s writte

 

Speed isn't as much the issue, because if it's being used as a RAM replacement, files will mostly be small. And more to the point, it'd mostly be 4K reads, which for most HDDs is maybe 1 MB/s. SD cards have more like 2-4 MB/s 4K reads. As well, there are seek times and latency, and a SD card well exceeds a HDD in that respect. A SSD would be a decent solution, but it's going to be a lot more expensive.

 

here you have the result of a class 10 SDHC card:



3.284MB/s 4k read 0.013MB/s 4k write.

example:
Hitachi 5k250 5400 rpm - 250gb:
0.98MB/sec 4k read 0.49 MB/s 4k write.

it seams write speeds are always faster on HDD then SDHC. the advantage is only on read speeds which is good in ths case.
But I've tried to use an SDHC card on my netbook and I failed to see any improvement whatsoever. Battery life was reduced though.

imo notebooks should come with CFast readers.

 

Wait. This is the first time i heard that this would work! O.O What applications would you use to enable it? I also have a netbook Eeepc 1000he. With 2gb ram. And still, I want to try what you guys are talking about.

 

Go for RAM... always.

Assuming only a single RAM slot, and not sure if its DDR2 or DDR3 but in either case:

2GB DDR3 = ~ $20
2GB DDR2 = ~ $30
2GB Class 10 SD = ~ $15

You will get ten times the performance using RAM over any kind of flash card, and if it's DDR3 then it's only $5 more.

 

Yes, assuming you can upgrade RAM, more RAM is always better. This is simply a solution for if you either cannot upgrade, or feel you cannot afford it and happen to have spare SD cards lying around. Also note that this can reduce the life of your SD card significantly, as it'll be sustaining more writes than would be "usual". If you do plan to do this, however, the 2 major programs are Readyboost, part of Windows 7 and Vista, and eBoostr. Both programs will use the SD card as extra cache memory, basically turning it into a large SuperFetch buffer.