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    XP Swap on Class 10 SD-Card in SanDisk Expresscard/34 Reader

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by duenor, Aug 21, 2011.

  1. duenor

    duenor Newbie

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    Hello!

    System: XP Pro 32bit, 2GB DDR2, 7200RPM WD Scorpio 320GB. Dell D520.

    Would like to: Place swap file (4GB) on a Class 10 SD-Card, stuck inside SanDisk Expresscard/34 reader.

    Hypothesis: Would speed up page file access as SD card should theoretically be faster than HDD as well as reducing the amount of work the HDD has to run around doing. Am guessing that since the SD card goes into the expresscard XP might detect as non-removable drive.

    Best option would be to buy Expresscard SSD but price prohibitive ($70 on up).

    Notes: Recognize that better idea might be to buy more DDR2. But reluctant to waste current DDR2 boards as well has suffering from perverse desire to fill every available slot on my faithful D520.

    TIA! :D
     
    duenor, Aug 21, 2011
    #1
  2. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    Hmz, raw throughput on the SD card will be less than the HDD on larger files.
     
    Meaker@Sager, Aug 21, 2011
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  3. duenor

    duenor Newbie

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    Agreed. But what of random read/writes? I think the real question is whether or not the Expresscard reader will use the PCIe bus or the USB bus. If the latter, XP will surely consider it a removable drive and render this discussion moot (although I will probably still do it as I hate dealing with dongles).
     
    duenor, Aug 21, 2011
    #3
  4. jackluo923

    jackluo923 Notebook Virtuoso

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    use readyboost. much better performance gain than putting swap file on sd card
     
    jackluo923, Aug 22, 2011
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  5. Pitabred

    Pitabred Linux geek con rat flail!

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    A Class 10 SD card means that you can read/write to it at about 10MB/s. That's not that fast. A normal hard drive will do 60-70MB/s read and write, as well as even having faster random-access times. Not to mention the way the flash is, it's not mean to be read from and written to at the same time... it's not like an SSD. It also has VERY limited write life as compared to an SSD. Really... an SD card as swap space is a bad plan.
     
    Pitabred, Aug 22, 2011
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  6. Hungry Man

    Hungry Man Notebook Virtuoso

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    Slower than a hard drive. Doesn't last as long.

    Won't work all too well, sorry to say.
     
    Hungry Man, Aug 22, 2011
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  7. chimpanzee

    chimpanzee Notebook Virtuoso

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    XP should be quite comfortable with 2GB RAM so I am wondering what would cause frequent swap. If you really need more memory, either get more memory(2GB DDR2 is a bit expensive but still reasonable comparing with the hassle of express card + SDHC) or just upgrade the computer.
     
    chimpanzee, Aug 22, 2011
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  8. newsposter

    newsposter Notebook Virtuoso

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    class 10 cards have wildly variable random and small block i/o numbers.
     
    newsposter, Aug 22, 2011
    #8