RamDisk Configuration
Contents
1. starts This will allow you to see the disk immediately in My Computer without having to manually format and partition the RAMDisk FAT16 is the simplest file system and is used for very small disks It is DOS compatible FAT32 Partition You can have RAMDisk create a pre formatted partition on the RAMDisk when it starts For disks greater than 32MB in size in Windows 2000 or XP FAT32 formatting can be selected Note that this results in a greatly reduced cluster size 5kB for disks smaller than 260MB and is much more efficient for disks that store a lot of small files Unformatted This setting creates an empty RAM disk without any partitions You will not see this disk in My Computer until you format it with Windows Disk Management Note that if a disk image file is loaded these settings will not be applied and the disk configuration will be the configuration of the saved image This is the best option to choose if you want to add the file system of your choice manually Start RAMDisk Pressing this button will start the RAM disk driver creating a new RAMDisk Be sure you have the settings correct for your system before you hit Start RAMDisk If you are in doubt go to File gt Restore Default Settings As a precaution the Start RAMDisk button will stop any currently running RAMDisk before attempting to start a new one If you have changed any of the RAM disk settings you will be prompted to save the current settings before starti2. 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 10 of 13 It is strongly advised that you keep any important information backed up on more than one img file Rotate your img file name from time to time or better yet use Windows backup to schedule periodic backups of the RAMDisk to a separate drive If your img file is lost or corrupted it cannot be restored unless you have a backup If RAMDisk is set to automatically load image at startup and that image is corrupted you will get a corrupted drive every time until you change the file name and or Stop and Restart the RAMDisk Since RAMDisk can only access image files through kernel file system I O large disk image files take a long time to back up and restore A 3045 MB disk image file may take up to several minutes to load and save If you have a very large disk image file you must plan on much longer boot and shutdown times In practical use the largest disk files are more efficiently backed up by Microsoft backup or other 3rd party backup utilities License files Each license file is good for one installation to unlock one copy of RAMDisk Once purchased we will send you a license file to be used to unlock RAMDisk If you purchase multiple copies we will send multiple license files one for each machine If you wipe your system and are a registered user we will get you a new license file usually within one business day Just contact su
3. Restores the default settings in case you need to get back to a known good state Exit Exits the GUI but does not affect the Driver Only Start and Stop will actually create or delete the RAMDisk Help Under this menu item you can User s Manual Spawn an IE window to open this HTML document Dataram Website Be sent directly to our homepage www dataram com About View version information and get a link to our home page Disk Size Specifies the size of the disk in MB Note that memory for the disk is allocated in 1MB units for disks less than 1GB 2MB units for disks between 1GB and 2GB in size and 3MB units for disks between 2GB and 3GB The minimum hard disk size is 5MB the minimum size allowed by the FAT16 format The maximum size of a FAT16 formatted drive is 2 GB The minimum size disk for FAT32 is 33 MB The minimum size for an unformatted disk is 5 MB and you can use Windows Disk management to format it into the FAT16 disk Selecting a larger unformatted disk 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 4 of 13 about 10 MB will allow you to use Windows Disk Management to format RAMDisk in NTFS The absolute maximum RAMDisk disk size is 64GB The amount of memory reserved by RAMDisk for the OS is 512 MB Therefore the maximum size RAMDisk you can create Installed RAM 512 MB FAT16 Partition You can have RAMDisk create a pre formatted partition on the RAMDisk when it
4. run the configuration tool get one or more messages about unregistered ocx files 1 Can I run RAMDisk on 64 bit versions of Windows YES RAMDisk supports Windows Vista x64 and Windows 2008 Server x64 2 Can I format a RAMDisk drive Yes RAMDisk drives can be formatted using Windows Disk Management It is not recommended using Partition Magic or other 3rd party disk management tools since they have not been tested for use with RAMDisk 3 How do I create an NTFS formatted RAM disk Since much of the NTFS structure is undocumented by Microsoft RAMDisk does not support creating an NTFS formatted disk explicitly there is no NTFS button like there is for FAT 16 and FAT 32 However you can format a RAM disk using the NTFS file system by using Windows Disk Management By saving and loading the RAM disk image on startup you can automatically start with an NTFS formatted RAM disk since the disk image format overrides any other configuration settings RAMDisk does not support dynamic disks Since Windows likes to keep track of dynamic disks it gets upset when one is missing like every time you shutdown a RAMDisk When prompted it is best to set RAMDisk to basic disk type 4 Can modify the partitions on the RAM disk You can modify the partition configuration of the RAM disk Windows Disk Management By saving and loading the RAM disk image on startup you can automatically start with the modified RAM disk si
5. you can use this memory instead of Windows system memory making optimal use of all the memory available to your system The Advanced tab will show you how much physical memory is available how much is used by Windows and your system hardware and how much is potentially available to RAMDisk Use Memory above 4GB for RAMDisk Selecting this option will configure the RAMDisk driver to use memory above 4GB leaving all system memory for Windows The maximum disk size limit will be adjusted to the Unused RAM Available to RAMDisk listed on the Advanced tab 3 IMPORTANT notes on Page files Swap space Temp files System Restore Found New Hardware message Disk images license files installing uninstalling and other really important stuff you will need to know if you want to avoid 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 9 of 13 trouble Swap space The term Swap space means A swap file or swap space or in Windows NT a page file is a space on a hard disk used as the virtual memory extension of a computer s real memory RAM Having a swap file allows your computer s operating system to pretend that you have more RAM than you actually do The least recently used files in RAM can be swapped out to your hard disk until they are needed later so that new files can be swapped in to RAM In larger operating systems such as IBM s OS 390 the units that are moved are called pag
6. GUI that talks to the driver and allows the user to set various options as well as start and stop the Driver create or delete a RAMDisk The Driver has been written to WDM standards and creates a low level disk object that Windows Device Manager and Disk Management are able to see and manage You can partition format mount a volume and assign multiple drive letters to RAMDisk but only if you would know how to do those things with a regular disk RAMDisk does not do it for you Upon successful Start of the RAMDisk a kernel level driver RAMDisk sys is loaded into the Windows System32 drivers folder This driver will be available to Windows each time RAMDisk starts It is removed when RAMDisk is stopped What is the benefit In a word SPEED Most users use RAMDisk to speed up applications like e Databases e Internet Explorer cache for faster web surfing e Audio and Video editing e CAD programs e Software compilers e Speeding up CD duplication e Games e SETI processing e TEMP files e Swap space e Web server cache e Custom applications with high I O high bandwidth or high security requirements Some users like the security of the RAMDisk because if you do not choose to back up the RAMDisk all information will be wiped upon power loss or shutdown Since RAM cannot store any trace of information without power you know the information is gone for good not just hidden on a track of a hard drive that can be easily undelet
7. RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 1 of 13 DATARAM Dataram RAMDisk v3 5 User s Manual and FAQ http www dataram com Table of contents 1 Introduction to RAMDisk 2 Screen by screen definition of settings 3 IMPORTANT notes on Page files Swap space Temp files System Restore Found New Hardware message Disk images license files installing uninstalling and other really important stuff you will need to know if you want to avoid trouble 4 Frequently Asked Questions and Answers 1 Introduction to RAMDISK What is RAMDisk RAMDisk is a program that takes a portion of your system memory and uses it as a disk drive Sounds simple In concept yes but in practice there are many tricky issues to deal with when operating a RAMDisk in Windows We continue to work hard to make RAMDisk as easy as possible to use but there is always room for improvement We provide updates regularly to improve features and address customer requests Please be sure to READ THE INSTRUCTIONS this document before you try the various RAMDisk settings How does it work RAMDisk is a kernel level driver that presents a standard disk drive to the OS however it stores 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 2 of 13 and retrieves data from the system RAM on your motherboard instead of an actual physical disk Along with the Kernel Driver is a
8. ave on shutdown System Restore IMPORTANT Windows system restore may shut down if you enable it on a RAMDisk It appears that since the disk is too small or too transient to include system restore information Windows can stop creating system restore points for all drives FIX You have to go into your system restore settings and disable system restore on the RAMDisk Found New Hardware message lf you see this message after installing RAMDisk something has gone wrong The RAMDisk driver is installed during setup so Windows does not need to find a driver later If this happens please use the uninstaller to remove RAMDisk check the web site for any updates and re install If you have a corrupt install file you may need to re download See also Installing below Disk images RAMDisk can save and load the entire contents of the RAMDisk to the system disk It is important to understand that this img file is not a standard disk image file but rather contains some geometry information specific to RAMDisk so you cannot use other software to create edit or save a img file even if the img file extension might lead you to believe you can Like any file the img file can become corrupted In fact since RAM is inherently volatile there is a risk of data loss or corruption any time power is lost or interrupted A corrupted RAMDisk can and will be saved to the img file either manually or automatically depending on your settings 4 3
9. aved to the disk file specified in the Filename field Use caution with this setting you can keep a hard drive very busy with a large enough RAMDisk and a short time interval thus negatively impacting your system performance 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html Save Disk Image Now This button can be used to force RAMDisk to write a disk image immediately to the filename specified in the Filename box Normally when the driver starts it locks in load save filenames set in the GUI at the time of the start Pressing the Save Disk Image Now button forces the driver to save to the location specified in a popup Filename box but does not override the filename locked in when the Driver was started You will need to stop the Driver and restart it to change the Filename registered by the Driver You will not be able to use this button when Background Update under the Load and Save tab is selected Event Log Tab 2 Dataram RAMDisk Configuration Utility File Help Settings Load and Save Advanced Event Log RAMDisk System Event Log Messages Information 2 23 2009 10 50 19PM RAMDiskVE Information 2 23 2009 10 49 56PM RAMDiskVE Scan System Log Start RAMDisk Stop RAMDis Scan System Log This button will scan the last 1 000 entries of your Windows event log and filter out RAMDisk related items The entries displayed can be double clicked to pull up th
10. e full event message This is a handy feature for understanding why your disk may have failed to start or stop Advanced Tab 32 bit OS Only 7 of 13 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 8 of 13 Dataram RAMDisk Configuration Utility tol e File Help Advanced Memory Options A 32 bit operating system Physical Address Extensions and gt 4GB of physical memory have been detected Installed Physical Memory 6144 MB Upper Address Used By Windows 4096 MB Unused RAM Available to RAMDisk 2048 MB If your system has memory above 4GB that is not used by Windows you can use this memory for RAMDisk Selecting this option will force RAMDisk to use this memory instead of allocating memory from Windows V Use Memory above 4GB for RAMDisk Start RAMDisk Stop RAMDis You will only see the Advanced tab if a you are running a 32 bit version of the Windows OS b your system has more than 4GB of physical memory installed and c your system has Physical Address Extensions enabled This tab will allow you to enable a feature of RAMDisk that will allow you to use memory above the 4GB limit for 32 bit versions of Windows This feature is not available for 64 bit versions of Windows because they do not have a 4GB memory limitation The Advanced tab shows you how much memory RAMDisk has detected above the 4GB limit which is unused by 32 bit Windows With RAMDisk
11. e the disk image at some point and select load disk image on startup Otherwise Windows does not know what drive letter you have created and will assign the next available drive letter Of course selecting Unformatted on the Settings tab will create a blank disk with no formatting information and therefore no drive letter 7 Why doesn t the image file timestamp seem to be changing when I have AutoSave turned on RAMDisk keeps track of write activity to the RAM disk and if there have been no writes since the last time the disk image was saved the disk image will not be written out again This saves on unnecessary hard disk I O and can make a big difference if you have a large disk image that changes infrequently 8 Can I boot from RAMDisk No Since RAMDisk is a Windows resident program you can t load Windows from it However you can load a second OS instance from RAMDisk using a multi session tool such as VMWare In fact RAMDisk is often used with VMWare to increase its performance 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 9 The driver is started but don t see a drive letter for the RAM disk in My Computer Use the Windows Disk Management to assign a drive letter to the RAM disk 10 When try to run the configuration tool get one or more messages about unregistered ocx files This can occur when certain common ActiveX controls that are used by the co
12. ed and even recovered after successive over writes An additional feature of a RAMDisk is that it will never wear out You can access it at maximum bandwidth 24 7 365 without fear of mechanical failure or fragmentation a RAMDisk can become fragmented just like any other disk but it does not take a performance hit like a physical disk does when it becomes fragmented A RAMDisk operating at maximum bandwidth does not produce excessive heat noise or vibrations 2 Screen by screen definition of settings Settings Tab 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 3 of 13 2 Dataram RAMDisk Configuration Utility fo ea File Help Settings Load and Save Advanced Event Log Basic Settings Set the size and type of RAMDisk you want to create FAT16 Partition FAT32 Partition Disk Size 400 e MB Unformatted Maximum 2048 MB Boot Sector Settings Windows boot sector O DOS Boot Sector Start RAMDisk Stop RAMDis This is the main GUI screen you will see each time you start the Dataram RAMDisk Configuration Tool program in the RAMDisk program group File Under this menu item you can Start RAMDisk Starts the RAMDisk creating a disk drive on your system with the settings you have selected Stop RAMDisk Stops the currently running RAMDisk deleting the disk and any data on it Save Settings Saves your configuration settings Restore Default Settings
13. es and the swapping is called paging TechTarget www whatis com You can see how confusion is bred by the multitude of terms used to identify Swap Space Here is what you need to know RAMDisk can never be larger than the actual RAM you have installed on your system Some users think that because they have a large virtual memory it will allow them to make a large RAMDisk Users have also attempted to assign a RAMDisk as the hard disk to which Windows will begin swapping data when it runs out of RAM Windows does not like to assign swap space to drives that are not available early in the boot sequence so this may result in difficulty assigning the swap space to the RAMDisk Temp files There are many kinds of Temp files and folders in Windows There is a Temp directory that Windows will use to store files for IE cache Windows Update scratch files and other stuff like WinZip scratch space etc In general we will refer to any file that is not important enough to back up a Temp file This is an ideal kind of file folder for RAMDisk to store since the data is not important to preserve after initial use in most cases Many users like to assign their temporary internet folder to the RAM Drive You have two important options to consider when doing this 1 Do save my data on shutdown or 2 do want it gone for good If you want faster surfing you should save on shutdown If you want absolute security for your web usage you should not s
14. n the RAMDisk disk Disk Label Selecting this option will allow you to specify an 11 character disk label for the RAMDisk drive This label will be created each time the RAMDisk is started If you have selected an Unformatted disk on the Settings tab this option will not be available This option is also not available if you have selected Load Disk Image at Startup Save Image Settings These boxes allow you to configure the Save Disk Image at Shutdown feature which will automatically save the entire contents of the RAMDisk along with the associated Driver settings upon Shutdown Save Disk Image On Shutdown Check this box to have RAMDisk Save all the contents of the RAMDisk and the Driver settings to the img filename specified in the Filename field It is best to use this feature after you have your settings worked out the way you would like them Saving a img file with the RAMDisk set up correctly is a good idea but be careful not to accidentally overwrite your only good file when you shut down by using this option If an image file cannot be opened on shutdown no image file will be created and a message will be sent to the Event Log If there is insufficient disk space in the specified path the output file will be truncated Background Update Selecting this option will cause the RAMDisk driver to spawn a thread that will track changes to the RAM disk and automatically update the disk image file specified by Filename unde
15. nagement software to create edit or save a img file even if the img file extension might lead you to believe you can The actual img file is not encrypted and can be viewed with hex editors etc and information can be extracted It is best to use this feature after you have your settings worked out the way you would like them It is important to understand that once the RAMDisk driver is running it continues to run even through reboots regardless of your settings in the Load Disk Image on Startup checkbox This setting simply tells the Driver to either load a pre specified image to the RAMDisk checked or create a new blank one unchecked upon startup If the Driver fails to load an image file for whatever reason it falls back on the rest of the configured settings potentially giving you a formatted disk with Temp directory etc depending on your settings even though a perfectly good img file may exist Check for a moved or misplaced img file if this occurs 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 6 of 13 Create TEMP directory This option will create a TEMP directory in the RAM disk when it is started If you have selected an Unformatted disk on the Settings tab this option will not be available This option is also not available if you have selected Load Disk Image at Startup This option is useful if you want to locate your temporary files directory o
16. nce the disk image format overrides 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 12 of 13 any other configuration settings 5 How do I create a bootable disk image You can use RAMDisk to create a bootable disk image The following example will create a disk image that can be used to create a bootable CD ROM This simple example will just load the XP bootstrap and can be used to start your XP installation To begin with start RAMDisk with the Windows Boot Sector option enabled under the Settings tab Go to the root directory of your XP system disk and do the following assuming r is your RAM disk attrib r s h ntldr copy ntldr r attrib r s h ntldr attrib r s h boot ini copy boot ini r attrib r s h boot ini attrib r s h ntdetect com copy ntdetect com r attrib r s h ntdetect com This will install the basic files necessary to bootstrap Windows NT 2000 XP For more information see the Windows NT Workstation 4 0 Resource Kit p 697 Save the disk image You now have an image suitable for creating a bootable CD ROM 6 How do I set the drive letter for the RAM disk You can modify the drive letter using Windows Disk Management If you do not use Windows Disk Management Windows will automatically assign the next available drive letter to your RAMDisk If you want a specific drive letter to appear each time you run RAMDisk you will need to sav
17. nfiguration tool are improperly registered on your system In the RAMDisk installation directory there is a batch file Register Components bat Execute this batch file with administrator privileges to properly register the ActiveX controls on your system Copyright 2008 2009 Dataram Inc Document Version 3 5 130 13 of 13 4 3 2009 4 11 PM
18. ng the disk In some cases you will get a message informing you to reboot in order to start the RAMDisk Simply hit OK or Cancel exit the GUI and reboot Be sure you do not have RAMDisk set to Load Disk Image at Startup unless you are sure the img file selected is the one you want loaded After rebooting you should be able to start the RAMDisk with your selected settings Once the RAMDisk Driver is started it will stay running even through reboots It will only stop when signaled to do so by hitting the Stop button The Driver captures load and save img filenames and other settings from the GUI at the time of Start It is important to note that in order to change these settings you will have to stop the Driver and restart If you make changes to the settings while the Driver is running you will be prompted to stop the Driver before the settings will take effect Stop RAMDisk Pressing this button will perform a series of IOCTL calls to dismount the RAM disk volume from the file system driver and stop the driver returning the memory used for the RAM disk to Windows In order for the driver to unload successfully there can be no open files on the RAM disk and Windows Explorer should not be displaying the contents of your RAM disk If you are using Background Update or Auto Save you may not be able to stop the driver without a reboot due to the fact that the disk is being accessed by the backup feature If the driver is unable t
19. o unload successfully you will get an error message stating RAMDisk was unable to stop and advising a reboot Reboot and RAMDisk will be stopped Boot Sector Settings You can select DOS or Windows boot settings These settings are only 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 5 of 13 used when using RAMDisk as a master image file for a bootable hard disk or CD Some people see this setting and assume RAMDisk is bootable unfortunately you cannot boot from RAMDisk Load And Save Tab of Dataram RAMDisk Configuration Utility File Help Settings Load and Save Advanced Event Log Load Image Settings V Load Disk Image at Startup Sreate TEMP directo Filename sk L C ARAMDisk img 2 RAMDis Save Image Settings V Save Disk Image on Shutdown AutoSave Filename C RAMDiskimg 2 Start RAMDisk Load Image Settings These boxes allow you to configure the Load Disk Image at Startup feature which will automatically start the Driver with the settings associated with the saved img file that has been loaded Load Disk Image at Startup Check this box to have the img file shown in the Filename box loaded automatically when RAMDisk starts It is important to understand that this img file is not a standard disk image file but rather contains some information specific to the RAMDisk disk geometry so you may not be able to use other disk image ma
20. pport ramdisk dataram com We can often send a new file same day if you know your order number and registration code from your registration e mail If you have a backup copy of the license file recommended you will not need to contact us for a new file the old one will work just fine even if you upgrade to a later version of RAMDisk Installing Be sure to install with Administrator privileges Also you should not get any errors on installation aside from any Microsoft warnings about unsigned drivers or Windows logo software warnings depending on your security settings If you do you may have a corrupt download Try re downloading If you continue to have trouble installing try disabling your anti virus software Be sure to re enable it after you install Be sure your file comes from Dataram Don t use files from other download sites Uninstalling Be sure to STOP the RAMDisk before you uninstall If you get a message stating that RAMDisk could not stop Reboot Verify the disk is stopped the Stop button will be grey and the disk will no longer appear in My Computer You may then proceed with the uninstall If for some reason you are unable to complete an automated uninstall you can uninstall manually using the following steps 1 STOP the RAMDisk If you get a message stating that RAMDisk was unable to stop reboot 2 Exit the GUI 3 Delete the program directory C Program Files RAMDisk This is the GUI directory 4 Sea
21. r the Load and Save tab in the Save Image Settings box This is the safest way to protect the data in a RAMDisk disk against corruption due to power loss or system failure the data in the RAM disk is mirrored to the image file within seconds There is a tradeoff however if you are running an extremely disk intensive program that does a lot of writes to the disk having Background Update enabled will introduce a performance penalty All of the changes to the RAM disk need to get written to the image file eventually and after an extended period of activity the driver will be limited by the speed of the hard disk A disk which does mostly read operations will not see a penalty Use Background Update when you have a RAM disk whose contents don t change frequently or has bursts of activity followed by periods when the driver can catch up Otherwise consider using the AutoSave or Save Image on Shutdown features When Background Update is set you will not be able to us the Save Disk Image Now button AutoSave Check this box to have RAMDisk Save all the contents of the RAMDisk to the img filename that was specified in the Filename field locked in when the driver was started at the specified interval The minimum time interval is 300 seconds This interval is used to control a timer and when this timer expires the system will check to see if the RAMDisk disk has been written to If it has the entire disk image will be s
22. rch your computer for the file RAMDisk sys It should be in your root drive system32 driver directory if RAMDisk is still running This is the RAMDisk driver It is created and removed when the driver is started and stopped If the file is there it means the RAMDisk is running If it could not be found it has been successfully deleted If the driver remains delete it 5 If you are sure you no longer need them delete any RAMDisk img files you may have saved default location C RAMDisk img That s it Other Stuff We value your feedback You can send an e mail to ramdisk dataram com and you can be assured that an actual human will read it and do their best to help 4 3 2009 4 11 PM RamDisk Configuration file G Data RAMDisk RAMDisk 20Users 20Manual html 11 of 13 4 Frequently Asked Questions and Answers Do you have a question that s not in the FAQ or have a suggestion for something that should be Contact ramdisk dataram com NYDN WN KE Can run RAMDisk on 64 bit versions of Windows Can format a RAMDisk drive How do create an NTFS formatted RAM disk Can modify the partitions on the RAM disk How do create a bootable disk image How do set the drive letter for the RAM disk Why doesn t the image file timestamp seem to be changing when have AutoSave turned on _ Can boot from RAMDisk The driver is started but don t see a drive letter in My Computer When try to
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