Hiya, please excuse my somewhat noobish question, but I'm just wondering, is it possible to use part of the storage memory or my microSD card as virtual memory? I'm running Schapps' WM6 ROM, and I want to start messing around with PocketDOS to play some old DOS games. However, I will need plenty of RAM both for the emulator and the games. As I only have about 25 megs free at boot, I'm just wondering if a swap file is possible?
Virtual memory
That's a brilliant idea, if it works it would be great.
We could increase performance too.
Let's hope one of the gurus out there has an idea, I don't see why it wouldn't work.
BUMP
*****bump*****​
Hmmm, seems kinda strange that it's not available already. So it must not be possible otherwise there'd be a cab floating around already?
Related
Hi All,
Just wondering if there is a program which can treat the SD card as the virtual memory. You know I am talking of something similar to Real Windows PC's. When the available RAM becomes low some of the data is written to the hard disk treating the hard disk as virtual RAM. So maybe the SD card on the Universal can be treated as virtual RAM.
My interest comes from the fact that while browsing complicated and long pages with lots of pictgures on Netfront or even PIE the full page cannot be downloaded because the RAM is exhausted.
If such a program is not available yet, can the Gurus of this site develop one. It would be wonderful as it would be particularly helpful in overcoming the limitations due to the known issue of memory leaks on WM5.
Just a thought and really don't know how reasonable or technically correct this is.
Kind Regards
hi all, kind of related couple of questions here - hope these aren't covered elsewhere, did a brief search but couldn't find anything
i have somehow managed to use up 50 mb of my main memory!
i am thinking of flashing up to the next wm6 black, i have v4 shadow currently.
if/when i do, which programs can be installed on the storage card? i used to have the treo 650 and certain programs would be quirky if not on the main memory. anyone have a list of programs that run well from storage? or can it be assumed that all of them can?
i imagine thats probably the best way to keep some storage space open. any other suggestions?
I fiddled around with my wm6'd hx4700 (thanks kuzuhara!) and a registry editor and found a way to make it regard SD as ram and xip from it.
This renders my device to achieve usage smooth enough i allow myself to reffer to the device as a mini-umpc^_^
For SD only atm, miniSD may or may not work depending on your devices driver. No MMC for the time being.
I sooooo hope this isn't old news
Here's to me not ****ing any of your devices up, it worked wonders for me.
P.S
IMPORTANT!
Delete the Program Files folder and reset again once you see the SD's been renamed to Program Files2.
On the next boot it'll mount as Program Files and everything will load from it.
Excuse me, my brains are stuck in google translator mode
4.11.2007
It seems i was rather in the wrong and am taking a whole new direction.
One which involves reading more carefully before i charge head into the guts of windows embedded.
Will take me a while until next post, and it might become hx4700 exclusive, but i promise you some cool stuff to come yet.
Anybody wanting to make their SD into Program Files to save space,
just start resco reg editor and change hklm\System\StorageManager\Profiles\SDMemory\Folder: Program Files.
(Originally is SD Card).
You can also try messing with it, making it into diffenent sys folders, just be careful
Mine is currently application cache (Volatile) and [email protected] Files.
(Running sweet with what i got to with the enablement of complete graphics accelaration, except for a minor hang up when returning from sleep).
Sooooooooooo...
ONLY DOWNLOAD AND APPLY THE CURRENT PATCH IF YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR'E DOING AND WANT TO GIVE BEATING ME TO IT A SHOT!
I'm hoping for a next release in a day, but not necessarily of this project but of an off-chute.
BTW, is it just me or is WM real *nix like?^^
anyone tried this ?
ranasrule said:
anyone tried this ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Downloaded, but waiting to see what others think.
Want to know what it does to the SD card and device as the readme does say to move the devices contents of its program files folder to the sd card?????
downloaded it too. but i notice its his forst post.
Lol... it's my first post, sorry..
All it does is make the device call the card drive "Program Files" and set a swap file that's used as most device memory (don't worry, it's faster than most none-nand flash). i had to leave a small buffer in device memory though.
The memory file is unallocated, so just don't forget to leave 528MB free at all times.
Re-read the original post
It is and will be updated with periodic updates should they come.
I've been using it for 72 hours now.
It takes the odd reset to free up memory, but nothing worst than what we had before.
well if all thing got wrong.. anyway to revert it back?.. well ofcourse hard reset is one of it. uhmm.. lets put hardreset aside first..
well.. cant wait to test this.. i made a whole backup of my registry so if thing went wrong.. ill just restore the registry backup..
Good point doube_ofour.
Just export the StorageManager registry key before applying the changes, and if worst comes to worst restore your backed up original.
So, anybody else installed and can connect to tell the tale?
DuperMan said:
So, anybody else installed and can connect to tell the tale?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I made a cab with the regs and installed it But I'm still experimenting .. Nothing bad happened so far how do i know the device is faster ?!! how did you measured your device's speed ?
So let me get this straight -- it will use the microSD in my TyTN as RAM -- the icky sticky stuff I run out of because internet explorer, pocket player, and spb mobile shell grab it all for themselves?
Is there any way to specify how much of the SD card is used as RAM -- since I don't really need 1 GB of RAM on my device.
I saw your post about 558 MB free but didn't quite understand it. You also said you need the odd softreset to free memory? but why would you need to free up a few MB when you have access to hundreds?
But thanks for sharing with the community -- if this really does work out well for us, that's pretty freaking amazing.
@DuperMan
Does this hack simply make our "Storage Card" transform into "Program Files"?.. Thats it?.. cant see any speed improvement.. besides my memory usage increased by that means my device will perform slow..
My "Program Memory and Storage Memory" Stays the same as 47mb total on both memory..
Exactly Ragart!
Only it's set to use miniSD, i think you'd have to mess with it a little to make it work on miniSD... if response is good i'll make a mini version.
Remember - It's only been tested on wm6 hx4700!
double_ofour said:
@DuperMan
Does this hack simply make our "Storage Card" transform into "Program Files"?.. Thats it?.. cant see any speed improvement.. besides my memory usage increased by that means my device will perform slow..
My "Program Memory and Storage Memory" Stays the same as 47mb total on both memory..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
in my case my program memory decreased by something around 10mb ! and I can't see any improvement in speed too ...
miniSD, hmm? Well that's the slightly-larger brother of my 1GB MicroSD. So I guess I'll just watch the thread and see others' reactions before I try anything (though I do have fullbackups)
Thanks for the quick response. So how much RAM does your hx4700 'have' now? and did you set it to 558 extra for a reason? Just curious questions from a person who doesn't understand the intricacies of reg editing
@doube_ofour:
Use it for a while, constant usage should be smoother. Did you free the space up by deleting the old Program Files as well?
Use it to surf for a while, multiple windows style, and you'll notice the difference.
Also, don't be mean to my hack Don't load it to spite, wait for each app to load and keep on starting apps without (majorly) worrying about a system crash.
@hma4:
The age old method of feel
It doesn't boost anything per say, but your device shouldn't be as compaction ridden as it was, so less mem degradation over time=more time between resets under heavy work loads. and i mean heavy. also, multi-tasking is MUCH more usable.
@ragart:
I set it to have a 512Mb paging area on the SD, plus 512kb in main for caching and another 16Mb for caching on SD, so that's a total of 528.5Mb overall mem, 16.5Mb cache and half a gig paging (good for them internet chaches etc..
i check on the registry that u have made in ur reg hack. seems like all the folders etc is the same even for a miniSD card ... so do u think it will work on miniSD too?
Hi everyone,
am quite new to these boards, and have only just got myself a secondhand xda IIs. In the last half a yer I have owned a HTC hermes, universal & kaiser but have finally settled on the BA because the design just suits me more. So far so good- am very happy!
I am a complete noob though and having just upgraded to WM6 from WM2003SE (following the WIKI guide & wizard) I am a bit puzzled about my phomnes' memory capacity and what goes where....
Reading over the forum I have heard how the reformating of exended rom (?) etc can increase your available storage to 128mb as part of the upgrade process. This I did with the unlocker and formatting tool. But upon upgradeing it seems I have only 64mb available for storage , but 100mb for 'programs'.... I am a bit confused. To make it worse when I load programs on the phone it actually reduces the storage capacity available rather than the 'program' memory- of which I have 75mb free that I can't seem to get at!! Can anyone please tell me what I am doing wrong or else point me in the direction of where I can educate myself about this? ....I know it is a very basic question, but am a complete novice to pdas since the last 6 months so please don't flame me!!
Thanks
Think of this in desktop computer terms.
Storage == hard drive
Program memory == RAM
explanation:
programs are installed to either storage or storage card. programs run using program memory.
hey tnx, i was looking for such info too tnx m8 for the help
Thanks! Crystal clear now!
one (or so) more quetion...
Hi- quick folow up question if anyone has the time to answer...
So I understand I have 64mb storage- but in WM2003 you could allocate how much to put to RAM & how much to put to storgae right? So therefore if I had lots of apps I wanted to load onto the phone and I needed more storage I could just reallocate. Was there not a way in the whole upgrade process to allocate less than 128mb to RAM so that I have more storage? I think I missed something here. If it is safe to have less than 128mb RAM i think I may go back and do the repartitioning thing again. Some advice would be much appreciated.
If so my question is why is it recommended to have 128mb RAM- would reducing it to less than that cause the phone to run too slow under WM6?? Is there a 'safe' guideline for minimum amount of RAM to allocate? Further clarification would be greatly appreciated! (As I see it I have lost some 'storgare' capacity this way, beecause programs excluded from the WM6 rom, eg powerpoint etc , be reloaded and so eat away at my new storage of 64mb)
I think you may have missed the point: storage is flash memory, program memory is RAM. The difference is that pre-WM5 flash memory held your vanilla system, Extended ROM, and the default (for hard reset). Everything else that you customised or installed went into RAM, which was therefore split between storage of programs and data and program memory. Remember how when your battery went flat your device lost everything? That's why, and why a backup battery was needed. WM5 and later devices do not need or have backup batteries.
Since WM5 all programs and user data are stored in flash: this can make performance slower but ensures that you survive a power failure unscathed. There are ways to get round the performance issues, compressing files with UPX saves space AND time because reading a smaller file from flash is obviously quicker, and expanding it in RAM goes very fast indeed. However I would not want to overstate the performance hit that you experience working from flash.
So this is why you have lost the ability to manage the memory split - it's nothing to worry about and indeed I am very pleased because my BA now has more program memory than my Hermes.
Hope this helps!
jbn
ssjw1000 said:
Hi- quick folow up question if anyone has the time to answer...
So I understand I have 64mb storage- but in WM2003 you could allocate how much to put to RAM & how much to put to storgae right? So therefore if I had lots of apps I wanted to load onto the phone and I needed more storage I could just reallocate. Was there not a way in the whole upgrade process to allocate less than 128mb to RAM so that I have more storage? I think I missed something here. If it is safe to have less than 128mb RAM i think I may go back and do the repartitioning thing again. Some advice would be much appreciated.
If so my question is why is it recommended to have 128mb RAM- would reducing it to less than that cause the phone to run too slow under WM6?? Is there a 'safe' guideline for minimum amount of RAM to allocate? Further clarification would be greatly appreciated! (As I see it I have lost some 'storgare' capacity this way, beecause programs excluded from the WM6 rom, eg powerpoint etc , be reloaded and so eat away at my new storage of 64mb)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In addition to jbn's answer above you can also use a ROM that has a RAMDISK. This takes a portion of the RAM and creates a folder that you can use as a filesystem. Many people prefer these, I do not. I use my SD card and my onboard storage and have no problems with space. If you decide to go with a RAMDISK enabled ROM beware that you will loose anything you install to that section of the filesystem if your batter and backup batter go dead. Exactly the same behavior you had with WM2003 in your BA originally.
Hello ppl,
Have one question please.
I cooked my own ROM and after fresh install, i got results for memory as per attached - no tasks running.
Is that good / bad, compared to a stock usage after fresh install ?
What is the "normal" usage after fresh install, can someone post actual figures ?
Brgds,
Radu
Hi Radu
By memory i dont know if u mean RAM or ROM,but if its RAM your result is good,if its ROM memory you can free up some more by removing apps like opera,office,google maps,copilot and to install them on storage card.
Hi Tzaca,
Thanks for fast reply, but..
"Good" is not just enough, i was looking for actual figures to judge a clear comparison. Spent a lot of time cooking and removing / adding various things, but i forgot to measure it it up, before. That was the question for.
Anyway, card installing is not an really good option except iGO, rest should live happily in phone mem, it's faster this way.
Can you post your figures ? just for quick comparison.
Brgds,
Radu
hi again...
by "good" i meant that 133MB is the best you can get out of that phone,even i couldnt get so much lol
as about card installing..i'm not agree with you..more stuff u will install on internal memory,slower your phone will be...and i say this from my experience,but of course you can install things where u want
it doesnt have sense to post screenshots of my phone RAM because i installed apps like CHT and of course RAM will be smaller than yours after fresh install,but i get around 120 MB RAM after soft reset.
btw..i didnt experience any slow running apps which i have installed on SD card,i dont think that phone ROM memory can go faster than my card which is 4 MB/s r/w ,so your argument is not relevant
Hi Tzaca,
Hehe, 133~135 Mb RAM, at the expense of a Manila free phone...
Not planning to use CHT or similar stuff like that, but to find a workable wp7 theme, would be enough for me.
I'm quite used to ideea of installing stuff on card - first WInMo device i had was a FS Loox - however i do not like it except beeing forced to - iGo+maps is too big for phone mem. I use card for music, photo, movie, as a suppoort for stuff... is not neccesarily the card rating @ 4/6 class, but it's actual speed within the system, R/W using phone mem is definitely faster that card...
Thanks anyway for prompt answer.
Best regards,
Radu