RAMDisk

[manisandher]

Without meaning to steal anyone's thunder (I hope you don't mind Marcin), I thought this topic was worthy of its own thread.

So, how exactly can running XX from a RAM partition improve its sound? I have a hypothesis which is related to this thread over at CA: http://www.computeraudiophile.com/content/Monster-raises-its-headagain.

Could it be that its all down to the SATA cable? Presumably, running XX from RAM would eliminate any ill effects that the SATA cable and HDD/SDD might be introducing.

It's a hypothesis (a far-fetched one, I know), that's all.

Mani.

[Raj.V]

Mani,

regarding your point on the SFS & Ramdisk, here is my system observation. (Note: my system may not be the most revealing.)

Yes, it still does make a difference with the SFS settings even with my Vista OS. For optimal SQ, I have to keep mine at 120-150 (I have always upsampled 4x).

But, interestingly I hear no difference in core-appointment settings, which I used to hear when playing with XXHE on harddisk.

Raj

[boleary]

So, in the Ramdisk Configuratio utility, what disk size should be selected; I have 4 gigs of ram on the computer? Also, should one select Fat 16 or 32? n the "Load and Save" tab, which checkboxes should be checked, I presume one would want disc image saved but.....Lastly, do I reinstall xx directly on the Ramdisc drive? Thanks in advance for your help!

[Raj.V]

I just used FAT16 and used the size which was already displayed (you should increase it) if you want to play flac or "copy to XXHE HD".
Click run. That's it.

Unzip XXHE in the newly created ramdisk. Create XXData folder. Basically the usual steps...

Run XXHE from the new Ramdisk and start also the original one from your HD - then you can A-B the XXHE/HD and XXHE/Ramdisk.

Raj

[PeterSt]

Select FAT32

I used 1GB for it, and can normally play an album.

Copy your current XX folder onto it, but use the complete structure. Thus, supposed you now have XX in

c:\Player\XX-0.9z-2\

make that folder on the RAMDisk and copy the complete contents, including the subfolders. Better leave out the TemporaryData (log data) to save some space.

Sadly you will have to set all your settings again.

When after a reboot the driver letter is the same for the RAMDisk, you can again copy the XX files, but now the settings will have been preserved.

About saving the "image", so all goes automatically after a reboot ... I must test this, and therefore now reboot this PC.

Peter


PS: Raj was ahead of me. FAT16 should work too -> it only allows less files (but think in millions).

[PeterSt]

The Save Image thing works by itself, but it seems that as soon as you use this (see 2nd tab), the RAMDrive isn't created automatically after a reboot. However, starting it up again, will now recreate the contents automatically. So, very much workable.

[Gerard]

The Save Image thing works by itself, but it seems that as soon as you use this (see 2nd tab), the RAMDrive isn't created automatically after a reboot. However, starting it up again, will now recreate the contents automatically. So, very much workable.

Peter,

Can you make this in XX? Use a button to do this automatically??

 

[manisandher]

No, once you select 'load disk image at startup' and also 'save disk image on shutdown' then everything becomes automatic. You will notice that your PC takes longer to shutdown, as RAMDisk saves the RAM disk image. On startup, the RAM disk is created automatically with XX and all the previous settings totally intact.

That's how it works on the 3 machines I've tried it on here.

Mani.

EDIT

I forgot to mention, once you've pressed 'start RAMDisk' and everything looks OK, then just close the window - DO NOT press 'stop RAMDisk', unless you actually want to delete the RAM disk and XX (if you've installed it there).

[boleary]

Thanks to all. 

[Nick]

My thoughts on why RAM disk work for music go back to the basic architecture of a PC. Music is generally improved by PC responsiveness (speed) in the right parts of the hardware, OS and HighEnd processes. Micro or even pico seconds must surely count in some areas. The responsiveness of the PC to the few software processes actually involved in playing music is what all our OS tweaks are about in the end.

This is NOT all fully worked through as a theory but...

For XXHighend to read from a Sata HDD, the CPU’s read request has to be transmitted from OS > SATA drivers > North Bridge > South Bridge > SATA implentation of the south bridge > the HDD itself. The HDD heads then find and read the data and load into the HDD cache if it’s not already there. To return the data from the HDD to XXHighEnd the data follows the reverse route; HDD Drive > Cache > SATA > southbridge > northbridge > CPU.

Disk sub subsystems are very well optimised for speed but not to the same level as CPU to RAM by DDR data transfer. If you assume that a the SATA HDD and RAMDisk software drivers are equally efficient in terms of  code and use of interrupts (big assumtion), you can seen from the diagram in this link http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/intel-p45-chipset,1961-3.html that the access of the CPU to RAM is both shorter and conducted over the higher bandwidth parallel channels of  DDR.  Much faster than CPU to a HDD access.

My guess is that the extra speed of access and data transfer, translates to MUCH more timely delivery of the data to XXHighEnd processes. RF and cables may also play a part but I’m guessing timing is the main influence.
Just a theory    any thoughts ?
Nick.

[Marcin_gps]

Nick, I'm sure you're right about it. I'll just add that from my experience lowest latency works/sounds best.

[Raj.V]

Nick,
your theory definitely holds water.

If the idea is to keep the transfer rates high and the paths short... perhaps it will help to have XXHE on Ramdisk and the music on a SSD connected through PCI slot. Then South bridge is out of the picture.

Is that possible???

Raj

[Nick]

Raj,

When I chose my mobo I didn't know what chipset to go for and what would work best for PCI based interfaces so I did a bit of reading on chipsets. Nothing too technical but I recon RAMDISK takes the southbridge out of the equation (and a lot else as well).

Nick.

[Josef]

I'm not sure I buy Nick's theory when it comes to XX:
For simplicity, let's say there is only 1 track in playlist - As I understand, before playing XX will first perform conversion to WAV (if needed) and then load resulting file into a pre-locked RAM - Only then, it starts playing i.e. reading music bits from there.
So the path bits have to travel to get to XX engine is identical to one used with RAM disk: no SATA cables magic etc...bits come directly from RAM in both cases.

If, however, RAM is not locked but merely 'allocated' and memory-mapped files API is used instead then it's a different story.... 

Peter, can you comment if this is not too much proprietary info you'd rather not disclose?

[Nick]

Josef,

Now I think about it, I think you are right. Both HDD play and RAMDisk play are playing from RAM already !!

I think I remember reading that preconverted files are loaded to memory before play (except WAVs that are not processed which need Copy to OS setting). This means as you say both HDD and RAMDISK are playing from RAM.

What is making the difference ??

Nick.

[manisandher]

As I understand, before playing XX will first perform conversion to WAV (if needed) and then load resulting file into a pre-locked RAM - Only then, it starts playing i.e. reading music bits from there.

Obviously Peter is the guy to clear this up. But my understanding is that this is exactly where the SFS comes into play - XX will load into RAM as much as is dictated by the SFS. If this covers a whole track, then that's what will be loaded. If it doesn't, then XX will transfer data to RAM when it needs to, during playback. This will be the case whether 'Copy to XX-drive' is selected or not.

But there's still a very curious thing going on here. Take a small, say, 15MB track and don't apply any additional processing to it in XX (e.g. upsampling). Now, you would think that there'd be no difference in SQ if the SFS was set to, say, 50 or 100. I haven't tried this (I'm away from home right now) but I bet the sound still changes... Also, IIRC it still takes longer to load a single 15MB when the SFS is set to 100 vs 50. Why this should be, I have no idea...

Mani.

[Josef]

Hmmm - I think I've found a method which clearly demonstrates that XX indeed behaves _very_ differently when run from RAM disk!

Experiment is simple: make a playlist with 1 track (preferably short so you don't have to wait long for results but it works with any length). I used Pink Floyd's 'Goodbye Cruel World' (The Wall) as it lasts only 45 seconds.
It does not really matter that much what settings you have but, to simplify, disable 'Copy to XX drive' and make sure Split File Size is big enough for your test track to fit in RAM in 1 piece (I just set it to 100MB). And, oh yeah, I used a WAV file as input: no FLAC conversions etc and no upsampling mumbo-jumbo: just straight 44/16.
Open Process Explorer, open XX from RAM disk and play the track in Unattended mode.

You should see something like this on XXEngine3.exe properties dialog: (Capture1.PNG)

XX has 9 threads of which only 2 are active 99% of time. This makes sense: one thread for XX and other for .Net main loop: Nice & clean.

Now try running XX from OS disk (does not matter if it's HD or SSD) and look at same dialog: (Capture2.PNG).

Ouch. Instead of 9 there are now 39(!) threads and about 32(!) of those are active 99% of time!
And all these damn extra threads keep 'context switching' all the time so at end of song there are in total about 10,600 context switches (~240/sec): (CaptureOS.PNG)

In contrast, when XX is run from RAM disk there were in total about 5,600 context switches (~120/sec): (CaptureRAM.PNG)

Don't ask me what 10x more threads are doing and what 2x more context switches do or mean but my gut tells me that more threading & switching probably is not good for music playback....

And a small shocker for the end: Try the same thing but start XX from _any_ disk (HD or SSD) as long as that is not OS disk and you should get pretty much same numbers as with RAM disk

So, it would at least seem that XX is best run from a non-OS disk.

An exciting speculation is that perhaps less context-switching has beneficial impact on sound quality?

Can somebody run this test on Vista and let us know if Vista does indeed make less context switches? (I used W7)

If it does, then perhaps we can push Peter to investigate how to make XX do 0 context switches in next version?

[Per]

So, it would at least seem that XX is best run from a non-OS disk.

That would explain why Mani experienced better SQ running XXHE from a 2nd SSD, compared to running on only one SSD, wouldn't it?

Per

[Josef]

>That would explain why Mani experienced better SQ running XXHE from a 2nd SSD, compared to running on only one SSD, wouldn't it?

Yep, sure seems that way
Still, I speculate that RAM disk is probably always a better option as everything is contained within MB i.e. less internal/external hardware gets powered up/down around and more stable power is always preferable for audio....

Fun part is that implications of using #context-switches as measure may go far beyond: For example, what if it can be used to explain (at least to a degree) why different players sound different even though they are all bit-perfect?
And why, e.g. Foobar set to pre-buffer music into RAM before playing and also using KS or WASAPI still sounds worse (eh, different than XX?

So, for fun I tried same experiment with Foobar. One thing immediately becomes painfully obvious: Foobar is context-switching like crazy all the time - even when not playing at all Interestingly, this does not seem to change during playback very much and is very similar to what XX does when run from OS disk. However, #threads is drastically better (=smaller) with Foobar and does not seem to be affected with where Foobar was started from...
So, there seems to be some code in XX which, for whatever reason, is highly susceptible to where XX is run from.....

[PeterSt]

All,

... Great !

Already last Monday I started a post about this, but never got round to finish it. But :

1. Mani is right;
2. Josef is right.

#2 is the most important.
I's a bit late to explain it all in detail now, but indeed open Process Explorer edit : Resource Monitor, and look at the CPU graph THE BLUE LINE at various SFS settings, and file sizes; This blue line is about the processor speed ...

Whatever it is you see, it is not related to anything I do, *except* for the CPU getting more active because a track part has to be loaded. So, at SFS=12 you understand this easlily. But now look at SFS=70 vs. SFS=200 etc. ... '
Does it make any sense to you ?

The reason I didn't post it yet, is because I found that this is very different in W7 vs. Vista. Also, it is different per MOBO "implementation". So, in the end I couldn't see the common denominator, hence the sense of it all. However, it looks like the processor speed is doing it to us all.
Think of something like "when the amount of memory to have under control is larger, it takes me (the CPU) more time to keep that control". But also : "when it is time to load a track part, well, I have to do something for that".
With this in mind, you will start to see how SQ can be so different, and the graph (blue line) just shows it.

But also have the Task Manager's cpu graph in the same screen. Why ? so you can see that the processor speed is independend from the "load" needed. So, CPU cycles needed stay zero all the time (especially when the track fits into memoy), but the speed of the CPU is ony larger.

This is only a small part ofthe whole story, I'm sure, and please keep in mind that this looks totally different for Vista vs W7, will be dependent on energy saving settings, plus it will be motherboard impeeded.
All 'n all we're all on the right track, but we don't know where the train is coming from, nor do we know where it is heading to. Not yet.

Peter


PS: The RAMDisk and saving of the image all works 100%, and after a reboot everything will be in there automatically, but takes 3 reboots to get there. Maybe it can be less than 3, but then it depedens on other (though related) sections.

[PeterSt]

Allright, my last post is a bit "loose" from what Josef discovered, and maybe it looks like I want to show something like "I already knew". But this is far from the case of course, and I only was at "some" track;

Josef, thank you for this really GREAT finding. I hope we all realize how important this is. Also, I hope I can do something with it, and I will do my ever best for that.

I also want to thank Marcin for his trial with the RAMDisk in the first place. It was not new to me, however, when I heard it first (well over a year ago I think) I could not believe it could ever matter for us ... also see Nick's post about the view how the RAMDIsk can ever make a difference when all is played from RAM already. But it so much matters where one reads things, and there is no doubt that we we read things here on our forum, it should be listened to and be further explored. Such a great value ...

Although I should be explicitly thanking everybody for his contribution to this small evolution, I also want to mention the huge amount of time Mani must have been putting into the SFS comparisons, as well as his motivation to proceed on this phenomenon. Boleary may be the starter of this all, although I am not sure at this moment whether Marcin mentioned it first.

It may start to be boring to ever hear me say that it is thanks to you out there that we are where we are and that I can never do this alone. But I'll just say it again ...

THANKS

Peter

[PeterSt]

Can somebody run this test on Vista and let us know if Vista does indeed make less context switches? (I used W7)

I will do this later today.

So, it would at least seem that XX is best run from a non-OS disk.

For Mani : Which coincidentally *is* what I did when I had the two SSDs in my system, a few days back. I forgot about your situation, but most probably in one of your scenario's (with the 2 SSDs) you had it the same.


Peter

[Calibrator]

Reading through the manual for RamDisk I noted that if you are using a 32bit version of Vista/Win7 , that RamDisk will utilize any memory above the 4GB limit normally restricted to. Great I thought, stick in another 4GB in the spare mem slots of my m/b and I can then have my cake and eat it too !

Turned out this wasn't such a joyous endeavour. I have just spend several hours phutzing around trying to get RamDisk working with that additional RAM but have been unsuccessful.

I'm currently playing under 32 bit Vista with SP2 installed.

The issue arises when asking RamDisk to load the saved image at a reboot. I could never find a combination of settings that allowed this. It would create a RamDisk from scratch without issue, but as soon as you requested a reload the system would start to load but then die and kick you back to POST. A jump into SAFE MODE to delete the image file and change settings for RamDisk were the only way of continuing.

In the end I've gone back to working with a 1.5GB Ramdisk using mem under Vista's immediate control. This is sufficient to load 2 albums at a time, which is usually the most I ever do.

I would be interested to know if anyone running 32bit versions of Vista/Win7 with MORE THAN 4GB MEMORY, has been successful in getting RamDisk working correctly using that additional memory.

Also, those running 64 bits versions with more than 4GB ram installed, are you able to create RamDisks up to 4GB OK that survive a reboot intact?

Cheers,

Russ

[Calibrator]

Nick,
your theory definitely holds water.

If the idea is to keep the transfer rates high and the paths short... perhaps it will help to have XXHE on Ramdisk and the music on a SSD connected through PCI slot. Then South bridge is out of the picture.

Is that possible???

Raj

One of these would be nice methinks

http://www.guru3d.com/article/ocz-revodrive-120gb-review/1

Cheers,

Russ

[AUDIODIDAKT]

Hello ALL,

I just want to thank everybody on forum for working together (Marcin, Nick, Mani, Peter, Telstar and more)
I still have to read all posts again.

I know that many people will be eager to hear my findings about the NOS1.
As you could imagine i spend this week over 40-50 hours on the xx project.
I think i will come up with a very nice post this weekend, so stay tuned.
Please give me some time.

For now I only say NOS1 and XX are TOP NOTCH, I will eleborate this, wait for my post !

Peter, Ciska and Paul, you are TOP NOTCH people as well, but I think you'll already know that.


The xx project evolved so much this week, but only due to the fact of combined forces on forum.

I am proud to be a member on this forum, working together with so much smart people.

SO to all who made it happen this week:

Roy

[PeterSt]

[Marcin_gps]

I'm very happy that my work is appreciated I keep tweaking OS, XXHE settings, because sth is always wrong and I can't sleep at night, haha. To be honest, the reason behind this is probably the same with everyone - to achieve the best SQ. Now I must admint I enjoy music like I've never have before, but it's not just because of RAMdisk only. I applied series of tweaks and those that Nick http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=1398.msg13228#msg13228 are amazing, I'm speechless. This is the new dimension of sound. I could only imagine what would happen if I turned network services off, etc... but I don't want another OS just for XXHE playback, at least not now.

SFS still matters, unfortunatelly, and I haven't found optimum for me yet.

Greets,
Marcin

[Gerard]

I'm very happy that my work is appreciated I keep tweaking OS, XXHE settings, because sth is always wrong and I can't sleep at night, haha. To be honest, the reason behind this is probably the same with everyone - to achieve the best SQ. Now I must admint I enjoy music like I've never have before, but it's not just because of RAMdisk only. I applied series of tweaks and those that Nick http://www.phasure.com/index.php?topic=1398.msg13228#msg13228 are amazing, I'm speechless. This is the new dimension of sound. I could only imagine what would happen if I turned network services off, etc... but I don't want another OS just for XXHE playback, at least not now.

SFS still matters, unfortunatelly, and I haven't found optimum for me yet.

Greets,
Marcin

There was someone that made a small program to do this automatically. Is there someone that can do it again?

 

[AUDIODIDAKT]

There was someone that made a small program to do this automatically. Is there someone that can do it again?

 

We will work on that too, if there are people with experience on this, please come forward.

We need to make .reg or .bat files to apply reg and os settings automaticly (maybe sound-card and xx settings too),
Also be patience with the vLite subject, we'll go to the bottum of this, but as you could imagine it will take time and lots of experimenting.

Grtz

[Telstar]

This is the new dimension of sound. I could only imagine what would happen if I turned network services off, etc... but I don't want another OS just for XXHE playback, at least not now.

SFS still matters, unfortunatelly, and I haven't found optimum for me yet.

Greets,
Marcin

When i was using the network card to take some stuff from my other pc, i experienced severe SQ loss, so I'm sure that killing all network services will improve the sound a lot, and since I have a dedicated pc for audio, it's the very first thing that I will try in the next optimizations (read back to Vista).

[Telstar]

Very shortly, xxhe from ramdisk and in Vista sounds the best.
Thanks to Marcin that got the idea and everyone who worked on it, particularly Peter, who has been a wonderful host for the second time.
All the frickin hours of travelling were worth. 

[PeterSt]

Can somebody run this test on Vista and let us know if Vista does indeed make less context switches? (I used W7)

Vista from RAMDisk :

SFS = 70. 4450 Context Switches for 45 seconds of a larger track, that 45 seconds not fitting into memory. But also less threads than your picture (notice the lack of 44c3 lines).

Next : track fits into memory, but notice that I realized this with increasing the SFS, but also by means of playing native 16/44.1 now (which before was 32/352.8 ).
1280 context switches. Further picture looks the same.
It may say nothing, but Dynamic Priority is 11 now. Before it was 10.

Next : Same as above, but 32/352.8 again. Switches : 4000. Needed one trackpart load.

Next : Back to SFS = 70, now XX started from the OS disk. Switches : 4300.

Next : Start XX from normal HDD (OS elsewhere), further the same as before. Switches 4700.


Tried a few things more, and it is the conclusion that nothing matters for the number of context switches, except the sample rate; It is my estimate that since buffer sizes were kept the same always, this is just a matter of buffers being full 16 times more early (16/44.1 vs. 32/352.8 ), and this hands things over to the driver 16 times more often.
Further noticed variations will be because of not starting the stopwatch at the same time always; this varied 3-5 seconds easily.

In all cases the (number of) threads were the same, and nothing looked unexpected to me (which I can't say from your W7 graphs, Josef).

Peter

[PeterSt]

AHUM.

Josef, I am so so sorry -not only for your efforts, but also for the idea to have found something-, but this is your Q2/3/4/5 settings ...
You just forgot to set them in your RAMDisk setup.

Btw, with whatever other "install" I do myself, I *always* forget to set the Q settings (only Q1 in my case), so I will try to do something about it. You just don't see them automatically, you know ...

So, I know how difficult it is not to see ghosts, but I'm afraid this was one of them. These are the worker threads for those Q settings (and yes, they really do something ... now you know hehe).
Case closed I suppose.

Again, so sorry. Peter
(but keep 'm coming !!)

[PeterSt]

Could it be that its all down to the SATA cable? Presumably, running XX from RAM would eliminate any ill effects that the SATA cable and HDD/SDD might be introducing.

It's a hypothesis (a far-fetched one, I know), that's all.

Now, on to this one;

I read that one too, but I always laughed louder on the "you have to burn in your downloads" soap. But ok, I kind of learned to not think about anything like a soap, because then we wouldn't be where we are today. So, can be, can be (the cable thing). But I see no electrical explanation in it. So, can not be.
For now.

However, there might well be other things going on, which are in a kind of same direction. So, first remember that this never is about the I/O's which are not there in the first place, once your SFS is large enough. But for example, look at the Resource Monitor how long it takes to let die out *other* processes, which emerge just because of that I/O once in a while. There are dozens of processes in the beginning (after reading a file (part)), and only with some luck they all have died out before the next I/O. So, the I/O has implications. Whether those implications are "audible" by itself I can't tell.
But now with the RAMDisk;

I can imagine that with the RAMDisk our necessary "I/O's" are not I/O's as such anymore, and thus those processes won't fire either (I didn't check it). Also, it may not be about the amount of those processes, but merely about a single nasty one implies. Avoid that nasty one, and the whole problem may be gone.

So, for now I'll leave it to this, but there sure is logic in eliminating that disk, be it a spinning one or an SSD, and many things becoming different because of it.

Haha, nice actually; suddenly there is no doubt in anyone's mind that *everything* matters. Now it's merely about "but what the heck is doing it". And this is only because suddenly things are *wrong* after a virtual improvement. Would it have been the other way around, not much thoughts would have been spent on it.

Now, who is able to boot the PC from a network card like the good old days from Novell could do it; The network card just took care of that job, at reading the OS image from a network drive, and next boot from its own internal memory. Or actually the ROM on the card;
If you look at a network interface card from today, the place for the ROM is still there, but the chip itself (3-4cm or so long) has been left off.

Oh well, Playtime I guess. Just music I mean.

No, one other thing which just slips my mind;
We also know about the "monitor falling asleep" and that being audible. Not that I heard that much myself, but this may be because I give it 45 minutes before falling asleep. Anyway, the other day, at observing my new system's problems, and looking at the clock speed of the processor and the SFS thing, my monitor fell asleep (after 15 minutes this time), and right after that there was no way my clock speed would ever change (the monitor awake again). So, the monitor not being "addressed" is BS, but the implications of it falling asleep are not. You see ?
And don't tell me we never heard about in fact huge problems with energy management, when it comes down to SQ ...

Peter


PS:
... which also may be related to a Disk falling asleep (which an SSD can do too I think). IOW, what happens if the thing has to go to sleep (watching watching watching) or whatever changes once it actually falls alseep (the monitor thing) or even when it wakes up again. Not so with a RAMDisk ...

[Josef]

>These are the worker threads for those Q settings (and yes, they really do something ... now you know hehe).

LOL, you're right about settings: luckily I did not close RAMdisk so was able to verify that all Q settings were 0 whereas, for whatever reason, disk-version had Q2=30. So, Q2=30 means XX creates extra 30 threads? Ouch. And indeed, after setting Q2=0 OS-XX behaves the same as RAM-XX!

But this exercise was not all for naught: it is very interesting that XX does _far_ less  #context-switches than Foobar and, even more interesting, that Vista has a LOT less than W7! (yours ~1300 vs mine ~5500!).

Now that Vista number just seemed waaaay too much to me (even taking into account I use a laptop where you have a dedicated PC) so I tried playing with Q1: Whereas Q2 always increased #context-switches Q1 _reduced_ them, and did _not_ create any extra threads!
Test track went from ~5500 with Q1=0 to ~1900 with Q1=11!

At least to me, this looks like Q1 is a really powerful tool as it seems to only influence the size of internal sound card buffer or somesuch without messing around too much, and produces something measurable which can be compared to other players - in process providing at least a hint why bit-perfection does not necessarily equate quality music playback (more switching = more jitter?)

On the other hand, Q2 though seems like a hack (sorry ) and if one has to use it then it most likely indicates a problem somewhere else down the line in equipment chain?

(note that Q3/4/5 at 0 or 30 had no effect at all on #threads/context-switches so it's unclear what they do)

[PeterSt]

Nice ... 

But FYI: Those threads balance out things in a way it was empirically defined by users' comments about SQ and what they did to incur for it. Never mind how exactly (please), and you may call it a hack.

About your further Q1 findings ... yes that will be correct. That is, assuming (and what I suggested) that it's the driver's turn to come into play when the buffer is full.

I have been looking somewhat further too (because this is all just a new angle anyway), but I think we have to look at it the other way around :
Not what XX is doing, but what it may imply. So, look at all the other processes and what they "consume". Not for processor capacity, but for that task switching (as how I call it, but "context switching" may be the official term). So, the more another task requires a time slice, the more XXEngine3 will be "swapped out". And thus : the less of those others, the more it will continue. And well, I found sufficiently enough processes with 100ds of thousands of switches (the PC being up for some 14-15 hours). But it's a hell of a job, and next you don't know much what to do with it anyway. So I started killing processes of which I knew they wouldn't harm, but after half an hour I had enough of it. Anyways ...

If the switching of Engine3 in W7 doesn't show significantly more compared to Vista, it is just not that. It may not even improve on sound ... I don't know (also don't forget : if you use Q2 etc., you now know what it does ... CREATE that stuff ... and you feel it's better. So ...).

And thus it may be a dead end. But still I feel it's something like that. Also : once a task (XX) is swapped out, *how long* does that take ? This theoretically is again a matter of priorities, and there things s*ck too.

At the moment I don't know.
Great thanks,
Peter

[Marcin_gps]

So Peter, would you say that XXHE is a multi-threaded app? I'm asking because I may have another small tweak from a hardware side. My memories could work in two dual channel modes - ganged and unganged. Ganged means you will have a large 128bit pipe and unganged means you will have a 2 x 64bit pipes. Unganged mode is supposed to help multi-threaded applications. I wonder if there would be any difference for XXHE?

[Josef]

Forgot to mention: One more place where it's interesting to observe #switching is WASAPI vs KS:

KS: Q1=0 ~5500 WASAPI: ~28000 (!)
KS: Q1=11 ~1900 WASAPI: ~3800
(both used Adaptive mode with 1024 buffer size)

So I guess this proves that there are indeed big internal differences in buffer sizes between KS & WASAPI which should help explain SQ differences...

[PeterSt]

Haha, I was waiting for this. But both are uncompareable. But let's say that the 28000 from Q1=0/WASAPI explains the more "detailed" sound, which actually is "stressed" (listen to violins).

In either case it has nothing to do with the Device Buffer Size in XXHighEnd. And, to really compare you must put the *real* device buffer size in the equation. Something like KS/Special Mode with a sound card buffer size of 48 and Q1 to 1. The monitor will not be able to keep up with the number of switches (I expect).

Now, be a man, and explain why this is all still bit perfect eh ?
hahaha.
Then I know it too.


Peter

[PeterSt]

So Peter, would you say that XXHE is a multi-threaded app? I'm asking because I may have another small tweak from a hardware side. My memories could work in two dual channel modes - ganged and unganged. Ganged means you will have a large 128bit pipe and unganged means you will have a 2 x 64bit pipes. Unganged mode is supposed to help multi-threaded applications. I wonder if there would be any difference for XXHE?

Marcin - Thanks. And yes, as multi threaded as can be. But :

Maybe better first try to (really !) proove to yourself what is working how for the better. Find that *real* thread on that *real* forum that *really* can explain it unambigiously. My bet : you can't. Nobody knows exactly. Not even your processor manufacturer.

It would be more "economical" to find how the Registry can be tweaked so drivers can get Affinity. I know it can, but I never really looked for it. But today it suddenly seems important to me.

Anyway, multithreaded yes ... the result ? no clue. Try it ?
You are most often right anyway, so ...

[Josef]

>Something like KS/Special Mode with a sound card buffer size of 48 and Q1 to 1. The monitor will not be able to keep up with the number of switches (I expect).

~46,000

[PeterSt]

Haha. But I forgot : not only the real soundcard's buffer size needs to be set to that, also XX's "Device Buffer Size". *And* Q1= ... to any value your system can bear (the label above Q1 shows the samples). So, this will be sub-48 sample buffer. But 46000 ? that's 1022 per second. Seems too low to me. At no upsampling it merely must be in the range of 44100 per second.

All just for fun and your understanding. I wouldn't bother too much !

[Josef]

Ah - I have set XX Buffer to 48 (Q1=1 then shows but sound card driver (Transit) cannot go lower than 128 bytes - and if I try another DAC via Windows built-in USB driver then I have no clue where to set buffer size....
I guess that is that then....

[Raj.V]

Hi all,

I better mention this while Ramdisk is the flavour of the week...

I looked up on Ramdisk benchmak and picked one of the top three (not free but has trial period). The read/write rates are higher than the free one suggested earlier by Marcin.

Result:
I thought I couldn't improve my laptop it anymore... but I was wrong.
Even blacker and more separation between the instuments and vocals. Cearly better for me.

I guess it follows the law of nature... If you want something free and good then get Fo*b*r and if you want something more rewarding then buy XXHE.

Please try it and don't forget to share findings... and explain if you know why... I thought ram is just ram.
Just create ramdisk with different SW, have separate XXHE installed and run it to compare.

Should also be able to check Ramdisk performance using HDTune. Just compared my HDD with the Dataram ramdisk and almost fell off the chair.

Raj

[Marcin_gps]

I was afraid that different ramdisk software would matter as well    Does your choice have ability to run from an image at Windows startup? What filesystem did you apply?

Cheers,
Marcin

[Marcin_gps]

here is a comparison of different RAMdisk programs - http://www.raymond.cc/blog/archives/2009/12/08/12-ram-disk-software-benchmarked-for-fastest-read-and-write-speed/

Peter, which read test is the most important for XXHE - sequential, 512K or 4K? I suppose it's sequential, but I'd like to be sure before I try a new software.

EDIT
But according to that test, RAMdisk is the best and not by a small margin. Raj.V - what did you install?

[PeterSt]

Should also be able to check Ramdisk performance using HDTune. Just compared my HDD with the Dataram ramdisk and almost fell off the chair.

Hey Raj,

Sorry for the stupid question maybe, but I'm not sure the ramdisk was so slow, or so increadably more fast than the hdd (the latter would be obvious).

Anyway, thanks for some again fresh ideas.
Peter

[Raj.V]

Yes they do save/load images.

I used FAT16.

The three I saw are QSoft, GiliSoft & VirtualDisk.
I tried GiliSoft.

Peter,
yes I thought the ram read/write should be the same but the benchmark tables say otherwise. I don't understand why. The read/write rate differences are small but if I can hear (I believe) it then it matters to me.

P.S. I meant that the Ramdisk was way faster than the HDD. Just funny to see the test proceed in HDTune.
Raj

[Telstar]

Links to the two ramdisk software used please (i dont remember the name of the one you suggested at the beginning, Marcin)

[Raj.V]

gilisoft
http://www.gilisoft.com/product-ramdisk.htm

dataram
http://memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk

I won't be able to test anything for a few days as I will be on holiday in a few hours.

Raj

[Marcin_gps]

http://www.madshrimps.be/vbulletin/f22/12-software-ram-disk-solutions-up-2358-1539mb-s-r-w-speeds-69781/
There you go - Dataram Ramdisk - free and the best

[Raj.V]

But guys no harm in trying. That's what we do here as members in this forum.
Imagine noone tried Marcin's super idea.

Software versions could have changed and different benchmarks seem to exist also.

P.S. I took the write speed as a benchmark in my selection.

Raj

[Telstar]

gilisoft
http://www.gilisoft.com/product-ramdisk.htm

dataram
http://memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk

I won't be able to test anything for a few days as I will be on holiday in a few hours.

Raj

I'll also try both of those, only on W7 so far

[PeterSt]

Peter, which read test is the most important for XXHE - sequential, 512K or 4K? I suppose it's sequential, but I'd like to be sure before I try a new software.

I downloaded that benchmark software in order to get something from the Help in there, but it doesn't bring much ...

Anyway, what we would be using is sequential write and read at the largest block size. But, it doesn't work like that, because the block size is a hardware thing, and normally it is defined at creating the volume (the Cluster Size in Windows terms). Not so here. However, I examined "our" RAMDisk a bit, and found that the "Cluster Size" is 4KB. This is rather small, and actually not much "productive" for our 30MB and up files (read : with a Cluster Size of 64KB, all would virtually be 16 times faster).

But ...

We can also format the RAMDisk ourselves ...  
So, when done with 64KB Cluster Size (this is the maximum) we will gain much speed again, from writing and reading our very large files.
The downside : there's also a lot going on for small files (less than 1KB), and they will be written (and read) as 64KB ... So, that's more slow then.

So far the theories. The practice you see below, and it all doesn't matter a bit (look at the file names; when not mentioned otherwise, it's NTFS formatted). I also wrote an album to the RAMDisk in the various situations, and it takes the same time for each formatted occasion. To me this says that the format and Cluster Size just doesn't matter at all, hence internally some standard will be make of it. What will matter though, is the least allocated space. Thus, for a 1KB file, 64KB will be used when formatted with a 64KB Cluster Size.

One last thing I noticed, and didn't know : With exFAT the Cluster Size can be 32768KB (this is 32MB), which would improve significantly on normal disk files. Down side : the relatively small CoverArt files will consume 32MB also, *and* they will need to read that 32MB per piece. Not preferrable !

[PeterSt]

Boleary may be the starter of this all, although I am not sure at this moment whether Marcin mentioned it first.

All,

Above quote from me before was phrased a little differently (I changed it), and as I understood from boleary in my dutch-english it was quite upsetting. OF COURSE this was not intended at all. So, in case others perceived it the same as boleary himself did, I referred to his great capabilities of using women voices as a measure for the sound quality; not a thing everybody does. Besides, I think his daughter is a singer, so this will be the utmost good environment to compare with reality.
Well, at referring to that, I think it came out as boleary nagging as a baby or something, only because of mentioning the "woman" thing in a wrong way.
Brian already understands now, but I sure don't want anyone else to think I referred to him as a nagging woman, baby or whatever else can nag. I hope this is corrected now !

All the best,
Peter

[Raj.V]

Peter,

I might be writing complete nonsense now...

Is it possible to partition ramdisk with 2 separate cluster sizes?
Then the small files and coverart can sit in the 4k cluster sized partition.

Raj

[Telstar]

Peter,

I might be writing complete nonsense now...

Is it possible to partition ramdisk with 2 separate cluster sizes?
Then the small files and coverart can sit in the 4k cluster sized partition.

Raj

It should be possible to create 2 ramdisks, but i think that the dataram software that we are using doesnt support 2 ramdisks at the same time. (i still cant see the letter unit, which must be "O" btw  )

[PeterSt]

Yes Raj, you must be up to some vacation. Hahaha.

But, although I think that will be possible, it will be of no use. So yes, I referred to the CoverArt etc., but that was related to permanent storage (the "music disks"); the CoveArt just won't go to the RAMDisk.

But it made me think ...

When the music is selected from a Gallery, the CoverArt will be taken from there as well. IOW, the "Copy to XXDrive" parameter will store the music file on the "XX Drive" (which it normally is not), *and* it will take the CoverArt from there as well (why ? because the Gallery will be on the XXDrive, so that just needs to stay there, and all is right). However, in our RAMDisk situation, the Galleries are not on the RAMDisk, but on the "original" XXDrive (where the XX folder was copied from). This means that the CoverArt is taken from that real disk (be it HDD or SSD). Will that matter (SQ) ? maybe ...
I am not sure at this moment, but if you play Unattended and shut off the CoverArt Wallpaper stuff it just won't be addressed.

Hmm ...

But Raj, have a nice vacation. I guess we'll just have to do it alone.



PS: Just saw Telstar's post ... I think he is right. But notice it all doesn't matter, because the Cluster Size can be as small as we want, because I don't see any performance penalties (see earlier pictures).

[PeterSt]

which must be "O" btw :D)

Yes, I use O: too. It has the roundest shape, so it will sound the most smooth.

[Calibrator]

Also, those running 64 bits versions with more than 4GB ram installed, are you able to create RamDisks up to 4GB OK that survive a reboot intact?

Well I answered this question myself by using a spare drive and installing a virgin Vista 64 image on it. Creating a 3GB RamDisk within a 8GB total capacity was successful and should accommodate up to about 4 queued albums. More importantly there weren't any issues experienced after each reboot, although it was a little quirky getting it's act all together initially.

Time now to back up the new build with Acronis True Image and transfer across to my Vertex 2 SSD. I can't believe how much slower normal drives are after using SSD's for a whle.

I also run some quick read tests using HD Tune Pro while I was at it. The HDD used for this build was a 1GB WD "blue" and started out at approx 110 MB/sec transfer, the SSD was in the order of 250 MB/sec and the RamDIsk was a whisker under 3500 MB/sec with a burst speed of 4300 MB/sec !!

Russ

[Telstar]

It took two reboots for this dataram disk to appear and it's hard to change the size when every option is greyed out
But it plays great! No going back to "normal" playback.

and now i'm out for lunch 

[AUDIODIDAKT]

The best way the apply RAMDisk:

First set the partition-size and fat32, then do nothing, reboot (or maybe 2 times)

Then you have image space (extra hdd) on your RAM, then copy the complete xx folder to that location.
next, setup xx with all settings that are needed, including your key.

Then go to the second tab in RAMDisk, Load and Save, and press "Save Disk Image Now" and select checkbox "Load Disk Image at Startup"
Reboot

Then finally select checkbox "Save Disk Image on Shutdown"
Reboot

Its about all those reboots that are needed, but when up and running it will work nice.

Roy

PS: correct me if i'am wrong, I will adjust it.

[PeterSt]

First set the partition-size and fat32, then do nothing, reboot (or maybe 2 times)

This seems superfuous, but is not; It will avoid copying the XX stuff to the RAMDisk again (maybe two times); no big deal, but setting those settings each time is not a nice thing.
Moral : first wait until the RAMDisk shows up automatically after a reboot (thus, maybe two), and when that works, copy in the XX data, set the settings, and finally check that box "Save Image on shutdown" and also save the Image at that point. This latter again is "necessary" because each change (like from the mentioned checkbox) is only dealt with *after* the reboot. So, just one step too late in fact.

Like Roy said : when it works, it keeps on working. Really a nice tool IMO.

Peter

[manisandher]

FWIW, I didn't have to reboot at all. As soon as I pressed 'Start RAMDisk', the RAM drive appeared. I then unzipped the XX files to it.

It has worked flawlessly on 3 different PCs with plenty of shutdowns/startups.

Mani.

[PeterSt]

Yes ... with me too. But it is about all automatically being there again after a reboot.

[Gerard]

Peter,

I might be writing complete nonsense now...

Is it possible to partition ramdisk with 2 separate cluster sizes?
Then the small files and coverart can sit in the 4k cluster sized partition.

Raj

The sound

It should be possible to create 2 ramdisks, but i think that the dataram software that we are using doesnt support 2 ramdisks at the same time. (i still cant see the letter unit, which must be "O" btw  )

I did install two yesterday. As it started i nodiced it was the wrong one. Then downloaded the one i like and activated that one to. I thought that i closed the previous wrong one but it did not.
The sound was terrible but that also could be of the two time´s 1500mb setting. I am not sure 


 

[Telstar]

Moral : first wait until the RAMDisk shows up automatically after a reboot (thus, maybe two), and when that works, copy in the XX data, set the settings, and finally check that box "Save Image on shutdown" and also save the Image at that point.

Yeah, i'm at this point now.
After several trials (and loosing xxhe with all its settings), i have managed to have the ramdisk available at boot, i put a dummy text file and i'm going to restart again.

[PeterSt]

(and loosing xxhe with all its settings),

Actually, the settings will stay, as long as you don't change the drive letter and folder name at a next attempt.
The Playlist Contents won't stay, because they come from the original copy. This is why the Image should be saved at each shutdown (that checkbox) because then *everything* will be back, just from that image (hence the copy from the RAMDisk itself).

It all may be a bit confusing.

Peter

[manisandher]

FWIW, I didn't have to reboot at all. As soon as I pressed 'Start RAMDisk', the RAM drive appeared. I then unzipped the XX files to it.

It has worked flawlessly on 3 different PCs with plenty of shutdowns/startups.

Yes ... with me too. But it is about all automatically being there again after a reboot.

What I meant was that it was there automatically after the first and all subsequent reboots. I don't understand why people are saying that it takes 2-3 reboots to make it all stable - not the case for me... on 3 different PCs.

Mani.

[crisnee]

A question, a thought and a reply, not necessarily in that order. We'll see.

Peter, does XX copy only the currently playing mp3, flac, etc. file (or part there of) to the local directory/disk or does it copy the whole play list. If the former, would it not be an advantage for the purposes of the ramdisk to incorporate a function that allows for the copy of the whole playlist; so that all xx functions (or as many as possible) during a particular play session would take place in ram (possibly the originating disk could slumber during...).

RE saving the disk image. It is not necessary to set "save the disk image" at shutdown and it might not always be advantageous. I for instance prefer that my ramdisk be the same as when I set it up, and to change only when I make setup changes. To do this I can save it manually. Your ramdisk should not be lost, and will load automatically until you actually "stop it." Because ramdisk space is limited I don't want to clutter it up with anything unnecessary that might be saved at shutdown.

Chris

[Gerard]

A question, a thought and a reply, not necessarily in that order. We'll see.

Peter, does XX copy only the currently playing mp3, flac, etc. file (or part there of) to the local directory/disk or does it copy the whole play list. If the former, would it not be an advantage for the purposes of the ramdisk to incorporate a function that allows for the copy of the whole playlist; so that all xx functions (or as many as possible) during a particular play session would take place in ram (possibly the originating disk could slumber during...).

RE saving the disk image. It is not necessary to set "save the disk image" at shutdown and it might not always be advantageous. I for instance prefer that my ramdisk be the same as when I set it up, and to change only when I make setup changes. To do this I can save it manually. Your ramdisk should not be lost, and will load automatically until you actually "stop it." Because ramdisk space is limited I don't want to clutter it up with anything unnecessary that might be saved at shutdown.

Chris

Isnt it saved to a file which is to be loaded at start?

[AUDIODIDAKT]

A question, a thought and a reply, not necessarily in that order. We'll see.

Peter, does XX copy only the currently playing mp3, flac, etc. file (or part there of) to the local directory/disk or does it copy the whole play list. If the former, would it not be an advantage for the purposes of the ramdisk to incorporate a function that allows for the copy of the whole playlist; so that all xx functions (or as many as possible) during a particular play session would take place in ram (possibly the originating disk could slumber during...).

XX does this only in UNattended mode.

RE saving the disk image. It is not necessary to set "save the disk image" at shutdown and it might not always be advantageous. I for instance prefer that my ramdisk be the same as when I set it up, and to change only when I make setup changes. To do this I can save it manually. Your ramdisk should not be lost, and will load automatically until you actually "stop it." Because ramdisk space is limited I don't want to clutter it up with anything unnecessary that might be saved at shutdown.

Chris

Yes, this could be to your own preference, it does save time on shut-down, but when all runs well, you dont have to do
several reboots a day, like most of us have done here in the last view days, when I shutdown after playing music I dont mind longer shutdown time,
This will get a little faster in different setup, be could also take longer if we need more RAM space.
Discusable, but also to your own liking

Roy

[PeterSt]

Peter, does XX copy only the currently playing mp3, flac, etc. file (or part there of) to the local directory/disk or does it copy the whole play list. If the former, would it not be an advantage for the purposes of the ramdisk to incorporate a function that allows for the copy of the whole playlist; so that all xx functions (or as many as possible) during a particular play session would take place in ram (possibly the originating disk could slumber during...).

A bit like Roy said : The whole Playlist goes to the RAMDisk at Unattended. With Attended it does too, but only those tracks that actually (come to) play.

RE saving the disk image. It is not necessary to set "save the disk image" at shutdown and it might not always be advantageous. I for instance prefer that my ramdisk be the same as when I set it up

This would be "wrong approach";
IOW, if this is your opinion, you use only a few of the functionalities in there; Working like that, the least you should do is denoting the XXData folder to somewhere on permanent storage. And then I think this is still not enough. So, what you call "clutter up" might be so, but it's necessary (though - and thus, depending on what you do).
The only thing I encountered so far as "doubtful" is the TemporaryData folder, which normally stays as long as possibe, and which indeed may overflow your RAMDisk. So, denote that to permanent storage and there's no problem, but it will be slower - depending on the type of track, useage of Normalized Volume (first time or not), HDCD, and some more. All 'n all, I always pointed that on a normal HDD (instead of SSD), and I thought to point that to the RAMDisk now. -> not good.

I hope it's clear a bit (or please believe me that anyone should save that image at shutdown *or* you must know what you are doing, and not complain about inconsistencies after a reboot).

Peter

[crisnee]

Peter, does XX copy only the currently playing mp3, flac, etc. file (or part there of) to the local directory/disk or does it copy the whole play list. If the former, would it not be an advantage for the purposes of the ramdisk to incorporate a function that allows for the copy of the whole playlist; so that all xx functions (or as many as possible) during a particular play session would take place in ram (possibly the originating disk could slumber during...).

A bit like Roy said : The whole Playlist goes to the RAMDisk at Unattended. With Attended it does too, but only those tracks that actually (come to) play.

Peter, I don't understand your answer. You say "With Attended it does too, but only those tracks that actually (come to) play." That isn't clear. It sounds like you're saying it copies the files one at a time as XX can't know before hand what will "come to play", however you also say "with attended it does too." So, does it copy all the files in the play list initially, or one at a time as you go along (in attended mode).

Chris

Never mind. I just figured it out. It copies one at a time in attended mode, not very useful to use ramdisk in this instance then it seems. An interesting point. I played the same file three times in succession and erased the corresponding UnicodeTrack in between. Each play the UnicodeTrack grew. Initially it was 58 mb by the third time it was 66 mb? 

Chris again

[crisnee]

RE saving the disk image. It is not necessary to set "save the disk image" at shutdown and it might not always be advantageous. I for instance prefer that my ramdisk be the same as when I set it up

This would be "wrong approach";
IOW, if this is your opinion, you use only a few of the functionalities in there; Working like that, the least you should do is denoting the XXData folder to somewhere on permanent storage. And then I think this is still not enough. So, what you call "clutter up" might be so, but it's necessary (though - and thus, depending on what you do).
The only thing I encountered so far as "doubtful" is the TemporaryData folder, which normally stays as long as possibe, and which indeed may overflow your RAMDisk. So, denote that to permanent storage and there's no problem, but it will be slower - depending on the type of track, useage of Normalized Volume (first time or not), HDCD, and some more. All 'n all, I always pointed that on a normal HDD (instead of SSD), and I thought to point that to the RAMDisk now. -> not good.

Peter, I really don't like the idea of saving the image file a shutdown every time, not because of length of shutdown and bootup but because you never really know what you're saving particularly if things went somewhat wrong at some point during the session. So to avoid saving the image, and to avoid possible problems I could create a batch file that would save the xxdata folder to the HD at shutdown and copy it back to ramdisk after start up. What else should I copy to and fro that might cause problems if I didn't?

Chris

[AUDIODIDAKT]

Peter, I really don't like the idea of saving the image file a shutdown every time, not because of length of shutdown and bootup but because you never really know what you're saving particularly if things went somewhat wrong at some point during the session. So to avoid saving the image, and to avoid possible problems I could create a batch file that would save the xxdata folder to the HD at shutdown and copy it back to ramdisk after start up. What else should I copy to and fro that might cause problems if I didn't?

Chris

Things went wrong here too, saving a corrupted image, afterall loosing all data, but you can make a back-up of that image, smart thing to do anyway.
If all settles in well, then these problems wont occur that much.

[Telstar]

Peter, I really don't like the idea of saving the image file a shutdown every time, not because of length of shutdown and bootup but because you never really know what you're saving particularly if things went somewhat wrong at some point during the session.

I dont really see the problem of this. When you use xxhe on a normal HD the stuff is there when you reboot. Now you can do that with the ramdisk too.

[crisnee]

Peter, I really don't like the idea of saving the image file a shutdown every time, not because of length of shutdown and bootup but because you never really know what you're saving particularly if things went somewhat wrong at some point during the session.

I dont really see the problem of this. When you use xxhe on a normal HD the stuff is there when you reboot. Now you can do that with the ramdisk too.

There's not really a big problem, but possibly a few annoying ones I'd like to avoid.

1. Reconstructing the Ramdisk because of corruption issues; according to some things I've read that's a fairly common occurrence. (I know I can back it up, but then why not just do the batch file thing I mentioned. Also unless I back it up regularly the point is moot not to mention that it'll take more time than the batch file effort).

2. Ramdisk space is limited; I don't want to save things to it inadvertently. I want it to be exactly the way I set it up to be, plus only the changes that I really need/desire. With the ramdisk I have the potential for complete control. Why give it up somewhat by saving the disk image at some arbitrary unwatched time? I can always save it manually exactly when I want to.

3. Constantly saving the basic same thing at shutdown is just asking for eventual corruption and the consequent need for a new ramdisk and program setup. I for one get very impatient with having to set things up again and again--looking for all the licenses and files and instructions blah blah.

Chris

[PeterSt]

Chris, you are not correct. Sorry. Telstar said it all.
Luckily this at last is about normal computing, and not about voodoo audio stuff. It works. If not, you have something (VERY) wrong in the first place.

Additionally, this doesn't take time at shutdown (hardly). It does significantly at bootup though (30 secs as I see it).

But as I said, go ahead if you feel it is good for you. As long as others don't listen to it, it's really ok.
haha

Peter

[crisnee]

Chris, you are not correct. Sorry. Telstar said it all.
Luckily this at last is about normal computing, and not about voodoo audio stuff. It works. If not, you have something (VERY) wrong in the first place.

Peter

Peter, How can you say I'm not correct? It's not a matter of correct. What I do know is that the things I mentioned do happen. And it's about computing, as you have to know corruption happens far to often. It's computing that is why it happens, not voodoo where what happens is much more interesting.

It just so happens that a few moments ago XX left one of its big Unicodetracks (400 mb) in the directory after the XX had been exited from, this would have been saved as part of the IMG file. No big deal perhaps but a large chunk of a small amount of Ram.

And I have nothing wrong with my system (finally) since I installed the Ramdisk . I've had almost no glitches and none of the continuous problems I had until very recently.

I think I've figured out which files I need to copy back and forth between the ramdisk and the hd, so that I don't need to save the IMG at shutdown, so no need to answer my query.

Besides just telling me I'm wrong and it's a bad idea, you might consider telling me why. I think it's a good idea, and just telling me it's not, is not very constructive and a bit arrogant.

Chris

[Telstar]

Besides just telling me I'm wrong and it's a bad idea, you might consider telling me why. I think it's a good idea, and just telling me it's not, is not very constructive and a bit arrogant.
Chris

Then dont select the autosave on shutdown. Save it manually, but when you will forget to do it, dont complain to us.

Back on topic now, please.

[PeterSt]

Ok Chris. Then you are correct.


PS: What do you think that happens otherwise with that 400MB Unicode track eh ?

PPS:

I think it's a good idea, and just telling me it's not, is not very constructive and a bit arrogant

Thinking that's a good idea while I say it's not, is destructive to yoursef and a lot ignorant.

PPPS: But what is your problem now ? I already said you could go ahead, if only others don't listen to it. Is it this latter what bothers you ?
Cut it out now please. We both said what we wanted.

[PeterSt]

PPPPS:

[AUDIODIDAKT]

It was open for discussion,
 

[Per]

Please. This is not the tone I have come to admire. I actually can see benefits starting from a clean sheet each time and that is also what I did - until my soundcard gave up on me a day ago.... "surt show" as we say in Danish.

Sleep well and don't let any disagrements or harsh words come between you.

Love you all.

Per

[boleary]

Finally got home and listened to xx/vista/RAMdisk. Wow, so much more refined, less harsh. SFS's significantly  reduced. Gotta thank Peter's SSD for frying and sending him back to Vista and Marcin, damn, wonderful collaboration. Am trying to take Roy's advice and go slow, but Nick's tweaks sure look interesting too. All in all its a little dizzying in "here" at the moment. Unbelievably cool....

[GerardA]

How about putting a Virtual Machine on RamDisk and putting Vista and XXHE in the VM?
Even allows to make more VM's for testing and comparisons!

[Marcin_gps]

I don't think it will be half as fast as optimized regular Vista installation.

[PeterSt]

I thought about that Gerard, but there's no way that will work good. I tried it earlier. Just the VM doesn't. Like Marcin says ... way too slow.

[Telstar]

How about putting a Virtual Machine on RamDisk and putting Vista and XXHE in the VM?
Even allows to make more VM's for testing and comparisons!

I thought that, but with a very thin linux distro, not windows.

[praphan]

Hi Peter and Mani,

I am one of those few dummies out there running XXHE on W7. Cannot wait to hear it on Vista. But then, I tried installing 0.9-z2 on Vista Business 32 bit without success.

Could anyone please give a dummy instruction to do a lite installation of Vista and step-by-step set up of RAMDISK.

I have W7 and Vista on the same PC.

I am running AMD X4 965 quad core, Gigabyte 880 GA-UD, Radeon HD 5770, Lynx Studio AES 16, 60GB SSD for OS alone, 2TB HHD for Data and 1TB HHD for W7 and other game/video applications.

Thanks in advance for your help guys!
Praphan

[PeterSt]

I don't know whether anyone will do this (may be too much work), but *if* someone does it, please create a new topic for it, and I will make it a sticky.

Peter

[Josef]

That RAMDisk benchmark someone posted here was run on a very old hardware so I've re-run it with best 3 on not-so-old hw (CoreDuo 2.2Ghz).

Top row NTFS, bottom FAT16.
From left to right: QRam Enterprise, GillSoft, DataRAM.

Not much difference between 3 packages except it seems that:

1. DataRAM consistently slower. (but also significantly lower DPC latency on 4K test!)
2. NTFS consistently slower.

So, going with FAT seems a no-brainer. Not only is it faster but it leaves more usable memory (notice NTFS ate 22MB on disk with no data).
Other than that, choosing one is a personal preference.
I've picked QRam as it has a ton of options on which part of RAM to use (might come in handy one day) and is cheaper than Gill (or free if you re-install once a quarter or so)...

[boleary]

Hi Praphan, here's a step by step for RAMdisck:

   
Re: RAMDisk - Setup
« Reply #61 on: October 08, 2010, 02:14:11 pm »
Quote
The best way the apply RAMDisk:

First set the partition-size and fat32, then do nothing, reboot (or maybe 2 times)

Then you have image space (extra hdd) on your RAM, then copy the complete xx folder to that location.
next, setup xx with all settings that are needed, including your key.

Then go to the second tab in RAMDisk, Load and Save, and press "Save Disk Image Now" and select checkbox "Load Disk Image at Startup"
Reboot

Then finally select checkbox "Save Disk Image on Shutdown"
Reboot

Its about all those reboots that are needed, but when up and running it will work nice.

Roy

PS: correct me if i'am wrong, I will adjust it.
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#4Engine, Special Mode, 48 samples, SFS 12MB, DAP, Scheme=3, Q1=1, Q2/Q3/Q4/Q5=30,30,0,0, PlayerPrio=Low, ThreadPrio=Realtime
x-Allow Format Change, x-Stop Services, x-Copy to XX-drive by Standard, x-Start Engine3 During Conversion
PeterSt
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Re: RAMDisk
« Reply #62 on: October 08, 2010, 02:21:50 pm »
Quote
Quote
First set the partition-size and fat32, then do nothing, reboot (or maybe 2 times)

This seems superfuous, but is not; It will avoid copying the XX stuff to the RAMDisk again (maybe two times); no big deal, but setting those settings each time is not a nice thing.
Moral : first wait until the RAMDisk shows up automatically after a reboot (thus, maybe two), and when that works, copy in the XX data, set the settings, and finally check that box "Save Image on shutdown" and also save the Image at that point. This latter again is "necessary" because each change (like from the mentioned checkbox) is only dealt with *after* the reboot. So, just one step too late in fact.

Like Roy said : when it works, it keeps on working. Really a nice tool IMO.

Peter

What kind of problems have you encountered trying to install XX on your Vista partition? Just wondering cause I'm planning the same with my desktop.

[Gerard]

Hi Praphan, here's a step by step for RAMdisck:

   
Re: RAMDisk - Setup
« Reply #61 on: October 08, 2010, 02:14:11 pm »
Quote
The best way the apply RAMDisk:

First set the partition-size and fat32, then do nothing, reboot (or maybe 2 times)

Then you have image space (extra hdd) on your RAM, then copy the complete xx folder to that location.
next, setup xx with all settings that are needed, including your key.

Then go to the second tab in RAMDisk, Load and Save, and press "Save Disk Image Now" and select checkbox "Load Disk Image at Startup"
Reboot

Then finally select checkbox "Save Disk Image on Shutdown"
Reboot

Its about all those reboots that are needed, but when up and running it will work nice.

Roy

PS: correct me if i'am wrong, I will adjust it.
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Esi Juli@ soundcard (KS)(x2v-v0_978)(Tweaked Coaxial)/Nvidea Geforce 9800 GTX+/750 Watt Zalman ZM-750-HP/100 MB Fiber-Optical Internet/
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#4Engine, Special Mode, 48 samples, SFS 12MB, DAP, Scheme=3, Q1=1, Q2/Q3/Q4/Q5=30,30,0,0, PlayerPrio=Low, ThreadPrio=Realtime
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PeterSt
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High Grade Audiophile

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Posts: 4852




 
   
Re: RAMDisk
« Reply #62 on: October 08, 2010, 02:21:50 pm »
Quote
Quote
First set the partition-size and fat32, then do nothing, reboot (or maybe 2 times)

This seems superfuous, but is not; It will avoid copying the XX stuff to the RAMDisk again (maybe two times); no big deal, but setting those settings each time is not a nice thing.
Moral : first wait until the RAMDisk shows up automatically after a reboot (thus, maybe two), and when that works, copy in the XX data, set the settings, and finally check that box "Save Image on shutdown" and also save the Image at that point. This latter again is "necessary" because each change (like from the mentioned checkbox) is only dealt with *after* the reboot. So, just one step too late in fact.

Like Roy said : when it works, it keeps on working. Really a nice tool IMO.

Peter

What kind of problems have you encountered trying to install XX on your Vista partition? Just wondering cause I'm planning the same with my desktop.

 


Boleary,

Did you say somewhere (i don't now were) that you would explain how to shut off services? I use my pc for music only and would like to play around a bit with those. If it ends up in a new install from Vista so be it.

i do not now if it is a lot off work but it would really be appreciated! (maybe a few screenshots)?


 

[boleary]

Wasn't me that talked about shutting off services; recently its mostly been Marcin, Nick, Roy and other knowledgeable folk. Most of those recent descriptions can be found in this thread and in the "We all Fell in the W7 Pitfall" thread.

[AUDIODIDAKT]

Gerard,

Search/Run, "Services.msc" or see here

For services and what they do see Black Viper

Roy

[Josef]

Hey guys - anybody spent some time listening to different RAMdisks?

I mean, this whole thing really makes no sense at all: as XX is pre-loading files into RAM before playing it should not matter, right?....ugh, then it should also not matter if HD/SDD is used......yet, it seems everyone here is noting a difference and mostly positive ones to boot ....gosh....

But, if we assume that RAMdisk makes a difference (even though it should not), could it be that different RAMdisks sound different too? (even though it should not matter at all?)

Indeed, Raj suggested that this was the case and, specifically, he found GiliSoft preferable to Dataram. Was anybody else here brave enough to venture into this highly improbable realm?.....No?

Well, why playing with benchmarks I also played same tracks from different RAMdisks and, as much as I hate to admit, it would seem that Raj could be onto something...

Contrary to Raj, though, I just can't stand Gilisoft....in short, found it too 'mechanical'....
On the other hand, Dataram was good but maybe just a bit 'thinnner' than QRam which I preferred in the end......

OK, I know this sounds weird (to say the least, LOL) but then I looked a bit under-the-covers and it seems RAMDisks go about their memory allocation differently: it seems that both Dataram & Gili rely on 'local device driver' memory (which is a bit of a no-no per MS recommendations when it comes to such large allocations, btw) whereas QSoft defaults to Kernel non-paged pool (although it can be configured to behave in similar manner or use Kernel Paged-pool instead...)

Now, in theory, this _could_ make a difference if one has a swap file.... I don't, so I'm stumped...

Anybody tried this? (or care to explain why this is all a placebo, please?...

[PeterSt]

Ok, I did not. But just because I'm happy as it is.

[JohanZ]

I'm happy as it is.

What RamDisk software do you use?

Regards,

Johan

[Gerard]

Gerard,

Search/Run, "Services.msc" or see here

For services and what they do see Black Viper

Roy

Thanx Roy,

Was there not someone who said he had only 8 services left? If so i like to now which they are.
(Mani Nick)??

 

[Marcin_gps]

Yeah, that was me. Actually, I ended up with 7 services running Give me some time to write about everything I applied.

[Gerard]

Yeah, that was me. Actually, I ended up with 7 services running Give me some time to write about everything I applied.

Ok thanx i will wait patiently 

 

[Telstar]

OK, I know this sounds weird (to say the least, LOL) but then I looked a bit under-the-covers and it seems RAMDisks go about their memory allocation differently: it seems that both Dataram & Gili rely on 'local device driver' memory (which is a bit of a no-no per MS recommendations when it comes to such large allocations, btw) whereas QSoft defaults to Kernel non-paged pool (although it can be configured to behave in similar manner or use Kernel Paged-pool instead...)

Now, in theory, this _could_ make a difference if one has a swap file.... I don't, so I'm stumped...

Anybody tried this? (or care to explain why this is all a placebo, please?...

I use the swap. but I dont have that much time to try

[AUDIODIDAKT]

Hi all,

Me also back at work, after a long period without a job.
 

So have to take some steps back now, although i will follow everything closely.
But unfortunately I can spend less time on testing and such.

Roy

[PeterSt]

I'm happy as it is.

What RamDisk software do you use?

Hi Johan. We all use this : http://memory.dataram.com/products-and-services/software/ramdisk (Dataram RAMDisk), except maybe for a few experimenting with other manufacturers.

[PeterSt]

Reading through the manual for RamDisk I noted that if you are using a 32bit version of Vista/Win7 , that RamDisk will utilize any memory above the 4GB limit normally restricted to. Great I thought, stick in another 4GB in the spare mem slots of my m/b and I can then have my cake and eat it too !

Turned out this wasn't such a joyous endeavour. I have just spend several hours phutzing around trying to get RamDisk working with that additional RAM but have been unsuccessful.

I'm currently playing under 32 bit Vista with SP2 installed.

The issue arises when asking RamDisk to load the saved image at a reboot. I could never find a combination of settings that allowed this. It would create a RamDisk from scratch without issue, but as soon as you requested a reload the system would start to load but then die and kick you back to POST. A jump into SAFE MODE to delete the image file and change settings for RamDisk were the only way of continuing.

In the end I've gone back to working with a 1.5GB Ramdisk using mem under Vista's immediate control. This is sufficient to load 2 albums at a time, which is usually the most I ever do.

I would be interested to know if anyone running 32bit versions of Vista/Win7 with MORE THAN 4GB MEMORY, has been successful in getting RamDisk working correctly using that additional memory.

Also, those running 64 bits versions with more than 4GB ram installed, are you able to create RamDisks up to 4GB OK that survive a reboot intact?

Cheers,

Russ

Hi there Russ,

I wondered ... Did you ever try to load/create the RAMDisk (of 4GB under 32 bits) just after the reboot ?

Thanks,
Peter

[Calibrator]

Reading through the manual for RamDisk I noted that if you are using a 32bit version of Vista/Win7 , that RamDisk will utilize any memory above the 4GB limit normally restricted to. Great I thought, stick in another 4GB in the spare mem slots of my m/b and I can then have my cake and eat it too !

Turned out this wasn't such a joyous endeavour. I have just spend several hours phutzing around trying to get RamDisk working with that additional RAM but have been unsuccessful.

I'm currently playing under 32 bit Vista with SP2 installed.

The issue arises when asking RamDisk to load the saved image at a reboot. I could never find a combination of settings that allowed this. It would create a RamDisk from scratch without issue, but as soon as you requested a reload the system would start to load but then die and kick you back to POST. A jump into SAFE MODE to delete the image file and change settings for RamDisk were the only way of continuing.

In the end I've gone back to working with a 1.5GB Ramdisk using mem under Vista's immediate control. This is sufficient to load 2 albums at a time, which is usually the most I ever do.

I would be interested to know if anyone running 32bit versions of Vista/Win7 with MORE THAN 4GB MEMORY, has been successful in getting RamDisk working correctly using that additional memory.

Also, those running 64 bits versions with more than 4GB ram installed, are you able to create RamDisks up to 4GB OK that survive a reboot intact?

Cheers,

Russ

Hi there Russ,

I wondered ... Did you ever try to load/create the RAMDisk (of 4GB under 32 bits) just after the reboot ?

Thanks,
Peter

hey there Pierre, I may not have ever tried pressing the actual "LOAD" command from within the GUI itself just after a boot. I was simply trying to get the automation happening correctly, but alas, it all kept dying. It would certainly CREATE a RAMDisk OK though with the extra memory.

It's all a moot point now anyway, as I installed Vista X64 and that all works just dandy. Takes a while to write the image out at system shutdown though

Russ

[PeterSt]

It's all a moot point now anyway, as I installed Vista X64 and that all works just dandy.

Yes, for you that is.

[Calibrator]

It's all a moot point now anyway, as I installed Vista X64 and that all works just dandy.

Yes, for you that is.

haha ... I thought that might have been the reply.

Tell ya what, I made a full system backup of my Vista 32 environment just before switching to X64, and I'll restore it to a harddrive and check out the ability to do an actual LOAD command.

It means working through my supper time, but anything for a good cause 

Back shortly.

RGB

[PeterSt]

Thank you Russ. I guess it is a matter for those (like me) getting an additional 4GB of memory, which is not very much useful if it doesn't work anyway.

But now I think of it ... did you take into account the max amount of ram (something like 2,5GB) the RAMDisk program supports without payed license ? If not, that may be your (reboot) culprit ?

Cheers,
Peter

[manisandher]

RAMDisk supports 4GB without a license. I'm hoping to use it @4GB as soon as my extra 4GB arrives (should be tomorrow).

Mani.

[PeterSt]

DOH !  I don't know where I read it, but it sure says 4GB. My bad. Sorry.

[Calibrator]

Back shortly.

nup ... still no go. The reason I didn't try a manual image load is there isn't an option to do that after reboot as I discovered.

The system dies during the left/right/left green "Night Rider" lights phase of the boot process, and kicks me back to POST.

As I said in original post, everything works fine if you don't tick the "use memory above 4 GB limit" which is on the "advanced" tab that appears when you have more than 4GB installed.

I suppose a few batch jobs could be set up to copy the contents from the ramdisk to somewhere just prior to shutting down, and a similar one used to restore those files following a successful boot, but I would have thought that unnecessary if the program worked as intended.

Surely there must be someone else out there running Vista 32 with more than 4GB ram installed, to re-affirm this bug?

Russ

[PeterSt]

Thank you Russ.

I suppose a few batch jobs could be set up to copy the contents from the ramdisk to somewhere just prior to shutting down, and a similar one used to restore those files following a successful boot

But does this imply that the "4GB outside of the OS" just works ? (IOW, use 3GB under the 32bit OS and in the mean time have the ram disk of 4GB)

[Calibrator]

But does this imply that the "4GB outside of the OS" just works ? (IOW, use 3GB under the 32bit OS and in the mean time have the ram disk of 4GB)

YES , creating an empty Ramdisk of up to 4GB works fine.

Russ

[Josef]

But does this imply that the "4GB outside of the OS" just works ? (IOW, use 3GB under the 32bit OS and in the mean time have the ram disk of 4GB)
[/quote]

It is my understanding that you'd need Win Server Datacenter or Enterprise edition in order to be able to use more than 4GB.
But why bother with 32-bit versions? 64-bit has no limit plus you get back RAM that your GPU may have 'stolen' (Half a gig in typical case).....

[PeterSt]

But why bother with 32-bit versions?

Because many coincidentally don't have that running ?



I know that many of you make it a sport installing OSes, but I don't.

[manisandher]

Haha...

Many of us were perfectly happy with W7 (ignorance is bliss) until you came along and told us to change back to Vista. But I was never going to do what you said, hence why I've ended up with W2008!

Hopefully we (myself included) can all just calm down now and systematically work at optimising Vista - it looks like we'll be with this OS for a while...

Mani.

[PeterSt]

But I was never going to do what you said

Ahum ...

All,

I thought of it before, and now think I really should mention it :

While we're debating about W7 vs. Vista - or may think by now that Vista is the solution - pure from theory W2008 should be the better solution;
It is Vista, it is more lean, it is more decent/stable, it is more towards "server" activities (hence less fancy stuff), *and* those who tried it, were ever so enthusiast; I didn't do it, but I guess a search for "2008" may come up with some posts about it.

I am sorry if this comes as additional confusement to you, but better late than sorry.

Peter

You said what ? hahaha

[Marcin_gps]

Mani, ru using W2008 or W2008R2, cause they're completely different:
W2008 - Vista
W2008R2 - W7

[manisandher]

... pure from theory W2008 should be the better solution...

You got me!

Mani, ru using W2008 or W2008R2, cause they're completely different:
W2008 - Vista
W2008R2 - W7

Ah well, there's a story here. I had a few hours spare on Saturday - the wife was out with the baby (in the UK it's customary to refer to one's partner as 'the') and I thought, right, this is my chance to sort the PC out. I wanted to load Vistax64, but only had Vista32, so I went onto the MS website and installed a trial version of W2008 instead. I got it installed and carried most of the tweaks mentioned on this site. I had never heard anything quite like it before from PC playback - it was the most precise sound imaginable, but in a 'clinical' and 'overly analytical' way. After listening to it for a couple of hours that I thought something must be wrong. And guess what? It was R2!

On Sunday, I downloaded the trial version of W2008 SP1, which is what I'm using right now. I have a full non-OEM licensed W2008 (with 5 CALs) on order, and it should arrive in the next couple of days. But I'm not going to be in too much of a rush to re-install it on my main machine.

In any event, there's a huge difference in sound between R2 and SP1, the latter sounding so much more laid back and simply more listenable.

Mani.

[PeterSt]

Mani, ru using W2008 or W2008R2, cause they're completely different:
W2008 - Vista
W2008R2 - W7

Thanks Marcin.

[Telstar]

I think that the main differences are about graphics and network services - a slimmed version of either vista or 2008 server (not R2) should sound both good.

I definitely decided to go back to Vista, need a SSD, though, i dont wanna load the OS on a spinning disk. 
How is it going, Roy?

[Marcin_gps]

My attempt to enable memory above 4GB in Ramdisk (dataram) failed, I get a lot of BSODs, so gave up, but I tried different software, according to performance comparison that I found - the best. It's VSuite Ramdisk server edition. Not only I can use 8GB of RAM (4GB for Ramdisk) on 32bit OS, but I'm sure it improved SQ over Dataram Ramdisk.

[Telstar]

My attempt to enable memory above 4GB in Ramdisk (dataram) failed, I get a lot of BSODs, so gave up, but I tried different software, according to performance comparison that I found - the best. It's VSuite Ramdisk server edition. Not only I can use 8GB of RAM (4GB for Ramdisk) on 32bit OS, but I'm sure it improved SQ over Dataram Ramdisk.

How much does it cost the server version?

[Marcin_gps]

$99
but you can try it for free and use 15 days

[Telstar]

$99

$119 for the 64 bit version. Did you try also the standard one
http://www.romexsoftware.com/en-us/vsuite-ramdisk/ramdisk-comparison.html

The main difference performance-wise seem to be only the overlapped I/O.

Edit: nevermind, it's limited to 4GB, does not match my idea of having 16GB of ram 12+ of which used by the ramdisk.

[Marcin_gps]

No, it's not limited to 4GB and you don't need 64bit OS in order to use memory above 4GB (PAE enabled)

Ramdisk size can be up to 2048TB.

[PeterSt]

Hey Marcin, better look at the comparison chart : http://www.romexsoftware.com/en-us/vsuite-ramdisk/ramdisk-comparison.html

[Marcin_gps]

Yes, I see it and there's exactly what I quoted before. And I know that it works, because I'm using it right now on a 32bit OS. Do I have to make a screenshot or what?" 

[Marcin_gps]

Peter, what is your advice on Overlapped IO support? Should I use it with XXHE?

http://www.romexsoftware.com/en-us/vsuite-ramdisk/support/overlapped-io-feature.html

[PeterSt]

Assuming this "overlapped" springs from several requests at the same time ... the only part in XX where this would happen is during the conversions (read and write). However, they are not all so much I/O intensive (it's not "copying" only) so the chance that several requests exist at the same time is not that large. This makes the "base" operation slower (because that Overlapped support causes overhead to begin with).

In either case you won't gain a tenth of a second on even a large transaction anyway. So I wouldn't bother.

[Marcin_gps]

Thanks

[Telstar]

No, it's not limited to 4GB and you don't need 64bit OS in order to use memory above 4GB (PAE enabled)

What I meant is that only the server version can use more than 4GB, that is for my purposes it's the only version i would use, so i would have to pay 120$, which is not trivial.
I'll try to A/B using the trial version. You can have two ramdisks running at once,right? this and the dataram one.

[Marcin_gps]

Yes, you can.

[Telstar]

Yes, you can.

hahahhahhahaha
(sorry thinking at obama)