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    Got a USB stick that Windows Vista doesn't want to use for memory? Read how to use it anyway.

    Peppies™
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    Got a USB stick that Windows Vista doesn't want to use for memory? Read how to use it anyway. Empty Got a USB stick that Windows Vista doesn't want to use for memory? Read how to use it anyway.

    Post  Peppies™ 29th June 2010, 18:54

    Sooner or later, everyone's computer tends to slow down. Call it old age or simply doing too much, but even the most cutting edge PC's seem to lag after a year or so of use.

    For those who aren't keen on opening up their PC to put in more memory, Windows Vista has a handy little feature called ReadyBoost that can use USB sticks for additional memory. Unfortunately, Windows Vista doesn't take kindly to the slower sticks on the market and refuses to use them. Proving once again that we control the computer and not the other way around, here's four simple steps to get around this limitation and use any USB stick you have to increase your computers memory.

    1. Setup

    First things first. Plug the device in. Ignore AutoPlay if you have the enabled, and go to Computer in the start menu. When it pops up, right-click the USB stick and select properties.

    2. Disable the stick

    Click on the Readyboost tab on the properties menu and check Do not restest this device. Click okay and unplug the stick from your computer.

    3. Edit the registry!

    Woah! Don't panic, it's not as frightening as it sounds. Firstly, you need to open regedit, by opening the start menu and typing regedit, then enter. The registry window should load up.

    Using the left-hand pane, work your way through the following folders: HKLM (Local Machine) -> SOFTWARE -> Microsoft -> Windows NT -> CurrentVersion -> EMDgmt. You'll have a list of USB devices the computer has encountered, one of which should be your USB stick. Click on it.

    Here there's a few details you need to edit. Double click on Device Status and change the value to 2, then ok. Do the same for ReadSpeedKBs and WriteSpeedKBs, changing their values to both 1000. Exit the regedit and breathe a sigh of relief.

    4. And back in again

    Now all that's left to do is put the stick back in and once again go to the device properties (Computer > Right-click on drive). If you look under the Readyboost Tab, you'll be able to now select Use this device. Success! Now enjoy your faster PC.

    ok, now here goes again the long comment on readyboost....

    Two of Vista's most useful new features are ReadyBoost and SuperFetch. The first lets you use an 'ordinary' USB memory key as additional RAM memory. Provided your USB key has a minimum read speed of 2.5Mbps and a minimum write speed of 1.5Mbps, you can insert it into a vacant USB port, select the 'Speed up my system' option from the resultant pop-up menu, and hey presto.
    The second of these features, SuperFetch, causes your PC to load commonly used programs much faster. It monitors which applications you use the most and preloads them into system memory so they're ready to launch when you need them. It also runs background processes such as disk defragmenting at lower priorities so they don't interfere as much with your everyday tasks.
    How much of an improvement the two features will provide to you depends very much on your system configuration, but in tests, ReadyBoost and SuperFetch provided a definite improvement in performance.
    My first test involved running the PCMark 2005 synthetic benchmark application on our Vista-equipped Dell XPS M1210 laptop, which has 512MB of system memory. On the first run, without ReadyBoost, the laptop scored 2,240 in PCMark 2005, and on the second run with a 2GB USB key and ReadyBoost enabled, it achieved 2,414 -- an eight per cent increase in performance.
    SuperFetch, in combination with ReadyBoost, seems to improve system responsiveness significantly. We ran a selection of our favourite applications a number of times to see what improvement we could get, and saw positive results. Adobe Photoshop CS2 took 31 seconds to launch on our first attempt, which was reduced to 14 seconds, then to 7 seconds on our second and third runs.

    As i said, your own mileage will vary, but we believe SuperFetch and ReadyBoost are great additions to Windows.

      Current date/time is 28th March 2024, 15:04