Here's how I got ARMA2 to perform smoothly using RAMDISK

[Vipera 10]

Here is free RamDisk software (it says evaluation but it's free if you don't want to pay)

http://members.fortunecity.com/ramdisk/RAMDisk/ramdiskent.htm

It works with Windows 7 32x and 64x. I use it.

Here is my settings how to remove stuttering at all.

http://forums.bistudio.com/showpost.php?p=1483684&postcount=265

Edited November 8, 2009 by Vipera

[An Fiach 10]

M8 no offence, but that thing wont be good for arma2.

Seq read and write are not important, and they are low on that thing...

Just check random read and write here http://www.legitreviews.com/article/877/4/

Random write times are slow, but you are using it as a read disk in this application are you not?

[Herbal Influence 10]

Maybe the new Virtual harddisk feature of Windows7 can be used and you need no other software?

EDIT: Oooops - sorry, Tankbuster, below, is absolutely right! No solution at all. :eek:

Edited November 13, 2009 by Herbal Influence

[Tankbuster 1747]

Maybe the new Virtual harddisk feature of Windows7 can be used and you need no other software?

Aggghhhh! You tricked me into clicking a link to a linux site!!! I'd rather be rickrofled. :)

But what does this gain us? Isn't it just like a temporary partition?

[jigawatt 10]

Well, I am up to 6gigs of ram on my PC now. Going to try and create a 4gig ramdisk and find out which files are loaded the heaviest and throw those in there. Hopefully I will see some performance gains.

I have noticed one strange thing though. When I first start off playing (campaign) my frames are in the mid to low 30's. After a while of gaming they dip down to the 20's. A reboot of my PC seems to fix the issue until I start getting into the 1 hour mark of playing again.

*EDIT* Nm, I found Liquidpinky post. http://forums.bistudio.com/showpost.php?p=1464956&postcount=100 Thanks!

Edited November 11, 2009 by jigawatt

[woodyB 10]

great post, thanks for all this info on setting up a ramdrive. I have decided to set up a 4gb ram drive tomorrow. One question-whats the procedure for setting up the ramdisk if we are using mods?

Edited November 12, 2009 by maj_woody

[Turakon 10]

What about installing the game in a hispeed USB disk or relocating the page file to that? Is it possible and will it bring about a solution to stuttering caused by disk access?

[m1c4d0 0]

What about installing the game in a hispeed USB disk or relocating the page file to that? Is it possible and will it bring about a solution to stuttering caused by disk access?

USB disks are slow ~25mb/s max. :)

[Vipera 10]

great post, thanks for all this info on setting up a ramdrive. I have decided to set up a 4gb ram drive tomorrow. One question-whats the procedure for setting up the ramdisk if we are using mods?

Check my message in another topic

http://forums.bistudio.com/showpost.php?p=1487579&postcount=288

---------- Post added at 12:56 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:53 AM ----------

Well, I am up to 6gigs of ram on my PC now. Going to try and create a 4gig ramdisk and find out which files are loaded the heaviest and throw those in there.

You can't create 4Gb ramdisk and leave only 2Gb for game and Windows. The game itself takes about 2Gb and you have to leave memory for OS. Otherwise you will receive worse result from what you had without ramdisk.

Edited November 13, 2009 by Vipera

[woodyB 10]

thanks vipera, will do. I heard on several posts, that the game wont chew up more than a gig of RAM, could it possibly utilize 2 gigs? but better to be on the safe side i suppose. I do know that with game booster i can get my OS needs down to 500MB while playing ARMA 2, I will make a 3G Ram disk with 500MB for page file and leave the rest to my computer. So out of 6gb, 3.5 would go to Ramdisk, 2.5 to OS and game. Whats your opinion on page file on Ramdisk?

thanks alot

Edited November 13, 2009 by maj_woody

[Vipera 10]

USB disks are slow ~25mb/s max. :)

But their read and seek speads are much faser HDDs so you can use USB flash disks as ReadyBoost in Vista and Win7.

Using memory in your storage device to speed up your computer

ReadyBoost can speed up your computer by using storage space on most USB flash drives and flash memory cards. When you plug a ReadyBoost-compatible storage device into your computer, the AutoPlay dialog box offers you the option to speed up your PC using ReadyBoost. If you select this option, you can choose how much memory on the device to use for this purpose.

When you set up a device to work with ReadyBoost, Windows shows you how much space it recommends you allow it to use for optimal performance. For ReadyBoost to effectively speed up your computer, the flash drive or memory card should have at least 1 gigabyte (GB) of available space. If your device does not have enough available space for ReadyBoost, you'll see a message telling you to free some space on the device if you want to use it to speed up your system.

[Tankbuster 1747]

USB disks are slow ~25mb/s max. :)

Yes, but eSATA flash drives are 90MB/s.

[cjph 0]

Just to share my recent experience with the RAM drives - leaving 2Gb for the system and game is OK, though I have had a couple of freezes requiring system reboots which I cannot say were or were not related to the setup. This is using the SuperSpeed RAMdisk under xp32, with a 6Gb RAMdisk holding a 2Gb pagefile and 4Gb of gamefiles. The remaining 2Gb of my total RAM is for the game and OS and no other background programs running.

One thing I found is that the Superspeed product allows the address space below 4Gb to be utilised as a RAMdisk, so people with 4Gb could benefit to some extent with a 1-2Gb RAMdisk. However, at $60 for the entry version and $100 for the full version it is very expensive just for game use imho. Once the 15 day trial is up I am looking at using the Dataram product, which is free to use for a 4Gb disk but only allows RAM addresses above 4Gb to be used, so probably of little use unless you have over 4Gb total RAM (unless anyone knows how to access the lower RAM with this product?). So I'll probably go to DataRAM and use a 4Gb RAMdisk, putting the pagefile on a Raptor.

As per some of the earlier advice I tried moving the remaining Addon files from the BIS directory on the Raptor to a generic 8Gb USB 2.0 drive, so that the 3.21Gb of larger streaming files (as originally posted) were on a RAMdisk and the smaller files on the flashdrive. I only managed to run a couple of scenarios and though I did'nt have any concrete measures the gaming performance was not noticably hit other than seemingly slightly longer startup and map load times. I will try and test more when I get time.

I hope this helps.

[This is Bosnia 10]

did anybody try to use

Gigabyte GC-RAMDISK (Rev 1.3) - i-RAM and store the game on it

[cjph 0]

I have'ent used the GC-RAMDISK, but looking at the prices here in the UK if you can find a new one they are around £70, plus approx £20 per Gb for DDR sticks it would cost about £150 new, or one went on the bay for £88 earlier this month. This compares to the £65 cost for an additional 4Gb of DDR2 plus the free DataRAM software for the same thing (assuming free slots etc).

I suppose it depends on whether you already have one and/or spare DDR sticks, though I could see it as an advantage to get two RAMdisks, for a total of 8Gb.

[pchaxor 0]

This all sounds fun and everything but I play the game wih no stutter, draw rates seem acceptable for the hardware I have.

1. Specs below in sig. (low end)

2. Page file on OS drive. not game drive. (physical drives)

3. Use latest beta build (1.04.60091 currently)

Is using a Ramdisk really that much better?

[rekrul 7]

Is using a Ramdisk really that much better?

Yes.

I went from normal/low settings, 2km VD with stutter (FPS from 40+ to 1) to very high and 6km VD and virtually no stutter (but a bit lower FPS, 28+).

[froggyluv 2136]

)

Is using a Ramdisk really that much better?

Was for me too. I haven't seen a texture loss/swap for a long time and flying around with VD set to 6000, playing with MandoMissiles is an absolute treat now.

[pchaxor 0]

Ok is there an easy to read toutorial ? Step by Step? If yes .. can the op please add to the first post? I read for like 30 minutes post after post to page 11 and then started to wonder a few things...

1. Can I do this with 4Gb Ram?

2. What Software do I use? (Superspeed/SuperVolume supports Win7 64bit? I did not see it.)

3. How and what do I need to do step by step to make this work?

It may have been already stated pages back, but what is the "STANDARD" that was agreed on. If any at all.

Edit: I am thinking this is all for null to be honest. I have been running the latest beta patch and there is not stutter or anything that could justify all this.

I mean I run Raptor drives and the reads are fast enough. Maybe it would be better if those that are considering doing this FIRST try the latest beta and see if it fixes the issue first.

If there is a HUGE difference in performance with this solution then I will be more willing to try it out, but it is hard for me to consider fixing something that isnt broken. LOL

And let's be honest here ... $100 for the software, another $100 for ram ... just to find out in the end that you could/should have upgraded that video card instead.

http://www.bistudio.com/developers-blog/arma-2-beta-builds-released-2_en.html

http://www.arma2.com/beta-patch.php

Edited November 13, 2009 by pchaxor

[froggyluv 2136]

@pchaxor - There are free varieties of this software as listed in this thread (maybe it's the twin thread) which I myself am using.

Best bet is to try it for yourself, perhaps its different for everyone.

[Killg0re 0]

Am stuck with the Ramdrive.

I got the ramdrive working (4096), and files moved (and backupped), But i cannot seem to "Pick Link Source", i just got Hardlink, and symbolic link...

Am system details: Win7 64Bit, 8Gb

Any idea's?

Btw, i installed: "vcredist_x64.exe for Vs2005 Sp1", and "Link Shell Extension"

Edited November 14, 2009 by Killg0re

[froggyluv 2136]

Am stuck with the Ramdrive.

I got the ramdrive working (4096), and files moved (and backupped), But i cannot seem to "Pick Link Source", i just got Hardlink, and symbolic link...

Am system details: Win7 64Bit, 8Gb

Any idea's?

Happens to me sometimes as well. One day the option is there while the next it ain't...

You can always do the modfolder thing as a backup as pointed out by kju

-mod=r:\@Ramdisk

With 'r' being the drive letter and '@ramdisk' your folder with the files.

Edit- Remember, as with any modfolder to place all the files into an 'addons' folder within '@ramdisk'

Edited November 14, 2009 by froggyluv

[santafee 10]

Only got 4 Gig Ram so i have to get another tweak maybe.

i got 2 physical Harddrives.

Im running the smaller one with XP where i play Arma.

Does it make sense to move the ArmaII installation to my Vista Hardrive,still playing under XP, starting from the Vista Hardrive?

Also i think the Vista HD, which is newer Hardrive, got more RPM, guess 7200.does this make it faster also?

[evilfury 0]

Do we have to add Addons folder in @ramdisk folder? Or just put pbo in @ramdisk without using addons?

Edited November 14, 2009 by evilfury

[rekrul 7]

Make sure the ramdisk is formated as NTFS and not FAT/other.