can you use RAM as storage?

bomcool · Sep 28, 2014

i know RAM is temporary and when your pc shuts down all the data goes, but if you had enough like 64 GB of it, could you use it as storage for your PC?

my college teacher thinks im dumb because i said you can, but i have seen people's computers with in the description they say, they use RAM for there OS or files? please help!

thanks
-jack

tiny voices · Sep 28, 2014

You can create a "RAM disk" It is not really practical or cost effective hence why no one does it.

USAFRet · Sep 28, 2014

Permanent storage, no.
You can use some of it as a RAMDisk. A portion of RAM is set aside, and appears to the OS as a hard drive. A really fast hard drive.

When you turn the PC off, whatever is there is gone. But there are some RAMDisk applications that will write that data back to the hard drive upon shut down. Then when you turn it back on, it retrieves that and writes back to that section of RAM.

manofchalk · Sep 28, 2014

Yup, its called a RAMdisk. Amongst professionals and speedfreaks its not unheard of for them to use it to cache their SSD's or host working files if their video editing or something.
Pretty much the fastest thing you can use as storage until 2050 and we have enough CPU cache to do it.

runswindows95 · Sep 28, 2014

If they create a RAM disk, it's for only temporary files, such as browser cache or Page File. The reason being is once the PC is turned off, the RAM disks loses all data. Also, with SSD's being cheaper, very few people mess with them.

Delroy Monjo · Sep 28, 2014

Back in the 32-bit days when the OS would only see about 3.7GB of RAM, RAMDISK was somewhat of an option-not so much anymore.

bomcool · Sep 28, 2014

thank you all for your fast replies and answers.-

USAFRet · Sep 28, 2014

I use a 4GB RAMDisk for Lightroom scratch space. But it is strictly a plaything, and sooo not necessary.
I'm not sure I see an actual performance benefit over using the secondary SSD.

runswindows95 · Sep 28, 2014

Yeah, with SSD's being so cheap these days RAM disks aren't widely used anymore. For the cost of RAM, you can get a 64GB SSD for a scratch / page file drive for $50.

manofchalk · Sep 28, 2014

I always found it weird people using RAM Disks to hold their page file. The thing is literally where data is is dumped if the RAM overflows or stagnates, if you eliminate it entirely (or limit it to some tiny size) you would force the data to sit in the RAM without going to the trouble of making the RAM Disk.

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can you use RAM as storage?

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