Can Intel Optane Memory work on Windows 7?

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m150

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I'm having dual boot of Windows 7 on HDD and Windows 10 on SSD. I'd like to buy an Intel Optane Memory to accelerate the boot speed on Windows 7, but my mainboard's website (Z370XP-SLI) stated that Windows 10 is the minimum requirement: https://www.gigabyte.com/MicroSite/454/intel-optane-ready.html

Is it true as I found an Intel website that has the driver for Windows 7: https://downloadcenter.intel.com/product/99745/Intel-Optane-Memory

Thanks.

P.S: will this Optane memory be noticeably faster than my SSD (Samsung 850 EVO)? Thanks.
 
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R
1. NO optane will not work as cache for windows 7. You can INSTALL windows on it just like any other drive though (if you have bootable m.2 in your MOBO) <<-- best for win7
2. a lot of videos around this topic :) example linus:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgTYSsaNU_A
short story: NO
in both cases
best option for windows is to move PAGEFILE to optane (this way whenever you use more ram than you have, you split load between SSD and optane drive.
you can also use windows superfetch to treat optane as cache. Will be slower than native windows solution, but hey it helps a bit, I've tested that :)
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Rdslw

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1. NO optane will not work as cache for windows 7. You can INSTALL windows on it just like any other drive though (if you have bootable m.2 in your MOBO) <<-- best for win7
2. a lot of videos around this topic :) example linus:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgTYSsaNU_A
short story: NO
in both cases
best option for windows is to move PAGEFILE to optane (this way whenever you use more ram than you have, you split load between SSD and optane drive.
you can also use windows superfetch to treat optane as cache. Will be slower than native windows solution, but hey it helps a bit, I've tested that :)
 
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Colif

Colif

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Gigabyte may have a reason why they don't support it on their boards, I would ask them before buying it even if there is a Intel driver for it. Your manual agrees with the system requirements on the web site.

System Requirements
1. Intel® Optane™ memory
2. The Optane™ memory must have at least 16 GB capacity, and it must have equal or smaller capacity than the hard drive/SSD to be accelerated.
3. The Optane™ memory cannot be used to accelerate an existing RAID array; the accelerated hard drive/SSD cannot be included in a RAID array.
4. The hard drive/SSD to be accelerated must be a SATA hard drive or M.2 SATA SSD and must have Windows 10 64-bit (or later version) installed on it. (Must be formatted for GPT partition.)
5. The motherboard driver disk
Click to expand...

Page 42 of your manual.

PS: No, it won't be, it all depends on what you use it for. Boot times are slightly faster but so slight you may not notice them.
Win 7 on SSD is pretty fast now.
Game load speeds also aren't that great

How much optane are you getting as its size decides what you can use it for.
 
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m150

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I believe my MB can support bootable M2 (it's Z370 anyway), but I only bought a 16GB one, so it surely can't be used to install Win7. Thanks for the suggestion regarding the PAGEFILE and cache, but I've already used RAM disk for those.



Thanks for your advice. I managed to buy a 16GB one as it's quite cheap ($22), but... maybe it's useless now.
 
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Colif

Colif

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I guess it is cheap enough to not think to check if you could use it before buying it. Optane will be good once its bigger, even the 128gb model released (talked about by linus) isn't much use now, even in raid. It beats a hdd but not a viable option if you have ssd now. I can see optane being lapped up by laptop OEM who can match it with a slow 5400 rpm hdd and make it not look as bad as it is.

It is faster than ssd but the difference isn't as big as comparing SSD to hdd.
 
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