Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!wuarchive!usc!jarthur!nntp-server.caltech.edu!tybalt.caltech.edu!toddpw
From: toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple2
Subject: Re: GS Ram disk settings
Message-ID: <1990Oct28.083016.25332@nntp-server.caltech.edu>
Date: 28 Oct 90 08:30:16 GMT
References: <1990Oct27.160708.1603@wpi.WPI.EDU> <14260@smoke.brl.mil>
Sender: news@nntp-server.caltech.edu
Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena
Lines: 23
Nntp-Posting-Host: tybalt.caltech.edu

>In article <1990Oct27.160708.1603@wpi.WPI.EDU> gerardo@wpi.WPI.EDU (Gerardo Leute) writes:
>>What do the two different rams disk settings do?  I heard some time ago that
>>if they were not the same, that the ram disk could screw up and crash the
>>computer. Is this (still) true?

gwyn@smoke.brl.mil (Doug Gwyn) writes:

>Yes, in fact as I recall the ROM03 IIGS doesn't provide the ability to
>set them independently.

The 'minimum' setting controls how much memory is initially allocated for the
RAMdisk. The 'maximum' setting is the most memory it will allocate. The problem
here is that when a program tries to write to the RAMdisk and the RAMdisk can't
allocate more memory, it returns an I/O Error -- this can be really annoying
and I always set my RAMdisk to the same min/max settings in order to avoid it.
(Solution: get a hard drive and don't use the ramdisk!)

Apple (amazingly) figured this out and fixed it in the ROM 03 by changing the
ramdisk option so that it has one size setting and always allocates the entire
disk beforehand.

Todd Whitesel
toddpw @ tybalt.caltech.edu