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From: tech@usceast.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: An external RAM disk for the ST
Message-ID: <2326@usceast.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 23-Feb-87 15:48:43 EST
Article-I.D.: usceast.2326
Posted: Mon Feb 23 15:48:43 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 26-Feb-87 22:36:40 EST
References: <687@vaxwaller.UUCP> <2315@felix.UUCP>
Reply-To: tech@usceast.UUCP (Bill Wood)
Organization: Csci Dept, U of S. Carolina, Columbia
Lines: 23

In article <2315@felix.UUCP> preston@felix.UUCP (Preston L. Bannister) writes:
>>	I have a plain vanilla 520 ST, and a product I'd be interested in
>>is an external RAM disk.  Something I could hook up to the cartridge port
>
>There is no way a product like this is going to cost significantly
>less than a hard disk.  The memory is relatively cheap, but once you
>add the case, power supply and interface logic it's going to cost you
>nearly as much (or more) than a hard disk.
>

But I have to disagree, The cartridge port will support a ramdisk without the
power supply and a cheap plastic case only costs a couple of bucks. Since I am
writing this on a 1Meg system with a Ramdisk in the cartridge port. That is,
with a total of 1.5Meg of ram. I agree that it CAN be expensive however the
harddisks that are available for the ST all seem to use steppers for the
head positioner and are very slow compared to the voice coil units which cost
twice as much. I do alot of compiling using the MW compiler and the ramdisk
speeds it up wonderfully. The fact is that if you are usually using just
one enviornment 3 or 4 megs of ram in place of a harddisk is an ideal
solution. Remember that whenever you access a HARD Disk that the DMA
channel cannot be used for screen updates. With a ramdisk this can be
worked around.
			Bill Wood.