32 replies to this topic

[wimb]

Universal XP Image file of 1.6 GB was made and used to boot from grub4dos menu on USB-Harddisk
The WinVBlock driver allows to boot either from RAMDISK or as FILEDISK on USB drive.
The hardware is quite different in both cases.

= =



EDIT:
Loading the 1.6 GB into RAMDISK can vary depending on boot medium (HDD or USB) and BIOS USB boot speed support.
- load from HDD in 20 seconds
- load from USB on computer with fast USB boot support - 70 seconds
- load from USB on computer with slow USB boot support - 54 minutes
Booting from RAMDISK takes another 40 seconds

On computer with slow BIOS then booting from FILEDISK on USB is much faster - booting in only 1.8 minute.

Booting with XP Image file on USB instead of from XP restored to partion on USB
has the advantage that one can select to boot either from RAMDISK or from FILEDISK

Booting from FILEDISK on USB is in advantage when loading of RAMDISK is slow or when the computer has less than 2 GB RAM.
Booting from RAMDISK is in advantage when direct booting from USB would give BSOD 7B

Both cases were at hand for the above given ScreenShots.
For the machine with Intel i3-550 processor, I got BSOD 7B when booting from FILEDISK on USB and solved by booting from RAMDISK.
The other machine has slow USB-boot speed and loading the RAMDISK took 54 minutes,
but booting from FILEDISK on USB is then quite fast and takes only 1.8 minute -

[Sha0]

... = ...

Tiny criticism of screen-shot: View -> Devices by connection shows the disk as a node on the WinVBlock Driver, which is not the default view, but might help in understanding by on-lookers.

[wimb]

Tiny criticism of screen-shot: View -> Devices by connection shows the disk as a node on the WinVBlock Driver, which is not the default view, but might help in understanding by on-lookers.

Yes, also View > Devices by connection is quite useful, but the sorting of the other view is also nice.

I have given some more information on booting XP from USB in the EDIT section of my previous post.

[Wonko the Sane]

The other machine has slow USB-boot speed and loading the RAMDISK took 54 minutes,
but booting from FILEDISK on USB is then quite fast and takes only 1.8 minute -

Well, I would like to say that the idea someone had a long time ago about the practical utility of FILEDISK booting had it's merits....


Wonko

[wimb]

Well, I would like to say that the idea someone had a long time ago about the practical utility of FILEDISK booting had it's merits....


Wonko

Hi jaclaz,

Thanks for your interesting list on RAMDISK and FILEDISK drivers
and for the way you keep things going organised.

http://reboot.pro/1507/

[Wonko the Sane]

Hi jaclaz,

Thanks for your interesting list on RAMDISK and FILEDISK drivers
and for the way you keep things going organised.

http://reboot.pro/1507/

Actually the clever part was this one :
http://reboot.pro/8168/page__st__11


Wonko

[wimb]

Actually the clever part was this one :
http://reboot.pro/8168/page__st__11


Wonko

Thanks, it is good and interesting to read about the history of WinVBlock driver.

[Wonko the Sane]

The thanks should go to Sha0 and to karyonix for having finally taken the challenge ALL the other peeps (some justified ) carefully avoided to take:
http://reboot.pro/5512/page__st__9


Wonko