Christof Lange wrote:
>
> Yes, my intention is to put everything on the RAM drive. The lower
> limit will be about 2 MB for a reduced Arachne package.
> But Arachne's CACHE directory will not always fit on the RAM drive.
This presents more problems than I feel are necessary these days so I,
personally, simply require the 8Mb total memory minimum.
It's not impossible to do what you want but just getting a fixed size
universal install working is the first (BIG) step anyway.
The "Arachne on a 2Mb system" isn't really useable.
First, 1Mb goes to DOS, then you MUST have a diskcache if everything stays
on floppy, and the best size for a floppy cache is 720k with a full track
look-a-head, but let us say you take only 1/2 of that: 360k for cache. The
trouble here is that core.exe won't even fit in that size. :(( And Arachne
is designed to use a \TEMP on ramdisk so you have to decide what to do with
the 640k of ram that you have left - TEMP or XMS ??
My suggestion would be to leave it as XMS and use no TEMP because Arachne
gets REALLY useless when you put xSwap on disk. Even HD. :((
Let's say you make the sensible decision that 2 Meg systems are OUT.
Arachne will work so poorly on that kind of system that the users are sure
to think Arachne is no good for anything.
How about a 4Mb minimum system ? I think you will find a howto on that.
I'm not sure if Arachne is distributed with ARAMDISK.txt, but it should
be at Virtual Arachne. <g>
> >Now that I have
> >experience on a 486 with 8 mB and a hdd, There are a couple of additional
> >possibilities: 1. mail and download path to hdd: small cache (<200kB) is
> >sufficient to load mails, for downloads a cache is not needed because the
> >overall speed is limited to modem speed, rather than disk write.
> Sorry, a misunderstanding, I suppose? I did not mean disk cache, but
> Arachne's CACHE directory. It will be needed even if I browse files
> offline (and there will quite some JPG on my package).
>
> >2. RAM is
> >needed for virtual screens; its size depends on the choosen size of those
> >VS.(Of course you'd rather turn VS off than swap to disk)
> OK, this is not necessary for the lower end PC.
>
> >3. Should you want
> >mail and downloads straight to diskette, remember that caching is readonly
> >for removable media
> But I probably will need disk caching if I set the path of Arachne's
> Cache directory to the hard disk. For instance
>
> 8 MB total XMS: Arachne with Cache directory RAM disk, no disk cache
> 3 MB total XMS: Arachne on RAM disk, Cache directory on HD,
> disk cache (how much?)
> 2 MB total XMS: maximum disk cache, Arachne does not fit on RAM disk?
>
> Please, Clarence, help with this!
I've done what I can above, and the division of memory between Ramdisk,
HD (or FD) cache and XMS is dealt with in ARAMDISK.txt. I do change that
once in a while as experience with difficult systems grows. ;-)
Today my division of 8Mb total is:
DOS 1024
Ramdisk 5120
FD cache 720
XMS 1328 (or so)
Generally, it is a good idea to turn off virtual screens unless you need
to make screenshots. Use 640x480x256 colors for smaller Virtual Screenshot
requirements.
Delete EVERYTHING having to do with setup, all background images and anything
that is only used once or less.
Keep as much memory as possible for XMS. More than 1Mb is preferred with
no VS and 2Mb should be more than enough. Use a disk cache suited to the
drive. For a floppy, try for an entire surface and a full revolution
look-a-head.
I hope some of that was correct. :)
- Clarence Verge
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