The Trackman Marble model T-CH11 optical trackball is what has kept me productive over the years. It's the 3 button model with the polka dotted ball. No scroll wheel. I have the middle button for set for double click. I run it with acceleration and sensitivity on maximum I can put the cursor anywhere on the screen with great accuracy with a small flick of my thumb. I have yet to find another pointer that comes even close in speed and accuracy. I can't believe all my friends that use mice... They watch me spin my marble and do things several times faster in amazement. But it's not any skill by me, it's the awesome pointer. All other pointers are totally lacking for me.
But Logitech the company has died in my eyes. I bought one of their scroll wheel models in '99, and promptly returned it and wrote Logitech a letter that they'd made a big mistake discontinuing the T-CH11. Everything that has followed I've been unimpressed with. Fortunately someone was selling a bunch of brand new T-CH11s three years ago on eBay and I snapped 4 of them up. I think I have 7 now and worship them all. I should go search eBay for more cause I'll probably be using this pointer until I die. Yes it's like a religion...
I wonder if you've heard of the DisablePagingExecutive registry key, among others. A google search revealed the following page.
Yes, thank you, but that's what I was referring to in my post. The setting has no effect on paging of the kernel or applications in Windows 2000, which is my current OS. It might work in NT though, but only works on the kernel, which really wouldn't help much. I'm really amazed Microsoft has never fixed this. Maybe they think this design is actually beneficial somehow... What's more amazing is how few people are aware of the bug. I move around several GB of data per hour and am excruciatingly aware of the issue.:(
But if you are investing this much money into a RAM drive, you should just buy enough RAM so that you don't need a swap file at all.
It doesn't matter how much RAM you have. Fact: Windows uses RAM as cache and harddisk as memory. Windows will still swap like crazy after it uses up all the free RAM for disk cache. Don't believe me? Open a few web pages and keep their windows in the background for 30 minutes. This will guarantee that they will be first in line to be paged out with the following operation: Copy about 4 GB of files, like as would occur when you burn a DVD-R. Windows will immediately page out your background windows to make room for the file cache. Try bringing those background windows to the front now and watch the system hang for a few seconds while it pulls them out of the page file. And if you happen to be doing I/O and/or have a high CPU load going on at the same time as you try to bring those pages to the foreground, the wait may be quite a while... After the windows have been pulled out of the swap, switching between them is quick until you leave them in the background again and do more large file operations.
Very dumb but that's the way MS has designed this braindead VM system. And it has frustrated me to no end. On Windows 9x/ME, the problem could be easily fixed by adding MinFileCache/MaxFileCache settings to the system.ini file. NT-2000-XP, forget it. There is no fix that I know of. I've been searching for years for a solution to this. I've tried every cache adjustment program and the registry tweak to keep the kernal from paging (which doesn't work). My latest attempt to fix the problem involved using O&O's Clevercache, which had no effect. I now have some more memory on order to up my box from 640 MB to 1GB (the max I can stuff in, it's an old Abit BX6 Rev2). I plan to use about 666 MB for a RAM disk and put the swap file on it. Even though my application load is usually around 400 MB, which will cause immediate paging with only 333 MB available for the system RAM, I expect to see a huge performance boost over my current setup of 640 MB system RAM. Since Windows insists on running programs out of the swap file no matter how much RAM one has, this should finally fix the problem, albeit in a very kludgy way.
The reason why most people say adding more RAM fixes the problem is because most people aren't doing enough I/O to make the problem evident. Anyone who does AV editing and trys to surf at the same time (like me) will attest to the issue.
It is enough flicker to be detected by an optical sensor such as used on a RPM meter for use on model airplanes (incandescent or fluorescent light). As a matter of fact, it is a good way to calibrate them. When set to a 2 bladed propeller, adjust the pot to get 3600 RPM.
Emusic.com only offers only low quality 128 kbps mp3s and they have no details on the ripping method or encoder. My own rips are done using Exact Audio Copy and encoded with LAME in the highest quality VBR true stereo mode. That mode generates files in the 220 to 290 kbps range and is damn close to CD quality no matter how complex the source material. I can always tell a 128 kbps MP3. They sound horrid, usually with a warbly high-end and/or flat sound. And Emusic's selection is poor. Not even a gothic-industrial-ebm section. While it's good they're making an attempt, they have much work to do before I'd consider using them.
Slashdot Mirror
But Logitech the company has died in my eyes. I bought one of their scroll wheel models in '99, and promptly returned it and wrote Logitech a letter that they'd made a big mistake discontinuing the T-CH11. Everything that has followed I've been unimpressed with. Fortunately someone was selling a bunch of brand new T-CH11s three years ago on eBay and I snapped 4 of them up. I think I have 7 now and worship them all. I should go search eBay for more cause I'll probably be using this pointer until I die. Yes it's like a religion...
I wonder if you've heard of the DisablePagingExecutive registry key, among others. A google search revealed the following page.
:(
Yes, thank you, but that's what I was referring to in my post. The setting has no effect on paging of the kernel or applications in Windows 2000, which is my current OS. It might work in NT though, but only works on the kernel, which really wouldn't help much. I'm really amazed Microsoft has never fixed this. Maybe they think this design is actually beneficial somehow... What's more amazing is how few people are aware of the bug. I move around several GB of data per hour and am excruciatingly aware of the issue.
But if you are investing this much money into a RAM drive, you should just buy enough RAM so that you don't need a swap file at all.
It doesn't matter how much RAM you have. Fact: Windows uses RAM as cache and harddisk as memory. Windows will still swap like crazy after it uses up all the free RAM for disk cache. Don't believe me? Open a few web pages and keep their windows in the background for 30 minutes. This will guarantee that they will be first in line to be paged out with the following operation: Copy about 4 GB of files, like as would occur when you burn a DVD-R. Windows will immediately page out your background windows to make room for the file cache. Try bringing those background windows to the front now and watch the system hang for a few seconds while it pulls them out of the page file. And if you happen to be doing I/O and/or have a high CPU load going on at the same time as you try to bring those pages to the foreground, the wait may be quite a while... After the windows have been pulled out of the swap, switching between them is quick until you leave them in the background again and do more large file operations.
Very dumb but that's the way MS has designed this braindead VM system. And it has frustrated me to no end. On Windows 9x/ME, the problem could be easily fixed by adding MinFileCache/MaxFileCache settings to the system.ini file. NT-2000-XP, forget it. There is no fix that I know of. I've been searching for years for a solution to this. I've tried every cache adjustment program and the registry tweak to keep the kernal from paging (which doesn't work). My latest attempt to fix the problem involved using O&O's Clevercache, which had no effect. I now have some more memory on order to up my box from 640 MB to 1GB (the max I can stuff in, it's an old Abit BX6 Rev2). I plan to use about 666 MB for a RAM disk and put the swap file on it. Even though my application load is usually around 400 MB, which will cause immediate paging with only 333 MB available for the system RAM, I expect to see a huge performance boost over my current setup of 640 MB system RAM. Since Windows insists on running programs out of the swap file no matter how much RAM one has, this should finally fix the problem, albeit in a very kludgy way.
This usenet thread is somewhat dated though quite applicable: Why do I need a swap file with 128mb of ram
The reason why most people say adding more RAM fixes the problem is because most people aren't doing enough I/O to make the problem evident. Anyone who does AV editing and trys to surf at the same time (like me) will attest to the issue.
I bought five 45GB 75GXP drives a year and a half ago. Three have failed so far. Doesn't seem like a very good track record to me...
75GXP tales from hell: 75GXP class-action suit filed
Oh.. and it flickers 120 times per second. There are two zero crossings with each cycle.
It is enough flicker to be detected by an optical sensor such as used on a RPM meter for use on model airplanes (incandescent or fluorescent light). As a matter of fact, it is a good way to calibrate them. When set to a 2 bladed propeller, adjust the pot to get 3600 RPM.
Emusic.com only offers only low quality 128 kbps mp3s and they have no details on the ripping method or encoder. My own rips are done using Exact Audio Copy and encoded with LAME in the highest quality VBR true stereo mode. That mode generates files in the 220 to 290 kbps range and is damn close to CD quality no matter how complex the source material. I can always tell a 128 kbps MP3. They sound horrid, usually with a warbly high-end and/or flat sound. And Emusic's selection is poor. Not even a gothic-industrial-ebm section. While it's good they're making an attempt, they have much work to do before I'd consider using them.