Tips--System.ini +V Cache

[Lancelot2]

I've tweaked my machines from day one by every means possible but one tweak always comes up as a supposed "bees knees" to improving your system performance in all sorts of ways and that is the " V Cache "tip of MaxFile=x,MinFile=x,ChunkSize=x.
I've tried nearly all combos including cacheman and have still found that leaving the V cache line in Sys.ini blank, is still the best setting performance wise.
The other day I again gave the tip another try by setting the MIN+MAX cache to 8192 and chunk to 512 and fired up UT and found that it took over 2.5 minutes to load the game. When the setting is on NIL, UT fired up in 19 seconds. So now I cant see how this can possibly be given out as a performance enhancement when it is not!!!
I am running Win98SE, Duron700,A7V,256 megs Ram,V3@190,MX300,cable modem,etc,etc.
Any others out there with good performance using V Cache?

[CMonster]

What you have discovered is that sometimes Windows default pararmeters and automatic resource handling is better than the static values you can assign by tinkering.

-I can't believe I said that about Windows

[Harold7]

I tried your trick and ran 3D Mark 2000.
The first run with my normal V-cache settings of 25056 min and max gave a score of 5579.
I then REM'd out the min and max v-cache settings in sysini. and got a score of 5573.
For my settings at least it doesn't seem to make much difference.
I'll run for awhile with v-cache REM'd out to see if there are any adverse effects over a period of time with other programs... doesn't seem to have any adverse effect on Netscape so far.

[Lancelot2]

Thanks for the reply guys. I did some more tests myself and found that to most business apps the V Cache settings os various sizes made no difference but on large games like UT, Alice and Sacrifice, the settings slowed the games down to choppy play and the load times were more than triple. With no V Cache settings the games played very fluid as they should and the load times were much faster.

[Harold7]

Well, after giving the programs I have a thorough workout, it appears that letting Windows dynamically manage v-cache, speeds up graphics applications somewhat.
I see a noticeable increase in speed in web page graphic content loading in Netsacpe 4.76 with my DSL connection.
I set up Cacheman 4.0 with my desired settings and then unchecked the mininmal and maximum cache settings (they are then greyed out )rebooted and tested that way.
If you check your sysini file after configuring Cacheman 4.0 this way you'll see that chunk size is the only listing, min and max v-cache settings are missing entirely... seems to work pretty well for me so far in games and photo programs.