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Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Software Issues and Discussion => Topic started by: sim085 on March 06, 2009, 02:59:08 PM
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Hi,
This has been a question I had for a very long time. Why did the Workbench have a RAM folder? All I know about it was that anything I put in it would be deleted after restarting the A500+? What was the purpose of such folder? and did it need anything hardware specific to work?
Regards,
Sim085
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I believe it's just a "scratch disk" area. You could use it to work with files, apps can use it cache data from slow floppies, apps may place temporary run-time data in this area... It's like a "RAM Disk" from the old PC days.
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Except it's dynamic unlike kludges on PC I think.
It doesn't waste any mem if it's not filled. It only uses the amount you've copied there.
It's very handy for unpacking, downloading files which you want to check before copying to disks and installing stuff etc. I use it all the time. It's fast and doesn't fragment the HD etc. You don't have to clean up mess.. it gets cleaned in reboot. And it's especially usefull with floppy only systems for file handling.
It's been fundamental part of Amiga always... also env variables reside there as well as T: assign for temporary files.
Then there's another interesting ram drive on Amiga, but you need to mount it separately. RAD: is disk residing in ram, but it survives the reboot (not power off (well maybe very quick)) :) It's also bootable. You could use it for quick boot device after first cold boot for example. Or have game disk unpacked there and boot from it.
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Thank you both for the replies. I know understand better the function of the RAM folder :)
Regards,
Sim085