Thinkpads Forum

stephenyeong wrote:[edited-R] I've tested the SD Card Reader on my X60; it is slow compared with my USB card reader and causes too many CPU interrupts.

I think this is caused by the old discontinued Ricoh R5C822 chip (in my case X60)
http://www.ricoh.com/LSI/product_pcif/p ... index.html

Thanks for pointing at the old thread. The interrupts help explain some of the other problems associated with using ReadyBoost actually slowing the machine. Interrupt handling sounds like a driver problem to me, unless there really is no buffer at all in the chip. Can't determine that since there are no real specs available for these chips.

Btw, the chip in the X60 tablet (as currently sold) is the R5C843. The chip in the new X61 tablet is the R5C847, which is yet another change to the machine. Hopefully, it fixes the speed problem.

Well, earlier today, I committed to throughly testing my X61t. I bought a Lexar 2GB x133 at Amazon. I found a mail-in rebate for $20 so it'll cost me about $35 at the end of the day, so it's not a huge big deal. When I get the machine, I'll post my results.

So is it just a driver issue that windows XP doesn't recognize SDHC cards?

I'm thinking of picking up an SDHC card, at the very least for capacity and speed in my camera, but only if it works with my thinkpad in XP.

Has anyone been able to get the SDHC card in an X60s to work under XP?

thanks guys! nice thorough responses to the transfer statistics: hd-sd, sd-hd, sd-usb.

http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.php?t=42063

^ this sorta answered my questions.

I still don't understand how Vista can work with SDHC, while XP cannot. Can anyone with XP confirm that using the 'windows SDHC update' works when using an SDHC card?

woohoo! using this update I was able to get Vista to recognize my 8gb SD-HC with my X60 tablet

thanks!

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/deta ... laylang=en

glad it was helpful. doesn't give me a leg-up though.

to SFWrtr and any other x61 owners

I just went to best buy and bought a Sandisk ultra II 4.0 gb sdhc card. As soon as I put it in, the autoplay had the option for readyboost. Naturally vista recomended to use the entire thing, but so far it seems like its working.

I am very interested in your results. When the card is in, does task manager show increased CPU usage? If you don't mind, could you lower the ReadyBoost area a bit and do some copies to and from the card and see how the machine handles it? I am hoping that Lenovo fixed their SD card reader.

Please check-in in the next day or so and tell us how it is going!

Info on testing environment:

x61 tablet
2gb ram
60gb 7200 rpm drive

I am in the middle of tweaking the system and alot of services are off. Indexing, search and the sidebar, etc, and I turned off readyboost from the drive. I did not restart the computer before each test, only once before the test. I did give windows ample time to load everything and get stabalized.

Also I used the windows clock on my desktop, so all times are approximations.

sd card specs from box:

Sd card specs
Sandisk ultra II 4.0 gb SDHC
read 10 MB/s
write 9 MB/s

test cases:
avi - 715 MB - 1 file
music - 342 MB - 63 files - 5 folders

The Results

avi file:
copy to SD card = 110 Secs
approx write = 6.5 MB/s
copy from SD card = 127 Secs
approx read = 5.6 MB/s

music:
copy to SD card = 55 Secs
approx write = 6.2 MB/s
copy from SD card = 55 Secs
approx read = 6.2 MB/s

These values aren't perfect, but an indication of the performance.
When i insert the card, cpu spiked due to autoplay and readyboost test. After I closed autoplay dialog my cpu was normal. I did not see any extra cpu usage for having the card in the slot.

During the test, the highest the cpu spike was 13%. I would like to blame aero for the spike, as it seems to have the major spike when the copy dialog decided to add more animation to the progress bar. Besides the random spikes, my cpu was fluctuating from 4% to 8%.

I believe thats everything, let me know if there is any other information you would like.

Overall I'm not happy with the performance of vista and the way the partitions are setup. I will probably try to find a vista dvd, try a network install, and set things up the way I like.

Mathew, thanks for the test (and welcome to the forums). The X61 SD performance looks much better than that of the X60; it's reasonably close to what I saw with an Ultra II CF card (which is rated slightly higher) using a CardBus CF adapter. With that kind of performance, SD looks like a much better option than the turbo memory.

tomh009 wrote:Mathew, thanks for the test (and welcome to the forums). The X61 SD performance looks much better than that of the X60; it's reasonably close to what I saw with an Ultra II CF card (which is rated slightly higher) using a CardBus CF adapter. With that kind of performance, SD looks like a much better option than the turbo memory.

Can't we have them both? If we can have them with both the how much better is the performance with say a 2 GB sad Card and Turbo Memory in place?

That is an excellent question I would like to answer, too.

Maybe once Lenovo makes more a few more X61s models available in Canada I can buy one and do some testing ...

Glad that I could shed some light. Once I find my copy of norton ghost, I should be able to do more tests.

Was the turbo memory automatically included in the x61? The only thing I remember was that you can't have turbo memory with 512 MB of ram, but I don't remember seeing any additional options to include it.

It's an option. Not available with 512 MB, and also not available if you select a WWAN option.

Ah excellent of course.
Well then, I won't be able to help out on any turbo memory tests.
Sorry.

So by adding a blank or empty 2gb or 4 gb SD card in the SD Card Slot along with the Turbo Memory the computer should perform better? What about just putting in a 4GB. SD card into the SD Card Slot, will that help improve perforomance as well?

Yes -- assuming you are running Vista, and you say "yes" when Vista suggests using the SD card for ReadyBoost.

stylinexpat wrote:So by adding a blank or empty 2gb or 4 gb SD card in the SD Card Slot along with the Turbo Memory the computer should perform better? What about just putting in a 4GB. SD card into the SD Card Slot, will that help improve perforomance as well?

Vista only supports one device for ReadyBoost/ReadyDrive. If you're using TurboMemory then the SD card won't be used.

tamasrepus wrote:Vista only supports one device for ReadyBoost/ReadyDrive. If you're using TurboMemory then the SD card won't be used.

Hmmm -- is that one total, or each of ReadyBoost and ReadyDrive support one device only?

If the latter, you could disable ReadyBoost on the turbo memory card (leaving on just ReadyDrive), and use an SD card for ReadyBoost.

tomh009 wrote:

tamasrepus wrote:Vista only supports one device for ReadyBoost/ReadyDrive. If you're using TurboMemory then the SD card won't be used.

Hmmm -- is that one total, or each of ReadyBoost and ReadyDrive support one device only?

If the latter, you could disable ReadyBoost on the turbo memory card (leaving on just ReadyDrive), and use an SD card for ReadyBoost.

Did you ever get resolution on this Tom? I have an x61 with 1 gb RAM and 1 gb TurboMemory.

Am thinking of getting a 4 gb SD card and/or 2 gb memory card. Would I not be able to use Readyboost with the SD card since I already have TurboMemory?