vanmick@hpsgm2.sgp.hp.com (Van Der Beek Michael-Leo) (05/06/91)
Hi, I am considering getting the stacker. It is a compression software and hardware which creates another partition so that it acts like another drive. It is supposed to double you disk space. Any comments on it? I will be grateful for any information you can give. Is it very slow (software only, I have a 386-33Mhz)? I guess it will slow down disc access if you use the compress partition, how about the other "normal" partitions, does it slow down too? There is supposed to have a very good disk cache software incorporated, how does it compare to other software like hyperdisk, PC-cache and others? Hyperdisk can return memory space to windows can the stacker do the same. Also can I run hyperdisk (or any other disk cache) with stacker? When the compression is done, if you get a error sector, do you lose the entire partition or just several files (this is very important, I usually keep several copies of my important data in several directories (troublesome but safer), so a lost of a couple of files is tolerable but not the entire directory.) Is there any know problems with other software (it is supposed to be pretty compatible with almost anything)? Thanks for all the help. Regards, Michael
yiky@bmerh768.bnr.ca (YikHon Yu) (05/09/91)
In article <20550003@hpsgm2.sgp.hp.com> vanmick@hpsgm2.sgp.hp.com (Van Der Beek Michael-Leo) writes: >Hi, > > I am considering getting the stacker. It is a compression software and >hardware which creates another partition so that it acts like another drive. >It is supposed to double you disk space. > > Any comments on it? I will be grateful for any information you can give. >Is it very slow (software only, I have a 386-33Mhz)? I guess it will slow >down disc access if you use the compress partition, how about the other >"normal" partitions, does it slow down too? I am running the coprocessor version of Stacker on my 386-33 and I haven't noticed any slowing down in disk access. I also tried using the software only and I would say the increase in disk access time is negligible (to me anyway. The uncompressed partition is not slowed down at all. > There is supposed to have a very good disk cache software incorporated, >how does it compare to other software like hyperdisk, PC-cache and others? >Hyperdisk can return memory space to windows can the stacker do the same. Also >can I run hyperdisk (or any other disk cache) with stacker? Instead of using the disk cache in the Stacker software, I use PC-Cache because it allows me to setup a MUCH BIGGER disk cache in extended memory. > When the compression is done, if you get a error sector, do you lose the >entire partition or just several files (this is very important, I usually keep >several copies of my important data in several directories (troublesome >but safer), so a lost of a couple of files is tolerable but not the entire >directory.) I had run a problem where the Stacker partition was corrupted and the whole partition was locked up into read-only mode by the Stacker software. But this was OK because I was able to backup my files and recreate the partition. Normally, you can run CHKDSK (yes, CHKDSK!) to clean up errors in the Stacker partition just like any DOS partitions. > Is there any know problems with other software (it is supposed to be >pretty compatible with almost anything)? I haven't run into any software problems. All my applications and games work and I can even load the Stacker software into high memery with 386^max. > > Thanks for all the help. > > >Regards, > > >Michael YikHon Yu Bell-Northern Research, Ltd. Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
huffman@se-sd.SanDiego.NCR.COM (Bill Huffman) (05/10/91)
In article <20550003@hpsgm2.sgp.hp.com> vanmick@hpsgm2.sgp.hp.com (Van Der Beek Michael-Leo) writes: > I am considering getting the stacker. It is a compression software and >hardware which creates another partition so that it acts like another drive. >It is supposed to double you disk space. > > Any comments on it? I will be grateful for any information you can give. >Is it very slow (software only, I have a 386-33Mhz)? I guess it will slow >down disc access if you use the compress partition, how about the other >"normal" partitions, does it slow down too? I have used it on a 286 and a 386. There is some minor slow down. It is more than acceptable to me. You can get a HW board that is supposed to make disk access even faster (than software only). The normal partitions aren't effected. What Stacker does is to create a normal file on your disk. Then it loads a "disk driver" that accesses the real file on disk, automatically compressing writes and decompressing reads. > There is supposed to have a very good disk cache software incorporated, >how does it compare to other software like hyperdisk, PC-cache and others? >Hyperdisk can return memory space to windows can the stacker do the same. Also >can I run hyperdisk (or any other disk cache) with stacker? The cache that comes with it is very rudimentary. I think it's only 64K (or something). The documentation suggests using another disk cache, if available. I use SMARTDRV. I'm sure any would work. > When the compression is done, if you get a error sector, do you lose the >entire partition or just several files (this is very important, I usually keep >several copies of my important data in several directories (troublesome >but safer), so a lost of a couple of files is tolerable but not the entire >directory.) never happened to me? So, I can't say for sure. I would guess that your other files would be okay. You would even be able to use Norton Utilities to try to fix it! (assuming Stacker was up). > Is there any know problems with other software (it is supposed to be >pretty compatible with almost anything)? I haven't found anything that didn't work. I have lots of games at home and lots of utilities at work. (PCTOOLS, XTREE Gold, Norton Utilities, Windows 3.0, WordPerfect, Supercalc) The only problem you will likely run into is if the program accesses the disk directly. This is very uncommon these days. The only type exception I know of is the SWAPFILE option in windows 3.0. The SWAPFILE would have to reside on a "real" disk.
vanmick@hpsgm2.sgp.hp.com (Van Der Beek Michael-Leo) (05/15/91)
Hi everyone, Thanks for your help. Now I just have to save up and buy the coprocessor card. Sigh, I never ending need to upgrade my PC :-). Thanks again. Regards, Michael