No, it isn't possible to save the memory cache for driving or delaying prefetch.
No, it isn't possible to save the memory cache for driving or delaying prefetch.
My older laptop still has a hard drive inside. I plan to switch to an SSD and add more RAM soon, but right now it serves its purpose as it is. Restarting takes a long time, while Shutdown with quick startup works fine. I discovered hibernation is even better—it runs much faster. It’s not perfect for keeping sessions fresh, but that’s the goal. I want to avoid clearing the memory settings and reuse it to save time. However, I learned that after hibernating, the system doesn’t save the cache or RAM usage; it gets wiped when the machine powers off. This causes two issues: first, there’s much less cache, so programs load slowly. Second, once Windows sees more RAM available, it triggers SysMain (prefetch) and starts reading from the disk to fill the cache. The drive then stays at 100% for at least five minutes until everything is loaded, after which usage drops slightly. I’m wondering if there’s a way to keep the memory cache on the drive so booting is faster, or if I can delay SysMain so Windows loads properly before starting the disk read. Maybe using Task Scheduler could help with this.
Can you put the laptop to sleep? That would preserve the RAM cache. Otherwise I’m not aware of a built-in method in Windows for that. Maybe you could write a script or program that reads those files and keeps them in RAM, which is essentially what prefetch does. Prefetch won’t cause much impact on disk I/O since it’s a low-priority task; the disk usage will be handled by other applications if needed.
Electronics expert, yes—I can rest, but sleep equals shutdown or hibernation. No, prefetch really slows things down a lot. Early on, the drive is full at 100%, making things feel extremely laggy. If I push it, I might let Windows load smoothly first, then open my programs, and only then let SysMain access the disk.