using SLC SD-cards for swap

[venm11]

I just bought a 16gb SD for readyboost to speed up an older laptop. That machine is maxed out with 4gb, so it would be much more desirable to use the SD card for swap to lighten the load on the HDD, but I assume that would burn out the MLC chips pretty quickly.

However, it seems there are SD cards with SLC flash chips which are apparently have 10x the life (100,000 cycles versus 10,000). I'm wondering if that would be enough, especially with wear leveling. After all, even MLC SSDs are used for swap, and according to some MS study I remember reading it wasn't that big of a deal.

The only other issue with using an SD for swap is that the card can be accidentally ejected from the slot, which would probably crash the OS.

http://www.amazon.com/Speed-Class-S...F8&qid=1366039813&sr=1-1&keywords=slc+sd+card

http://www.amazon.com/Dane-Elec-Dur...F8&qid=1366039513&sr=1-2&keywords=SD++SLC+8gb

 

[d50man]

super glue and what apps are so heavy on a laptop that 4gb won't cut it?

 

[venm11]

i'm not going to permanently glue a swappable SD card into the slot. Apps don't need to be "heavy" to exhaust 4gb in this day and age.

I do employ virtual machines, which of course have their own swap which in addition to the host OS' swap drags the HDD down quite a bit. However, I'm more comfortable using traditional HDDs in this case because this is not the typical laptop usage on which an SSD's expected life is based. An SD card is cheap, easy and replaceable.