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I haven’t heard anyone else suggest this so either I’ve had a really good idea or I’ve been missing out on something:

Hard drive manufacturers are starting to make drives with a lump of flash memory in them so that frequently used files can be reached more quickly; the trouble is, these drives are so new they’re barely available and the ones that are available are as expensive as you’d expect something as new a revolutionary as this to be. So, what to do? Well, the other day I saw a message box pop-up on my PC , followed by a click from my hard drive as it woke-up followed a second or two later by the playing of the sound file associated with the message box and I thought to myself how that whole process wasn’t as smooth as anyone would like and won’t it be great when we get these hybrid hard drives. Then it hit me: Use a USB flash memory stick to hold files that get used often! Things like sound files, wallpaper, all the things that are used so often they more or less blend into the background (or at least, are supposed to). This idea can be used for other files too, like perhaps mail client files (Outlook PST files, for example). The only real limitations are how much space is available and whether the program can be convinced to store it’s files there. I’m thinking this will let things happen more smoothly on PC’s where the hard drive has spun-down and also save power and wear and tear on the hard drive. I’m also thinking about perhaps installing Firefox on a stick to see whether there’s any performance gain to be had there. This ties in neatly with Portable Apps and the work they’re doing on being able to take your most important applications with you from computer to computer.

[Edit] Apart from the limitations mentioned above, the real disadvantage of this approach is that you have to do it by hand, finding the files and changing settings. The advantage, apart from cost and availability, is that you get to chose the files that are stored in flash. The files I mentioned above are most likely not going to stay in a cache for long because they aren't used often enough so by my choosing which files to move I can taylor the storage as I want it and after all, isn't that all any geek wants? ;-)

So, what do you think? Is this old news or a good way to get flash storage working for you without the big outlay?