[arch-general] BTRFS USB key fails to boot

[Δημήτρης Ζέρβας]

yaffs2 would be faster than ext2?
On Jul 31, 2012 3:21 AM, "Δημήτρης Ζέρβας" <01ttouch at gmail.com> wrote:

> hm... I curently use ext2 and I have installation in a partition of my sd
> card. wich fs would be better than ext2, given that I need quich r/w but as
> less writes as possible?
> On Jul 31, 2012 3:18 AM, "Leonardo Dagnino" <leodag.sch at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Well, I don't think it will "destroy" the flash... As it is made of NAND
>> flash, I suppose that it reacts pretty much like an SSD. Anyway, it should
>> take a considerable time until it wears out, and if you use it only to
>> install an OS, it won't have any writes, what means that it shouldn't wear
>> out for some years (or at least I hope so)
>> For what I remember, btrfs uses a pretty big amount of space, what means
>> more writes.
>>
>> Leonardo Dagnino
>>
>> Obs.: NAND flash only has a limited amount of erases/writes, not reads.
>>
>>
>> 2012/7/30 Zhengyu Xu <xzy3186 at gmail.com>
>>
>> > I've no idea on how btrfs performs with a flash disk actually. My btrfs
>> > partition just locates on a normal hdd so I have never thought about it
>> :-)
>> >
>> > Regards,
>> > Zhengyu Xu
>> >
>> > On 2012-7-31, at 8:27, Δημήτρης Ζέρβας<01ttouch at gmail.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > > is it actually safe to format an usb flash to btrfs? won't it destroy
>> the
>> > > flash because of the read/writes?
>> > > On Jul 31, 2012 2:20 AM, "Zhengyu Xu" <xzy3186 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> > >
>> > >> On Mon, 2012-07-30 at 17:36 -0400, Kyle wrote:
>> > >>> Trying to install Arch on a USB key, I am having trouble getting a
>> > >> bootable system. I created a basic BTRFS filesystem and mounted it
>> with
>> > SSD
>> > >> optimizations and compression. I didn't create any subvolumes or
>> > anything
>> > >> else that is said to be problematic when booting to a BTRFS
>> filesystem.
>> > >> From that point, I followed the installation guide for a normal
>> install.
>> > >> However, after reading the documentation for GRUB and Syslinux, my
>> newly
>> > >> created install doesn't boot. I looked at the wiki entry for
>> installing
>> > to
>> > >> a USB key, but it is still written for AIF and grub-legacy. However,
>> the
>> > >> main difference I can find doesn't seem to apply, because although it
>> > >> mentions that the USB key where grub-legacy is installed is always
>> > hd0,0,
>> > >> grub2 is supposed to look for the UUID of the disk, which matches
>> > correctly
>> > >> in /boot/grub/grub.cfg. I also tried setting up this install to boot
>> > using
>> > >> Syslinux, but both bootloaders just drop me into some kind of shell
>> and
>> > >> refuse to boot. Unfortunately, since I am
>> > >>> visually impaired and use speech to install and use Arch, I am
>> unable
>> > to
>> > >> see whether I am in a "normal shell" or a rescue shell, or even what
>> > kind
>> > >> of issue the bootloaders are having that keeps them from finding a
>> > kernel.
>> > >> Should I be using a different filesystem other than BTRFS, even
>> though
>> > both
>> > >> bootloaders are said to support it? Should I not be using compression
>> > on my
>> > >> filesystem? Could this be a problem that is entirely unrelated to the
>> > >> filesystem I'm using? Any help is greatly appreciated.
>> > >>> ~Kyle
>> > >>
>> > >> Did you add usb and btrfs to the hooks array in your mkinitcpio.conf?
>> > >>
>> > >> Regards,
>> > >> Zhengyu Xu
>> > >>
>> > >>
>> > >>
>> >
>>
>