[gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Joseph]

I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation (reliability) of the brand.
My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.

-- 
Joseph

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Mick]

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On Thursday 28 Aug 2014 21:45:10 Joseph wrote:
> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.

Interesting ... mine also failed catastrophically a couple of months ago after 
around 5 years of continuous use.

Which reminds me to run a backup on my Seagate:

Model Family:     Seagate Momentus 7200.4
Device Model:     ST9500420ASG

I'm not sure how much anecdotal reports on reliable drives actually hold 
water, unless we're talking about an epidemic of failures like I seem to 
recall Dell's Seagate drives experienced a few years ago.
 
-- 
Regards,
Mick

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Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Joseph]

So there seems to be a pattern :-/
How about SSD they are not that much more?  Will it withstand Gentoo compilations :-) ?

--
Joseph

On 08/28/14 22:46, Mick wrote:
>On Thursday 28 Aug 2014 21:45:10 Joseph wrote:
>> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
>> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
>
>Interesting ... mine also failed catastrophically a couple of months ago after
>around 5 years of continuous use.
>
>Which reminds me to run a backup on my Seagate:
>
>Model Family:     Seagate Momentus 7200.4
>Device Model:     ST9500420ASG
>
>I'm not sure how much anecdotal reports on reliable drives actually hold
>water, unless we're talking about an epidemic of failures like I seem to
>recall Dell's Seagate drives experienced a few years ago.
>
>-- 
>Regards,
>Mick

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Alan McKinnon]

On 29/08/2014 00:56, Joseph wrote:
> So there seems to be a pattern :-/
> How about SSD they are not that much more?  Will it withstand Gentoo
> compilations :-) ?

No. There is not a pattern. Two guys used drives for 5 years and then
they failed.

5 years? Wow. That's double what you can reasonably expect, you got good
service.

SSDs are much more expensive than spinning disks, 1TB will cost a
fortune. But they work in Gentoo very well - I'm on my second and this
one is 256G, still runs as fast as the day I got it.


> 
> -- 
> Joseph
> 
> On 08/28/14 22:46, Mick wrote:
>> On Thursday 28 Aug 2014 21:45:10 Joseph wrote:
>>> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
>>> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
>>
>> Interesting ... mine also failed catastrophically a couple of months
>> ago after
>> around 5 years of continuous use.
>>
>> Which reminds me to run a backup on my Seagate:
>>
>> Model Family:     Seagate Momentus 7200.4
>> Device Model:     ST9500420ASG
>>
>> I'm not sure how much anecdotal reports on reliable drives actually hold
>> water, unless we're talking about an epidemic of failures like I seem to
>> recall Dell's Seagate drives experienced a few years ago.
>>
>> -- 
>> Regards,
>> Mick
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 


-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com

[gentoo-user] SSD recmmendation / input

[Joseph]

No, I wouldn't get 1TB SSD too expensive but something like 300GB I might consider it.
Are they worth the investment? What brand do you have and how long?

--
Joseph


On 08/29/14 06:11, Alan McKinnon wrote:
>On 29/08/2014 00:56, Joseph wrote:
>> So there seems to be a pattern :-/
>> How about SSD they are not that much more?  Will it withstand Gentoo
>> compilations :-) ?
>
>No. There is not a pattern. Two guys used drives for 5 years and then
>they failed.
>
>5 years? Wow. That's double what you can reasonably expect, you got good
>service.
>
>SSDs are much more expensive than spinning disks, 1TB will cost a
>fortune. But they work in Gentoo very well - I'm on my second and this
>one is 256G, still runs as fast as the day I got it.
>
>
>>
>> --
>> Joseph
>>
>> On 08/28/14 22:46, Mick wrote:
>>> On Thursday 28 Aug 2014 21:45:10 Joseph wrote:
>>>> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
>>>> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
>>>
>>> Interesting ... mine also failed catastrophically a couple of months
>>> ago after
>>> around 5 years of continuous use.
>>>
>>> Which reminds me to run a backup on my Seagate:
>>>
>>> Model Family:     Seagate Momentus 7200.4
>>> Device Model:     ST9500420ASG
>>>
>>> I'm not sure how much anecdotal reports on reliable drives actually hold
>>> water, unless we're talking about an epidemic of failures like I seem to
>>> recall Dell's Seagate drives experienced a few years ago.
>>>
>>> --
>>> Regards,
>>> Mick
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>-- 
>Alan McKinnon
>alan.mckinnon@gmail.com
>
>

Re: [gentoo-user] SSD recmmendation / input

[Alan McKinnon]

On 29/08/2014 06:54, Joseph wrote:
> No, I wouldn't get 1TB SSD too expensive but something like 300GB I
> might consider it.
> Are they worth the investment? What brand do you have and how long?


Only you can decide that.

They work, they work well, they are fast, very fast

Are you willing to spend the money?

Quality does vary with price, there is some cheap rubbish out there.
Mine are Samsungs as shipped by Dell, my opinion is they are worth every
cent and I downgraded the GPU on the quote to rather spend on the SSD.
You might have a different point of view




> 
> -- 
> Joseph
> 
> 
> On 08/29/14 06:11, Alan McKinnon wrote:
>> On 29/08/2014 00:56, Joseph wrote:
>>> So there seems to be a pattern :-/
>>> How about SSD they are not that much more?  Will it withstand Gentoo
>>> compilations :-) ?
>>
>> No. There is not a pattern. Two guys used drives for 5 years and then
>> they failed.
>>
>> 5 years? Wow. That's double what you can reasonably expect, you got good
>> service.
>>
>> SSDs are much more expensive than spinning disks, 1TB will cost a
>> fortune. But they work in Gentoo very well - I'm on my second and this
>> one is 256G, still runs as fast as the day I got it.
>>
>>
>>>
>>> -- 
>>> Joseph
>>>
>>> On 08/28/14 22:46, Mick wrote:
>>>> On Thursday 28 Aug 2014 21:45:10 Joseph wrote:
>>>>> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
>>>>> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
>>>>
>>>> Interesting ... mine also failed catastrophically a couple of months
>>>> ago after
>>>> around 5 years of continuous use.
>>>>
>>>> Which reminds me to run a backup on my Seagate:
>>>>
>>>> Model Family:     Seagate Momentus 7200.4
>>>> Device Model:     ST9500420ASG
>>>>
>>>> I'm not sure how much anecdotal reports on reliable drives actually
>>>> hold
>>>> water, unless we're talking about an epidemic of failures like I
>>>> seem to
>>>> recall Dell's Seagate drives experienced a few years ago.
>>>>
>>>> -- 
>>>> Regards,
>>>> Mick
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> -- 
>> Alan McKinnon
>> alan.mckinnon@gmail.com
>>
>>
> 
> 
> 


-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com

Re: [gentoo-user] SSD recmmendation / input

[J. Roeleveld]

On Thursday, August 28, 2014 10:54:25 PM Joseph wrote:
> No, I wouldn't get 1TB SSD too expensive but something like 300GB I might
> consider it. Are they worth the investment? What brand do you have and how
> long?

Please do NOT top-post.


Currently, from what I found out, good brands are:
Intel, Samsung and Crucial.

Do check on how they perform though, for my usage (Extensive use of VMs), the 
Samsung EVOs were not suitable as the performance can drop with large writes. 
(doesn't help when taking a full snapshot, eg. with memory-dump, of a VM with 
a lot of memory)

But for most people, the EVOs are good.
The Samsung Pro does not have this, but costs more.

The Crucial has, according to some reviews, a cleaner shutdown where any 
outstanding writes during shutdown are actually committed to disk. I am not 
convinced I will ever notice it either way though.

Intel has good reviews and good performance.

For any model you are considering, check the reviews online as the technology 
behind SSDs is still changing and the firmware and chips keep changing as 
well. A good brand now, might be a bad one tomorrow.

For reference, I use the following in my laptop:

# smartctl -a /dev/sda | grep "Device Model"
Device Model:     INTEL SSDMCEAC120B3
# smartctl -a /dev/sdb | grep "Device Model"
Device Model:     Crucial_CT1024M550SSD1

--
Joost

> --
> Joseph
> 
> On 08/29/14 06:11, Alan McKinnon wrote:
> >On 29/08/2014 00:56, Joseph wrote:
> >> So there seems to be a pattern :-/
> >> How about SSD they are not that much more?  Will it withstand Gentoo
> >> compilations :-) ?
> >
> >No. There is not a pattern. Two guys used drives for 5 years and then
> >they failed.
> >
> >5 years? Wow. That's double what you can reasonably expect, you got good
> >service.
> >
> >SSDs are much more expensive than spinning disks, 1TB will cost a
> >fortune. But they work in Gentoo very well - I'm on my second and this
> >one is 256G, still runs as fast as the day I got it.
> >
> >> --
> >> Joseph
> >> 
> >> On 08/28/14 22:46, Mick wrote:
> >>> On Thursday 28 Aug 2014 21:45:10 Joseph wrote:
> >>>> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
> >>>> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
> >>> 
> >>> Interesting ... mine also failed catastrophically a couple of months
> >>> ago after
> >>> around 5 years of continuous use.
> >>> 
> >>> Which reminds me to run a backup on my Seagate:
> >>> 
> >>> Model Family:     Seagate Momentus 7200.4
> >>> Device Model:     ST9500420ASG
> >>> 
> >>> I'm not sure how much anecdotal reports on reliable drives actually hold
> >>> water, unless we're talking about an epidemic of failures like I seem to
> >>> recall Dell's Seagate drives experienced a few years ago.
> >>> 
> >>> --
> >>> Regards,
> >>> Mick

Re: [gentoo-user] SSD recmmendation / input

[Joseph]

Thank you for the input.
I've decided to try SSD:
Crucial MX100 512GB SATA 6Gb/s 2.5

It seem to have a good review
I have a Poly-ITX 945GC3 an ATOM-330  how to check if this disk will be compatible with this motherboard?

The unit run asterik, hylafax and VM (VirtualBox) 7/24

--
Joseph


On 08/29/14 08:58, J. Roeleveld wrote:
>On Thursday, August 28, 2014 10:54:25 PM Joseph wrote:
>> No, I wouldn't get 1TB SSD too expensive but something like 300GB I might
>> consider it. Are they worth the investment? What brand do you have and how
>> long?
>
>Please do NOT top-post.
>
>
>Currently, from what I found out, good brands are:
>Intel, Samsung and Crucial.
>
>Do check on how they perform though, for my usage (Extensive use of VMs), the
>Samsung EVOs were not suitable as the performance can drop with large writes.
>(doesn't help when taking a full snapshot, eg. with memory-dump, of a VM with
>a lot of memory)
>
>But for most people, the EVOs are good.
>The Samsung Pro does not have this, but costs more.
>
>The Crucial has, according to some reviews, a cleaner shutdown where any
>outstanding writes during shutdown are actually committed to disk. I am not
>convinced I will ever notice it either way though.
>
>Intel has good reviews and good performance.
>
>For any model you are considering, check the reviews online as the technology
>behind SSDs is still changing and the firmware and chips keep changing as
>well. A good brand now, might be a bad one tomorrow.
>
>For reference, I use the following in my laptop:
>
># smartctl -a /dev/sda | grep "Device Model"
>Device Model:     INTEL SSDMCEAC120B3
># smartctl -a /dev/sdb | grep "Device Model"
>Device Model:     Crucial_CT1024M550SSD1
>
>--
>Joost
>
>> --
>> Joseph
>>
>> On 08/29/14 06:11, Alan McKinnon wrote:
>> >On 29/08/2014 00:56, Joseph wrote:
>> >> So there seems to be a pattern :-/
>> >> How about SSD they are not that much more?  Will it withstand Gentoo
>> >> compilations :-) ?
>> >
>> >No. There is not a pattern. Two guys used drives for 5 years and then
>> >they failed.
>> >
>> >5 years? Wow. That's double what you can reasonably expect, you got good
>> >service.
>> >
>> >SSDs are much more expensive than spinning disks, 1TB will cost a
>> >fortune. But they work in Gentoo very well - I'm on my second and this
>> >one is 256G, still runs as fast as the day I got it.
>> >
>> >> --
>> >> Joseph
>> >>
>> >> On 08/28/14 22:46, Mick wrote:
>> >>> On Thursday 28 Aug 2014 21:45:10 Joseph wrote:
>> >>>> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
>> >>>> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
>> >>>
>> >>> Interesting ... mine also failed catastrophically a couple of months
>> >>> ago after
>> >>> around 5 years of continuous use.
>> >>>
>> >>> Which reminds me to run a backup on my Seagate:
>> >>>
>> >>> Model Family:     Seagate Momentus 7200.4
>> >>> Device Model:     ST9500420ASG
>> >>>
>> >>> I'm not sure how much anecdotal reports on reliable drives actually hold
>> >>> water, unless we're talking about an epidemic of failures like I seem to
>> >>> recall Dell's Seagate drives experienced a few years ago.
>> >>>
>> >>> --
>> >>> Regards,
>> >>> Mick

Re: [gentoo-user] SSD recmmendation / input

[Alan McKinnon]

On 29/08/2014 15:28, Joseph wrote:
> Thank you for the input.
> I've decided to try SSD:
> Crucial MX100 512GB SATA 6Gb/s 2.5
> 
> It seem to have a good review
> I have a Poly-ITX 945GC3 an ATOM-330  how to check if this disk will be
> compatible with this motherboard?




I have to ask: how much exactly do you really know about computers?
Because most of your questions lead me to believe not very much, and you
ask folks here to do your thinking for you.


Now go onto TheGoogle(tm), find the data sheet for your motherboard and
see if it supports SATA running at that speed.

Why should we do your google searches for you mean you can just as
easily do them yourself?




> 
> The unit run asterik, hylafax and VM (VirtualBox) 7/24
> 
> -- 
> Joseph
> 
> 
> On 08/29/14 08:58, J. Roeleveld wrote:
>> On Thursday, August 28, 2014 10:54:25 PM Joseph wrote:
>>> No, I wouldn't get 1TB SSD too expensive but something like 300GB I
>>> might
>>> consider it. Are they worth the investment? What brand do you have
>>> and how
>>> long?
>>
>> Please do NOT top-post.
>>
>>
>> Currently, from what I found out, good brands are:
>> Intel, Samsung and Crucial.
>>
>> Do check on how they perform though, for my usage (Extensive use of
>> VMs), the
>> Samsung EVOs were not suitable as the performance can drop with large
>> writes.
>> (doesn't help when taking a full snapshot, eg. with memory-dump, of a
>> VM with
>> a lot of memory)
>>
>> But for most people, the EVOs are good.
>> The Samsung Pro does not have this, but costs more.
>>
>> The Crucial has, according to some reviews, a cleaner shutdown where any
>> outstanding writes during shutdown are actually committed to disk. I
>> am not
>> convinced I will ever notice it either way though.
>>
>> Intel has good reviews and good performance.
>>
>> For any model you are considering, check the reviews online as the
>> technology
>> behind SSDs is still changing and the firmware and chips keep changing as
>> well. A good brand now, might be a bad one tomorrow.
>>
>> For reference, I use the following in my laptop:
>>
>> # smartctl -a /dev/sda | grep "Device Model"
>> Device Model:     INTEL SSDMCEAC120B3
>> # smartctl -a /dev/sdb | grep "Device Model"
>> Device Model:     Crucial_CT1024M550SSD1
>>
>> -- 
>> Joost
>>
>>> -- 
>>> Joseph
>>>
>>> On 08/29/14 06:11, Alan McKinnon wrote:
>>> >On 29/08/2014 00:56, Joseph wrote:
>>> >> So there seems to be a pattern :-/
>>> >> How about SSD they are not that much more?  Will it withstand Gentoo
>>> >> compilations :-) ?
>>> >
>>> >No. There is not a pattern. Two guys used drives for 5 years and then
>>> >they failed.
>>> >
>>> >5 years? Wow. That's double what you can reasonably expect, you got
>>> good
>>> >service.
>>> >
>>> >SSDs are much more expensive than spinning disks, 1TB will cost a
>>> >fortune. But they work in Gentoo very well - I'm on my second and this
>>> >one is 256G, still runs as fast as the day I got it.
>>> >
>>> >> --
>>> >> Joseph
>>> >>
>>> >> On 08/28/14 22:46, Mick wrote:
>>> >>> On Thursday 28 Aug 2014 21:45:10 Joseph wrote:
>>> >>>> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any
>>> recommendation
>>> >>>> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Interesting ... mine also failed catastrophically a couple of months
>>> >>> ago after
>>> >>> around 5 years of continuous use.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Which reminds me to run a backup on my Seagate:
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Model Family:     Seagate Momentus 7200.4
>>> >>> Device Model:     ST9500420ASG
>>> >>>
>>> >>> I'm not sure how much anecdotal reports on reliable drives
>>> actually hold
>>> >>> water, unless we're talking about an epidemic of failures like I
>>> seem to
>>> >>> recall Dell's Seagate drives experienced a few years ago.
>>> >>>
>>> >>> --
>>> >>> Regards,
>>> >>> Mick
> 
> 
> 


-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com

Re: [gentoo-user] SSD recmmendation / input

[Rich Freeman]

On Fri, Aug 29, 2014 at 12:54 AM, Joseph <syscon780@gmail.com> wrote:
> No, I wouldn't get 1TB SSD too expensive but something like 300GB I might
> consider it.
> Are they worth the investment? What brand do you have and how long?
>

SSDs improve performance significantly, but as you point out they are
quite expensive.  If you use one you should consider using a
filesystem optimized for flash.

If you're talking about a laptop then your options are going to be
limited, since they're typically not overflowing with drive bays.

However, for a desktop/server I would recommend a small SSD for the OS
and selected other files, and spinning disks for general storage.  I
have a 64GB SSD which is fairly inexpensive and use it for my root,
but home and selected directories out of var are on spinning disk.
So, I can have 7TB of disk space and keep the cost reasonably low, and
get almost the same benefit out of having the most-frequently-accessed
files on SSD.  I use RAID for the spinning disks, and do daily backups
of the SSD - little of importance on the SSD changes all that often
anyway and since it is only 64GB a restore will go quickly.

I actually mount my browser cache, /var/tmp, and /usr/portage on
tmpfs.  Distfiles and pkgdir are on the spinning disks.

If the /usr move ever becomes an option on Gentoo then it would get
even simpler - stick /usr on the SSD.

Rich

Re: [gentoo-user] SSD recmmendation / input

[Daniel Frey]

On 08/28/2014 09:54 PM, Joseph wrote:
> No, I wouldn't get 1TB SSD too expensive but something like 300GB I
> might consider it.
> Are they worth the investment? What brand do you have and how long?

I have several SSDs. I currently use Kingston, Crucial, and Intel.

A bit of background - I use a mythtv setup with multiple frontends. I
had a SSD in the backend but it failed after about two years with no
warning -- one day I noticed the frontends behaving strangely and found
out I couldn't log into the backend (via ssh or directly.) The server
sustained a lot of writes to the database daily, however, the actual
recordings were on rust disks.

It was a Kingston that failed, a 32GB model.

The Crucial and Intel I have are still relatively new, the Crucial being
a year and a bit old, and the Intel only a few days old. :-)

Speedwise, there's no comparison. Especially running emerge/compiling -
my frontend (equipped with an E8400 and 2GB RAM) with the Kingston SSD
beats my main workstation equipped with a rust raid10 (a QX9650 with 8
GB RAM) every time.

I have two recommendations for a new SSD user - 1) Flash the firmware to
a new version right away if available, and 2) Don't partition the entire
SSD if you can avoid it. Apparently SSDs will use unused space for wear
leveling - as an example I believe I only partitioned 20GB (out of a
64GB SSD) on my frontends. That's a bit excessive and you may not be
able to do that, but you get the idea.

Also make sure to use parted to partition so the partitions themselves
are aligned properly.

(Regarding the firmware update - my Crucial had one and I ignored it.
About 3 months later my laptop was acting weird and complaining about
the disk. I was lucky - I flashed the firmware and it was fine with no
data loss. Others are not so lucky...)

Dan

Re: [gentoo-user] SSD recmmendation / input

[Joseph]

The Crucial 512GB SSD is not that expensive and I found some notes on partitioning SSD on Gentoo:
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/SSD

It seems to me I'll only have boot, swap and root partition; home I think will be mounted on root partition.

--
Joseph


On 08/29/14 07:49, Daniel Frey wrote:
>On 08/28/2014 09:54 PM, Joseph wrote:
>> No, I wouldn't get 1TB SSD too expensive but something like 300GB I
>> might consider it.
>> Are they worth the investment? What brand do you have and how long?
>
>I have several SSDs. I currently use Kingston, Crucial, and Intel.
>
>A bit of background - I use a mythtv setup with multiple frontends. I
>had a SSD in the backend but it failed after about two years with no
>warning -- one day I noticed the frontends behaving strangely and found
>out I couldn't log into the backend (via ssh or directly.) The server
>sustained a lot of writes to the database daily, however, the actual
>recordings were on rust disks.
>
>It was a Kingston that failed, a 32GB model.
>
>The Crucial and Intel I have are still relatively new, the Crucial being
>a year and a bit old, and the Intel only a few days old. :-)
>
>Speedwise, there's no comparison. Especially running emerge/compiling -
>my frontend (equipped with an E8400 and 2GB RAM) with the Kingston SSD
>beats my main workstation equipped with a rust raid10 (a QX9650 with 8
>GB RAM) every time.
>
>I have two recommendations for a new SSD user - 1) Flash the firmware to
>a new version right away if available, and 2) Don't partition the entire
>SSD if you can avoid it. Apparently SSDs will use unused space for wear
>leveling - as an example I believe I only partitioned 20GB (out of a
>64GB SSD) on my frontends. That's a bit excessive and you may not be
>able to do that, but you get the idea.
>
>Also make sure to use parted to partition so the partitions themselves
>are aligned properly.
>
>(Regarding the firmware update - my Crucial had one and I ignored it.
>About 3 months later my laptop was acting weird and complaining about
>the disk. I was lucky - I flashed the firmware and it was fine with no
>data loss. Others are not so lucky...)
>
>Dan

Re: [gentoo-user] SSD recmmendation / input

[covici]

Joseph <syscon780@gmail.com> wrote:

> The Crucial 512GB SSD is not that expensive and I found some notes on partitioning SSD on Gentoo:
> https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/SSD
> 
> It seems to me I'll only have boot, swap and root partition; home I think will be mounted on root partition.
> 
> --
> Joseph
> 
> 
> On 08/29/14 07:49, Daniel Frey wrote:
> >On 08/28/2014 09:54 PM, Joseph wrote:
> >> No, I wouldn't get 1TB SSD too expensive but something like 300GB I
> >> might consider it.
> >> Are they worth the investment? What brand do you have and how long?
> >
> >I have several SSDs. I currently use Kingston, Crucial, and Intel.
> >
> >A bit of background - I use a mythtv setup with multiple frontends. I
> >had a SSD in the backend but it failed after about two years with no
> >warning -- one day I noticed the frontends behaving strangely and found
> >out I couldn't log into the backend (via ssh or directly.) The server
> >sustained a lot of writes to the database daily, however, the actual
> >recordings were on rust disks.
> >
> >It was a Kingston that failed, a 32GB model.
> >
> >The Crucial and Intel I have are still relatively new, the Crucial being
> >a year and a bit old, and the Intel only a few days old. :-)
> >
> >Speedwise, there's no comparison. Especially running emerge/compiling -
> >my frontend (equipped with an E8400 and 2GB RAM) with the Kingston SSD
> >beats my main workstation equipped with a rust raid10 (a QX9650 with 8
> >GB RAM) every time.
> >
> >I have two recommendations for a new SSD user - 1) Flash the firmware to
> >a new version right away if available, and 2) Don't partition the entire
> >SSD if you can avoid it. Apparently SSDs will use unused space for wear
> >leveling - as an example I believe I only partitioned 20GB (out of a
> >64GB SSD) on my frontends. That's a bit excessive and you may not be
> >able to do that, but you get the idea.
> >
> >Also make sure to use parted to partition so the partitions themselves
> >are aligned properly.
> >
> >(Regarding the firmware update - my Crucial had one and I ignored it.
> >About 3 months later my laptop was acting weird and complaining about
> >the disk. I was lucky - I flashed the firmware and it was fine with no
> >data loss. Others are not so lucky...)
How is the partitioning advise effected by lvm?  I use that  all the
time and just do a normal boot partition and the rest given over to
lvm.  But this may be not good with an ssd.



-- 
Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
How do
you spend it?

         John Covici
         covici@ccs.covici.com

Re: [gentoo-user] SSD recmmendation / input

[Sid S]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 3736 bytes --]

An SSD has the best performance return per dollar than most any other
investment you can make (for a typical workload). It's actually rather
unlikely you'll get a bad one if you stick to relatively known brands.
ADATA has some cheap options that, while pretty low on the totem poll, will
give you a decent amount of storage and speed. If you don't mind spending
more you can look at Crucial, PNY, Intel, etc. But keep in mind you'll
receive diminishing returns w.r.t. higher read and write speeds - you
actually get most of the speed increase due to an SSD's better random read
response, which can be had with even the cheapest ones.

Any disk you pick will be compatible with your motherboard, though if it is
older you may not reach the SSD's peak throughput.

I use a 256gb SSD drive with two 1TB platter drives. It will hold your OS,
swap, and some media. I use LVM.

Wear levelling will work properly even if you partition the whole disk


On Fri, Aug 29, 2014 at 1:14 PM, <covici@ccs.covici.com> wrote:

> Joseph <syscon780@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > The Crucial 512GB SSD is not that expensive and I found some notes on
> partitioning SSD on Gentoo:
> > https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/SSD
> >
> > It seems to me I'll only have boot, swap and root partition; home I
> think will be mounted on root partition.
> >
> > --
> > Joseph
> >
> >
> > On 08/29/14 07:49, Daniel Frey wrote:
> > >On 08/28/2014 09:54 PM, Joseph wrote:
> > >> No, I wouldn't get 1TB SSD too expensive but something like 300GB I
> > >> might consider it.
> > >> Are they worth the investment? What brand do you have and how long?
> > >
> > >I have several SSDs. I currently use Kingston, Crucial, and Intel.
> > >
> > >A bit of background - I use a mythtv setup with multiple frontends. I
> > >had a SSD in the backend but it failed after about two years with no
> > >warning -- one day I noticed the frontends behaving strangely and found
> > >out I couldn't log into the backend (via ssh or directly.) The server
> > >sustained a lot of writes to the database daily, however, the actual
> > >recordings were on rust disks.
> > >
> > >It was a Kingston that failed, a 32GB model.
> > >
> > >The Crucial and Intel I have are still relatively new, the Crucial being
> > >a year and a bit old, and the Intel only a few days old. :-)
> > >
> > >Speedwise, there's no comparison. Especially running emerge/compiling -
> > >my frontend (equipped with an E8400 and 2GB RAM) with the Kingston SSD
> > >beats my main workstation equipped with a rust raid10 (a QX9650 with 8
> > >GB RAM) every time.
> > >
> > >I have two recommendations for a new SSD user - 1) Flash the firmware to
> > >a new version right away if available, and 2) Don't partition the entire
> > >SSD if you can avoid it. Apparently SSDs will use unused space for wear
> > >leveling - as an example I believe I only partitioned 20GB (out of a
> > >64GB SSD) on my frontends. That's a bit excessive and you may not be
> > >able to do that, but you get the idea.
> > >
> > >Also make sure to use parted to partition so the partitions themselves
> > >are aligned properly.
> > >
> > >(Regarding the firmware update - my Crucial had one and I ignored it.
> > >About 3 months later my laptop was acting weird and complaining about
> > >the disk. I was lucky - I flashed the firmware and it was fine with no
> > >data loss. Others are not so lucky...)
> How is the partitioning advise effected by lvm?  I use that  all the
> time and just do a normal boot partition and the rest given over to
> lvm.  But this may be not good with an ssd.
>
>
>
> --
> Your life is like a penny.  You're going to lose it.  The question is:
> How do
> you spend it?
>
>          John Covici
>          covici@ccs.covici.com
>
>

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Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Mick]

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On Thursday 28 Aug 2014 23:56:57 Joseph wrote:
> So there seems to be a pattern :-/

Well, a sample of two can hardly be called a pattern!  :p


> How about SSD they are not that much more?  Will it withstand Gentoo
> compilations :-) ?

I have no experience with SSDs yet, but I see myself buying a new laptop soon 
which I expect will come with SSD as standard.

-- 
Regards,
Mick

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Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Peter Humphrey]

On Thursday 28 August 2014 16:56:57 Joseph wrote:

> How about SSD they are not that much more?  Will it withstand Gentoo
> compilations :-) ?

I put a SanDisk SSD in my little Atom LAN server when its 2.5" disk failed. 
It's too early yet too offer an opinion on reliability, but my preparatory 
reading suggested it should be about average.

I have a 32-bit chroot on my workstation to build packages for it, so it only 
has to run emerge -k. I did this because the poor little Atom isn't up to 
massive compilation tasks. Not in a reasonable time, anyway.

-- 
Regards
Peter

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[J. Roeleveld]

On Thursday, August 28, 2014 02:45:10 PM Joseph wrote:
> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.

I agree with the rest, 2 does not make a pattern.
I use WDs extensively and only had a few failures. None of the failures led to 
dataloss. (Thanks to SMART and Backups)

For 1GB spinning rust 2.5inch, I use WD Blue drives. They do the job they were 
bought for (cheap backup storage).

After 5 years, you might want to consider replacing the laptop though 
(Assuming that's where the drive is)

--
Joost

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Joseph]

The box is a small server/backup unit Poly-ITX 945GC3 an ATOM-330.
The unit run 7/24 
So I was thinking of putting a new disk in it but can not decide if to go with SSD or another Western Digital drive.
It was my first disk failure so I'm disappointed with WD performance.

The unit run asterik, hylafax and VM (VirtualBox)

What file system is best suited for VM?

--
Joseph

On 08/29/14 08:45, J. Roeleveld wrote:
>On Thursday, August 28, 2014 02:45:10 PM Joseph wrote:
>> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
>> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
>
>I agree with the rest, 2 does not make a pattern.
>I use WDs extensively and only had a few failures. None of the failures led to
>dataloss. (Thanks to SMART and Backups)
>
>For 1GB spinning rust 2.5inch, I use WD Blue drives. They do the job they were
>bought for (cheap backup storage).
>
>After 5 years, you might want to consider replacing the laptop though
>(Assuming that's where the drive is)
>
>--
>Joost

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[J. Roeleveld]

On Friday, August 29, 2014 06:37:03 AM Joseph wrote:
> The box is a small server/backup unit Poly-ITX 945GC3 an ATOM-330.
> The unit run 7/24
> So I was thinking of putting a new disk in it but can not decide if to go
> with SSD or another Western Digital drive. It was my first disk failure so
> I'm disappointed with WD performance.
> 
> The unit run asterik, hylafax and VM (VirtualBox)
> 
> What file system is best suited for VM?

Please do NOT top-post.

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Alan McKinnon]

On 29/08/2014 14:37, Joseph wrote:
> The box is a small server/backup unit Poly-ITX 945GC3 an ATOM-330.
> The unit run 7/24 So I was thinking of putting a new disk in it but can
> not decide if to go with SSD or another Western Digital drive.
> It was my first disk failure so I'm disappointed with WD performance.


You are complaining about ONE failure after FIVE years?

Everything after 3 is bonus. Count yourself lucky.





> 
> The unit run asterik, hylafax and VM (VirtualBox)
> 
> What file system is best suited for VM?
> 
> -- 
> Joseph
> 
> On 08/29/14 08:45, J. Roeleveld wrote:
>> On Thursday, August 28, 2014 02:45:10 PM Joseph wrote:
>>> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
>>> (reliability) of the brand. My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
>>
>> I agree with the rest, 2 does not make a pattern.
>> I use WDs extensively and only had a few failures. None of the
>> failures led to
>> dataloss. (Thanks to SMART and Backups)
>>
>> For 1GB spinning rust 2.5inch, I use WD Blue drives. They do the job
>> they were
>> bought for (cheap backup storage).
>>
>> After 5 years, you might want to consider replacing the laptop though
>> (Assuming that's where the drive is)
>>
>> -- 
>> Joost
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 


-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com

[gentoo-user] Re: 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Hans]

On 28/08/14 21:45, Joseph wrote:
> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
> (reliability) of the brand.
> My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
>
Go Samsung actually made by Samsung in Korea or if you can get Hitachi 
actually made by Hitachi in Japan.  Western Digital and Seagate come out 
of the same plants in Thailand and Indonesia and don't last.

I had a 14 year old Toshiba Laptop with a Toshiba disk, The disk died 
after 14 month when the warranty has expired. Replaced it with Samsung 
disk. The Laptop was used until very recently 24/7 as mail and web 
server with buld in UPS (battery) until the screen and keyboard died. 
The Samsung disk is still alive and well as a plugin backup for the 
replacement Laptop server.

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[J. Roeleveld]

On Saturday, September 13, 2014 09:45:28 PM Hans wrote:
> On 28/08/14 21:45, Joseph wrote:
> > I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
> > (reliability) of the brand.
> > My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
> 
> Go Samsung actually made by Samsung in Korea or if you can get Hitachi
> actually made by Hitachi in Japan.  Western Digital and Seagate come out
> of the same plants in Thailand and Indonesia and don't last.

What do you mean with don't last?
I have seen Hitachis die within a year and WDs that lasted more then 10 years.
That is no guarantee that Hitachis are unreliable or WDs are always reliable.

> I had a 14 year old Toshiba Laptop with a Toshiba disk, The disk died
> after 14 month when the warranty has expired.

1 failure 14 years ago is not a reliable result to base your comments on.

> Replaced it with Samsung
> disk. The Laptop was used until very recently 24/7 as mail and web
> server with buld in UPS (battery) until the screen and keyboard died.

A laptop is not designed to run 24/7 and neither are the batteries reliable 
after being constantly charged 24/7. Did you ever test the "ups" 
functionality?

> The Samsung disk is still alive and well as a plugin backup for the
> replacement Laptop server.

If the new one has a Li-Ion battery, you have a nice fire-hazard....
Hope you have sufficient cooling for the battery, considering you are using it 
24/7.

--
Joost

Re: [gentoo-user] Re: 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Alan McKinnon]

On 14/09/2014 22:27, J. Roeleveld wrote:
> 
> On Saturday, September 13, 2014 09:45:28 PM Hans wrote:
>> On 28/08/14 21:45, Joseph wrote:
>>> I need to select 500GB or 1TB infernal 2.5in drive, any recommendation
>>> (reliability) of the brand.
>>> My current WD 320GB fail after 5-years.
>>
>> Go Samsung actually made by Samsung in Korea or if you can get Hitachi
>> actually made by Hitachi in Japan.  Western Digital and Seagate come out
>> of the same plants in Thailand and Indonesia and don't last.
> 
> What do you mean with don't last?
> I have seen Hitachis die within a year and WDs that lasted more then 10 years.
> That is no guarantee that Hitachis are unreliable or WDs are always reliable.

+1 to that

Spinning disks are inherently unreliable things.

We somehow expect them to last without fault for 5 years and lose sight
of the fact that if we don't switch them off that is 43,830 hours. How
many bearings out there in the world are built to last 50,000 hours at
bargain-basement consumer prices?

Aircraft, marine and earth excavation engines are made to that spec.
With a million buck price tag. Your machine machine isn't and drives are
in the same class as decent washing machines.

> 
>> I had a 14 year old Toshiba Laptop with a Toshiba disk, The disk died
>> after 14 month when the warranty has expired.
> 
> 1 failure 14 years ago is not a reliable result to base your comments on.

No-one makes a bad car anymore. Everyone turns out a dud occasionally.
s/car/disk/ is still true


> 
>> Replaced it with Samsung
>> disk. The Laptop was used until very recently 24/7 as mail and web
>> server with buld in UPS (battery) until the screen and keyboard died.
> 
> A laptop is not designed to run 24/7 and neither are the batteries reliable 
> after being constantly charged 24/7. Did you ever test the "ups" 
> functionality?
> 
>> The Samsung disk is still alive and well as a plugin backup for the
>> replacement Laptop server.

Hans, don't take this the wrong way, but what you say doesn't mean squat.

Google has 1,000,000+ drives, I'll trust what they say after statistical
analysis.
Rack Space has a goodly number of drives too so I'll trust them as well.
I'll even trust my previous employer (an ISP with 10+ data centres) and
customers fitting every example of every drive out there at random. Our
tests (admittedly unscientific due to lack of controls) showed that
every brand and type was about as likely to fail as every other type,
excepting anomalies due to bad batches.

But your anecdotal once-off experience - doesn't mean anything




-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Stroller]

On Sun, 14 September 2014, at 9:53 pm, Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon@gmail.com> wrote:
> ...
> Google has 1,000,000+ drives, I'll trust what they say after statistical
> analysis.
> Rack Space has a goodly number of drives too so I'll trust them as well.
> I'll even trust my previous employer (an ISP with 10+ data centres) and
> customers fitting every example of every drive out there at random.

There is some great information of this kind available - the trouble is that, by the time you've tested drives for 3 years, your information is 3 years out of date (as far as "what's the latest drive I should buy?" is concerned).

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2089464/three-year-27-000-drive-study-reveals-the-most-reliable-hard-drive-makers.html

From this report we should buy Hitachi and distrust Seagate, but not only were only specific models tested, for all know both manufacturers may have long ago changed their manufacturing methods now.

Stroller.

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Alan McKinnon]

On 15/09/2014 13:10, Stroller wrote:
> 
> On Sun, 14 September 2014, at 9:53 pm, Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon@gmail.com> wrote:
>> ...
>> Google has 1,000,000+ drives, I'll trust what they say after statistical
>> analysis.
>> Rack Space has a goodly number of drives too so I'll trust them as well.
>> I'll even trust my previous employer (an ISP with 10+ data centres) and
>> customers fitting every example of every drive out there at random.
> 
> There is some great information of this kind available - the trouble is that, by the time you've tested drives for 3 years, your information is 3 years out of date (as far as "what's the latest drive I should buy?" is concerned).
> 
> http://www.pcworld.com/article/2089464/three-year-27-000-drive-study-reveals-the-most-reliable-hard-drive-makers.html
> 
> From this report we should buy Hitachi and distrust Seagate, but not only were only specific models tested, for all know both manufacturers may have long ago changed their manufacturing methods now.


Which is why most folks who buy substantial numbers of drives do
something like this:

1. Decide what drives[1] you like and take proper statistical history
into account. The answer is often somewhat random and more about "I
like" rather than "I know for a fact".
2. Buy those drives.
3. Establish a relationship with that vendor.
4. If step #2 goes south and you got duds, get replacements leveraging on #3


But asking a random bunch of dudes on a mailing list "what is a good
drive right now" is a useless question. If the mailing list is big
enough there are only two eventual answers:

- any of them
- none of them


[1] This can be 0, 1 or more drive types



-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Dale]

Alan McKinnon wrote:
> On 15/09/2014 13:10, Stroller wrote:
>> On Sun, 14 September 2014, at 9:53 pm, Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> ...
>>> Google has 1,000,000+ drives, I'll trust what they say after statistical
>>> analysis.
>>> Rack Space has a goodly number of drives too so I'll trust them as well.
>>> I'll even trust my previous employer (an ISP with 10+ data centres) and
>>> customers fitting every example of every drive out there at random.
>> There is some great information of this kind available - the trouble is that, by the time you've tested drives for 3 years, your information is 3 years out of date (as far as "what's the latest drive I should buy?" is concerned).
>>
>> http://www.pcworld.com/article/2089464/three-year-27-000-drive-study-reveals-the-most-reliable-hard-drive-makers.html
>>
>> From this report we should buy Hitachi and distrust Seagate, but not only were only specific models tested, for all know both manufacturers may have long ago changed their manufacturing methods now.
>
> Which is why most folks who buy substantial numbers of drives do
> something like this:
>
> 1. Decide what drives[1] you like and take proper statistical history
> into account. The answer is often somewhat random and more about "I
> like" rather than "I know for a fact".
> 2. Buy those drives.
> 3. Establish a relationship with that vendor.
> 4. If step #2 goes south and you got duds, get replacements leveraging on #3
>
>
> But asking a random bunch of dudes on a mailing list "what is a good
> drive right now" is a useless question. If the mailing list is big
> enough there are only two eventual answers:
>
> - any of them
> - none of them
>
>
> [1] This can be 0, 1 or more drive types
>
>
>


I have to agree.  I have had a WD drive do a hard failure.  I recently
had the sector error on a Samsung as some may recall.  The WD failure
was on this list to but that was years ago.  If a person buys a lot of
drives, eventually they will all fail.  I suspect that every brand of
drive has failures that are under warranty too.  I'd even bet that every
brand has DOAs as well. 

About the only thing that may help is if there is a known bad batch out
there that should be avoided at all costs.  Other than that, roll the
dice and buy a drive.  Then make sure you have backups. 

Dale

:-)  :-) 

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Stroller]

On Mon, 15 September 2014, at 1:23 pm, Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon@gmail.com> wrote:

> ...
> But asking a random bunch of dudes on a mailing list "what is a good
> drive right now" is a useless question.

"Dear Gentoo-User, which hard-drive manufacturer has the best marketing at the moment?"

Re: [gentoo-user] 1TB 2.5in drive recommendation

[Alan McKinnon]

On 15/09/2014 16:35, Stroller wrote:
> 
> On Mon, 15 September 2014, at 1:23 pm, Alan McKinnon <alan.mckinnon@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> ...
>> But asking a random bunch of dudes on a mailing list "what is a good
>> drive right now" is a useless question.
> 
> "Dear Gentoo-User, which hard-drive manufacturer has the best marketing at the moment?"


Western Digital.



[ hey, you asked :-) ]


-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com