>>The best thing is there is no fragmentation, so if you update files there won't be any speed loss.
>Indeed there's fragmentation. It's the same filesystem down there, only that, having almost zero seek time, fragmentation has very little effect.

Sure, the file system still fragmentates, but as the blocks are more or less randomly scrambled over the entire flash media, it doesn't matter. Running a defragment tool wouldn't cause any speed gain.

On slower system like the Efika fragmentation is a real problem. e.g. I had Sputnik launch taking 28 seconds on Efika. After running defragmentation it needs around 3 seconds to pop up. So especially on Efika using CF cards provides a gigant speed gain.

>>using a faster (more expensive) card will increase this amazing speed even more.
>If the controller's software allows for it.

Well, that would be MorphOS and sure the controller/driver maximum speed is the limit.

Its not even nearly reached here. The cheap card I am using seems to be slower
in DMA mode (6 MB/s) than in PIO mode (17 MB/s) which is used on card reader.
Since any hard drive is faster than 6 MB/s. But as we don't have that big
program files, the speed doesn't really matter. On hard drive the seek times
kill total drive speed, while CF card always deliveres with 6MB/s.

Anyway the faster the card the better of course. I guess the next card I would buy is a 16GB or 32GB SanDisk Extreme III card which already got quite cheap.

Geit

@ Geit

thanks for all those infos

Ok, I bought one of those adapters (CompactFlash to IDE Adapter 40 pin/male, DMA support) and I also have a Sandisk Extreme 3 CF-card for testing.

Now before I test it, could you please tell me where I can get the "HDMBRClear"? Is this a program?

Further can I connect on the same cable at 1st this adapter and at end a DVD drive? If so then I suppose that the DVD drive has to be set to slave. But my CF to IDE Adapter does not have a Slave/Master setting possibility like on your picture.

Another question, if I format the System partition and then copy the backup from CD back to this partition, is the partition fragmentation free or do I have to use anyway "Defrag"?

Tnaks very much for your help.

Christoph

Quote:

Interesting! Until now, nobody has reported a second IDE device working on the Efika.

Quote:

A filesystem has to be very dumb to fragmentate something that is only written once.

Quote:

Don't defragment flash storage: First, as Geit said, fragmentation has almost zero effect on a storage that has zero seek time. Second, every further writes on flash media (and defragmenters write a hell of a lot) wears ot the cells to some extent.

@ jcmarcos

Quote:

Interesting! Until now, nobody has reported a second IDE device working on the Efika.


Well, I was thinking to test this on an Pegasos 2. wouldn't it work on the Peg2?



Quote:

A filesystem has to be very dumb to fragmentate something that is only written once.


Ok, which means then that the partition is not fragmentated after copying back the files.


Quote:

Don't defragment flash storage...


Ok, I will not!

>@ Geit
>thanks for all those infos

No problem.

> Ok, I bought one of those adapters (CompactFlash to IDE Adapter 40 pin/male, DMA support) and I also have a Sandisk Extreme 3 CF-card for testing.
> Now before I test it, could you please tell me where I can get the "HDMBRClear"? Is this a program?

It should be in your c: drawer, as its a dos command. If not, then you can use the tool wipe disk, which has the same effect, but its also killing hard disk content. Well, just start it and wait a few seconds, then you can abort, as the mbr is one of the first blocks to be killed.

> Further can I connect on the same cable at 1st this adapter and at end a DVD drive? If so then I suppose that the DVD drive has to be set to slave. But my CF to IDE Adapter does not have a Slave/Master setting possibility like on your picture.

Yes, you can use a second device on the same cable. The CF card is like a hard
drive. Well, if your interface hasn't a jumper, you have to consult the manual
or just try. I would guess its set to master, because thats the only way the
interface can be used alone. Maybe they just didn't solder the jumper field and
you can change master slave by cutting and closing some wires, but anyway thats
not needed.

> Another question, if I format the System partition and then copy the backup from CD back to this partition, is the partition fragmentation free or do I have to use anyway "Defrag"?
yes, copiing your a partition to another, format and copy back will defrag the media. For flash media it isn't required to defrag, as the media itself is mixing up the used blocks and access times are quite fast.

Geit


[ Edited by geit on 2008/6/21 1:28 ]

>Interesting! Until now, nobody has reported a second IDE device working on the Efika.

Because its not working. We tried with several CDDrives and Harddisks without success.

The only way is using an USB CD/DVD-ROM which works fine.

Geit

@ Geit


thanks again for the infos


Quote:

> Now before I test it, could you please tell me where I can get the "HDMBRClear"? Is this a program?

It should be in your c: drawer


Ok, sorry I have it in MorphOS/C but I looked in C/


Regards

Christoph

@Geit
Thanx for all infos, now i know what to expect on my birthday

Hi, now i have found one adapter and a sandisk extreme III 1GB.
I tried different configurations like slave and master and so on.
The OF can see a FAT partition, but in MorphOS i cant find it at all.
I tried with SCSIConfig but my device dont show up.
I tried with hdmbrclear but recieve this message: Error 32 while opening ide.device unit 1.
Looks like the system dont recognize the device at all.
On the adapters package i can read: Best Connectivity IDE2CF-A1.
Anyone had success with this adapter???

Quote:

sounds like a tempting option for MorphOS2.0 on Efika.

> sounds like a tempting option for MorphOS2.0 on Efika.

It definatly is. I know from personal experience, that on Efika hard drive fragmentation becomes noticable.

As I update most stuff on harddrive over and over, bootspeed and application launch got slower.

Just as example. Sputnik took 27 seconds to launch after boot. After defrag it needed around 2 seconds.

But I also guess it would speed up even that configuration when using a flash drive.

Geit

@Geit
Have you test your CF on Morphos 1.4?
Is it possible it only works on Morphos 2???

> Have you test your CF on Morphos 1.4? Is it possible it only works on Morphos 2???

No, but a CF card acts as hard drive, so it should work fine.

Don't forget to connect power cable. Happend here, the first time I tried it. :D

Geit

@geit
Thanx for your quick reply:)

The powercable is ok, i have also tried to connect the device to a pc and it worked fine.
When i connect it to my peg2 nothing is shown, only when i stop the booting and look at OF i can see a FAT partion.
I have also tried to boot the peg with orginal Morphos cd, the result is the same:(

I guess you don't have a proper RDB on that card.

When OpenFirmware is able to read the card MorphOS should be able to do the same. The main problem would be that FAT95 isn't proper handling all kinds of variations of fat disks.

You need to put an RDB on to it and format the drive with SFS or FFS file system.

Geit

@geit
Now i have done some testing.
Time to get rid of the stupid MBR:)
First i start Mupper on my peg and use the command dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hdc bs=512 to erase and write zero over the CF.
When i boot Morphos i can't find the CF, it's like trying access a drive thats not fysical there.
Hmmm, maybe i can use the HD's RDB and put it on CF...
I start Mupper and copy the begining of my Morphos boot disk to CF with dd if=/dev/hda of=/dev/hdc bs=512.
When i boot Morphos i can't find the CF, it's like trying access a drive thats not fysical there.
Damn...
If i use SCSITool the CF doesn't show up, only my HD and DVD can be found.
Nothing is wrong with master, slave and so on, because another OS (Mupper) on the same computer find the CF.
Even if a device should have a MBR i suppose it should be seen in SCSITool????
In this case i am very sure that i wiped all shit out with dd:)
Is the usage of dd correct? i suppose dd write from the first block.
How can i put a RDB on CF when i can't access it at all in Morphos?, should i use Mupper once more and put a RDB with dd?, in that case where can i get an correct RDB image?
Is there anyone had success with a CF on Morphos 1.4.5 Pegasos2?????