Installed Gentoo on SSD, how do you treat your SSD?

eccerr0r

In my faster machines I have SSDs (Intel 520, 530 series) and I basically treat it as any other hard drive...
I do have PORTAGE_TMPFS=/tmp (or a real RAM TMPFS) but if I run out of RAM, it gets sent to the SSD.

Even after a few years of having this SSD:

The Doctor · Moderator Joined: 27 Jul 2010 Posts: 2678

I try to use the SSD to speed up the OS. I think I fit best in the "avoid writes" category because I pull off swap/portage/general data storage to the large data drive I have installed. other than that, I treat it as I would any other drive.

Lets just say I still consider SSDs to be new technology without a proven track record.

(Yes, I do frequent backups. :wink:

)
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asturm · Developer Joined: 05 Apr 2007 Posts: 8935

I treat my SSDs exactly like regular HDDs, I am using tmpfs for PORTAGE_TMPDIR but have been doing that already before.

eccerr0r · Posted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 4:38 am Post subject:

Yeah, I have /usr/portage/* on my SSDs when they fit and only have PORTAGE_TMPDIR=tmpfs when I have enough RAM (for build speed, not trying to save write cycles). Yep, I have to set PORTAGE_TMPDIR to my SSD without question for my 4GB machine while building Firefox (my 8GB machine will build Firefox in tmpfs), and have swap on SSD on these machines.

I guess I'm just letting the cards where they want to fall, I trust them enough (at least for now). I haven't had issues with my SSDs and even my oldest one that's not SD/CF/MMC - a miniPCIe in my eeePC - is still holding up despite it probably rewritten over many more times than any of my larger disks.

SD media I've had multiple failures already, but unsure if it's due to build quality or what. But I've never installed Linux on one of them until recently... We'll see how long this lasts (I have my doubts in SD card wear leveling, but not SATA SSDs.)
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Levns · n00b Joined: 02 Dec 2014 Posts: 7

My laptop only have a SSD, so I don't really have any other choice than use it as a normal HDD.

I try to do all emerges I can on a tmpfs at /tmp, but some just don't fit into it, and it's back the drive.

Anon-E-moose · Posted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 12:43 pm Post subject:

I use my ssd for everything except videos, music, etc (off on a large hdd) and those aren't speed sensitive.
I have /, /home, /usr/portage and /var on the ssd.

I swapped out a transcend 128 gig ssd for a samsung evo 256 gig on christmas and even with /usr/portage on it
I've only written 133 gig to it and that's with daily sync's and emerges.
Since the disk is supposed to last into the multi-terrabyte range for writes I'm not too worried.
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Naib · Posted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 12:52 pm Post subject:

my portage_tmp is on a HDD, the rest on my SSD
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kernelOfTruth · Posted: Sun Jan 18, 2015 1:52 pm Post subject:

/var/tmp, /tmp are either tmpfs or zram volumes

besides that: no change
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Atmmac · Posted: Thu Jan 22, 2015 7:15 pm Post subject:

The price has come down significantly. I just use it as a normal drive if it breaks it breaks. It

Ant P. · Watchman Joined: 18 Apr 2009 Posts: 6920

Apart from a few things I do anyway for the sake of reducing mechanical noise (/tmp+$PORTAGE_TMPDIR on tmpfs), and redirecting some useless syslog output to a tmpfs, nothing special.

cryptosteve · Veteran Joined: 04 Jan 2004 Posts: 1169 Location: GER

I build my stuff in tmpfs and treat my ssd like any other HDD. But some data is still on a real hdd (like audio and pictures).
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eccerr0r · Posted: Thu Jan 22, 2015 8:04 pm Post subject:

Hmm... even all my syslogd/journal outputs are to SSD... I guess silence isn't an issue with an ssd :D
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WWWW · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 30 Nov 2014 Posts: 143

why not put portage temp in ssd?

SSD might degrade faster but why not using its advantages?

For an average gentoo user, would compiling on the ssd be a lifetime risk on it?

What people think?

asturm · Developer Joined: 05 Apr 2007 Posts: 8935

szatox · Advocate Joined: 27 Aug 2013 Posts: 3134

EmaRsk · Apprentice Joined: 07 Sep 2004 Posts: 158 Location: Italy

Some guys did some math:
http://www.storagesearch.com/ssdmyths-endurance.html
http://maxschireson.com/2011/04/21/debunking-ssd-lifespan-and-random-write-performance-concerns/

BlueFusion · Guru Joined: 08 Mar 2006 Posts: 371

I have my / and /home on a 120GB Samsung 840 EVO. Had it for about 5 months now. I use btrfs. I was using encrypt below btrfs but without AES-NI it was limiting it to 120MB max....so I went back to pure btrfs.

I treat it like any other drive mostly. I have torrents and my music and video libraries written to a 4tb drive. Portage temp dir is a tmpfs. With 24GB, I've never had an issue with running out of space in tmpfs.

Also to note, I'm using the deadline scheduler on the SSD and I set my vm_dirty settings to take advantage of more RAM. I set it to allow data to be "dirty" for 2 minutes and use 40% of my RAM. Data is writes to drives less often now (all drives, though).
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eccerr0r · Posted: Wed Jan 28, 2015 7:34 pm Post subject:

I think the only application that SSDs will suck in is video surveillance... If the disk is small enough and video bandwidth high enough, the turn over rate will mow through rewrite endurance pretty readily. Otherwise I think any average use of disk on a system, the disk will run out of space and become useless before it wears out.

Though if you have 64MB RAM and using a small SSD as swap instead of buying more RAM... killing yourself (time) and the SSD (wearout)
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