From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Jul 20 19:03:15 2009 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 85C46106566B for ; Mon, 20 Jul 2009 19:03:15 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from kensmith@cse.Buffalo.EDU) Received: from phoebe.cse.buffalo.edu (phoebe.cse.buffalo.edu [128.205.32.89]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 547D08FC18 for ; Mon, 20 Jul 2009 19:03:14 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from kensmith@cse.Buffalo.EDU) Received: from [128.205.32.76] (bauer.cse.buffalo.edu [128.205.32.76]) (authenticated bits=0) by phoebe.cse.buffalo.edu (8.14.1/8.13.7) with ESMTP id n6KImLN2051696 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=NO); Mon, 20 Jul 2009 14:48:29 -0400 (EDT) (envelope-from kensmith@cse.buffalo.edu) From: Ken Smith To: Fbsd1 In-Reply-To: <4A614478.5080400@a1poweruser.com> References: <4A5BEABB.6070802@a1poweruser.com> <4A5D6453.3060100@a1poweruser.com> <4A5E876C.8000804@a1poweruser.com> <4A602684.4030205@a1poweruser.com> <4A614478.5080400@a1poweruser.com> Content-Type: multipart/signed; micalg="pgp-sha1"; protocol="application/pgp-signature"; boundary="=-HuxagwnrTSnzTNAZdOJ6" Organization: U. Buffalo CSE Department Date: Mon, 20 Jul 2009 14:48:21 -0400 Message-Id: <1248115701.17503.53.camel@bauer.cse.buffalo.edu> Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Evolution 2.24.5 FreeBSD GNOME Team Port X-DCC-Buffalo.EDU-Metrics: phoebe.cse.buffalo.edu 1335; Body=0 Fuz1=0 Fuz2=0 Cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org, Randi Harper Subject: Re: Install from a USB Pen X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 20 Jul 2009 19:03:15 -0000 --=-HuxagwnrTSnzTNAZdOJ6 Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable On Sat, 2009-07-18 at 11:41 +0800, Fbsd1 wrote: > Took 3 times longer to download the 8.0-BETA1-i386-memstick.img that to=20 > download the 8.0-BETA1-i386-disc1.iso. I suggest you look into another=20 > method of creating the memstick.img so it downloads faster. dd does no=20 > compression of the data. You're comparing apples to oranges here to some extent. disc1 isn't compressed either. The reason the memstick is larger is that it contains more stuff than disc1. That extra stuff is usually referred to as "livefs" and having that allows the memstick to be used in "Fixit" mode - you can boot off the memstick and enter into sysinstall's "Fixit" menu item which in turn you can use to get to a usable shell that has all the normal FreeBSD base system utilities available. That functionality can be useful for recovering a machine from mistakes. The CDROM media has a separate livefs. We needed to separate them out because of size issues on the CDROM media - the contents of disc1 plus the contents needed from the livefs disc to make it work in Fixit mode are too big for our target CDROM media size (700Mb). The DVD media contains both so DVDs can be used for this 'Fixit' mode as well. If you're going to use download time as any sort of evaluation of the memstick's merit you need to compare the speed of downloading it versus the speed of downloading both disc1 and livefs. Though I'm not quite sure why that's any measure of the memstick's merit. I think I've settled on the memstick images containing what was provided with BETA2, which will be the installation bits from disc1, the livefs bits, and just the packages that make up the documentation. Put a slightly different way it's the contents of the DVD minus all packages except for the documentation packages. That's my best guess on the trade-off of size versus functionality that would benefit the most end-users. > Using a 8gb memstick as the target to install 8.0 on took 2 times longer=20 > than disc1 cd installing to same 8gb memstick. This shouldn't come as too big a surprise, for *typical* machines things slow down a bit if you're using the same I/O subsystem for both reads and writes. I'm guessing your CD isn't USB. Even if it is, you're again comparing apples to oranges to a large degree here. If a speed comparison is important to you here then compare the speed of installing from the memstick we provide versus one you create with your script from disc1. I'd be surprised if installing from the one you created using your script was faster than the memstick we provide. > Here is a script i have used in the past to convert the disc1.iso to=20 > bootable memstick. Maybe its better to add this script to the place=20 > where 8.0-BETA1-i386-disc1.iso is located in place of the memstick.img. > That way the 3 times larger memstick.img is not needed any more. Per above the 3 times larger memstick.img we're providing has more functionality than what you would get by running your script. For some people your script also causes something of a chicken-and-egg issue. It may not be particularly convenient to run your script if you don't already have FreeBSD installed on a machine. I don't see the harm in us providing one pre-built memstick image for peoples' convenience. --=20 Ken Smith - From there to here, from here to | kensmith@cse.buffalo.edu there, funny things are everywhere. | - Theodore Geisel | --=-HuxagwnrTSnzTNAZdOJ6 Content-Type: application/pgp-signature; name="signature.asc" Content-Description: This is a digitally signed message part -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.9 (FreeBSD) iEYEABECAAYFAkpku+oACgkQ/G14VSmup/a0PwCgi52omOSdGZuApYOOK2emeDb8 Z1cAoJt9HDn2jmJWFsvpagiPeB4ZvHaL =ID7r -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --=-HuxagwnrTSnzTNAZdOJ6--