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Date:      Sun, 25 May 2014 09:43:50 -0700
From:      Nathan Whitehorn <nwhitehorn@freebsd.org>
To:        Allan Jude <allanjude@freebsd.org>, Kurt Lidl <lidl@pix.net>
Cc:        freebsd-sysinstall@freebsd.org, "Michael W. Lucas" <mwlucas@michaelwlucas.com>
Subject:   Re: bin/164281: bsdinstall(8): please allow sysinstall as installer option
Message-ID:  <53821DC6.60701@freebsd.org>
In-Reply-To: <53821B1F.8000509@freebsd.org>
References:  <201404151630.s3FGU0Zg026166@freefall.freebsd.org> <CAM9wqY8Bn9yQvMbpMdg1wcVhx5AGgK6rP1tkh9qccDhWZaU9Kw@mail.gmail.com> <012501cf5f1f$c5e7c740$51b755c0$@FreeBSD.org> <5358223B.1090408@gmail.com> <535827AC.3040503@allanjude.com> <53582CC4.2080808@freebsd.org> <53583D5C.5020506@pix.net> <53583DB8.1080905@freebsd.org> <20140423230210.GA20429@pix.net> <538219DA.3040702@freebsd.org> <53821B1F.8000509@freebsd.org>

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On 05/25/14 09:32, Allan Jude wrote:
> On 2014-05-25 12:27, Nathan Whitehorn wrote:
>> I'm (finally) integrating these patches now. Could you remind me what
>> the point of the gnop is? I'm not sure I get it.
>> -Nathan
> The 'gnop -S 4096 <device>' makes a virtual device that has a sector
> size of 4096 bytes. This causes ZFS to set ashift=12 even for devices
> that mis-advertise (lie about) their sector size. There is no real harm
> in using 4k sectors on a 512b sector device, but using 512b sectors on a
> 4k device will cause write amplification (read-modify-write) since the
> device will have to deal with it as a partial block update.

I think our ATA code mostly has this under control at this point.

> Additionally, the sector size can only be set at pool creation time,
> even if you have have 512b sector devices, you'll want to create your
> pool as 4k, so that in the future when you add additional devices, or
> replace failed devices, the 4k sector devices will be supported. ZFS
> complains loudly when you try to add mis-matched sector size devices to
> a pool.
>
>

This is a good reason, even if the circumstances behind it are stupid. 
Is there really no way to handle this besides gnop? Can't we just fix ZFS?
-Nathan



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