Re: Better an USB-Stick or 2.5"-HD?

[Marc Pignat <marc.pignat@hevs.ch>]

Hi!

On Wednesday 29 October 2008, Geoff Parker wrote:
> Just for a data point, I've been running Debian  etch on my NSLU2 for nearly
> 2 years of continuous service on the same 1 GB SanDisk USB stick partitioned
> with a 128MB swap partition and an ext3 root partition.  I have not had any

And this is the problem, you can't know in advance if the wear levelling is
implemented in the right way. You can buy a USB stick, test it for 2 years
then you can tell if the wear levelling is ok, and when you can tell it's
working fine there is no way to buy this deprecaded usb stick ;)

So you can:
1) use an USB stick and be prepared to loose your data
2) use an USB HDD and be prepared to loose your data

In any case you should have a backup, so the problem is more about power saving
and media price, performances, ...

The USB stick will consume far less, access times should be smaller and the
bandwidth will probably be smaller (this probably won't be noticeable on a 
small cpu like the one in the NSLU2).

The USB HDD will consume more power, and wake-up time are super-long (1-2
seconds).

I you've enough money, I will recommend the USB stick, in the case the wear
levelling is not working well, your stick will be dead before the end of the
warranty ;)


Best regards

Marc