Guest post by Linux kernel 3.4 has been released. New features include several Btrfs updates: support of metadata blocks bigger than 4KB, much improved metadata performance, better error handling and better recovery tools; there is also a new X32 ABI which allows to run programs in 64 bit mode with 32 bit pointers; several updates to the GPU drivers: early modesetting of Nvidia Geforce 600 ‘Kepler’, support of AMD RadeonHD 7xxx and AMD Trinity APU series, and support of Intel Medfield graphics; support of x86 cpu driver autoprobing, two new device-mapper targets, several perf improvements such as GTK2 report GUI and a new ‘Yama’ security module. Here’s the full list of changes.
Great! As a die-hard M$ fan, the way Windows 8 is going, I’m eager to finally install a Linux distro on my desktop permanently. I’m sure many others are pondering about this as well. Metro is so f*cked up to use (such a productivity killer – yes, I tried the latest beta, it’s still crap), I’m willing to bet everything I own that no serious business (let’s say the Forbes 500) will ever allow Windows 8 on their desktops as a default. Maybe for special purposes only, but nothing more.
On another note: does anybody know if BTRFS is stable enough for regular use? Last I heard there were still some people losing files or waking up with a borked file system. I was recommended ext4 (which I like), but I’m always looking for a “better” file system.
BtrFS doesn’t have a production quality fsck yet, so it’d be playing russian roulette with your data. Hopefully that’ll be there by 3.5.
Btrfs is probably stable enough to use, but its recovery tools (the last time I checked) were not up to par with the recovery tools for other file systems. Plus Btrfs in my tests is quite a bit slower than ext4. You’re probably better off using ext3 or ext4 for now, until Btrfs performance and reliability have been proven.
I used btrfs on my Ubuntu 11.04 system (just as a trial) and it totally bogged down I/O operations on my system.
Only figured it out that it was actually the case when doing a fresh install for the 12.04
So you can try it if you want (and you probably should since there might be some hardware issues related to that) but just remember that in case something funky happens to revert to ext3 or 4 and check if you have same issues.
Unfortunately, no. I’ve played with it on disposal data and results were a bit frightening… It will get there, but right now it’s not stable for production use.
Stick to ext4. It’s just as supported as any newly added file system.
Edit: and probably just as good.
Edited 2012-05-22 01:34 UTC
Btrfs is looking better every release, but it isn’t for everyone yet.
Windows 8 will be the next Vista.
I wouldn’t be surprised if more business uses the newer Windows server version than the desktop version.
As the server version got a lot of new tricks.
I’ve been off Windows for years now, so I don’t care what Windows does. Personally I’m looking forward to seeing bcache* get merged in the Linux kernel.
This also seems to be more and more likely to happen soon (by some definitions of soon).
* http://bcache.evilpiepirate.org/
Or use XFS
I’ve been using XFS for years without a glitch. Fast, scalable, simply fantastic.
I’ve been using XFS for years without a glitch. Fast, scalable, simply fantastic.
I did some testing with XFS a few months ago. An IO-bound process took over 5 days (!!) on ext3, 14 hours on XFS). In my testing, ext4 was a little faster than XFS, but it still takes *way* to long to fsck.ext4 a 1TB file system filled with tiny files. Fsck.xfs is always under 2 seconds.
You might like this XFS presentation from Jan. this year:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FegjLbCnoBw
First I would try it some times. There’s a “VirtualBox disk image of Kubuntu 11.04 i386 Desktop, stable version” on
http://min.us/mX2I0UnLl
to conduct experiments on it.
About it there is a README.txt on https://i.minus.com/1337778127/eeGARp8m1AmKNLNAgSSWjA/drL47umKRwqLn….
If you have any doubt, on this thread you can make questions.