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What Filesystem? (lemmy.world)
submitted 1 year ago by cianmor@lemmy.world to c/linux@lemmy.ml
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What filesystem is currently best for a single nvme drive with regard to performance read/write as well as stability/no file loss? ext4 seems very old, btrfs is used by RHEL, ZFS seems to be quite good... what do people tend to use nowadays? What is an arch users go-to filesystem?

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[-] SinJab0n@mujico.org 3 points 1 year ago

It depends, for a normal user? Ext4, maybe btrfs because in terms of stability is the best {but u lose some functions like the ability to make a swap file, wich today isn't really that useful, but u lose the ability to make one). Want something really fast fort large files? ZFS, but if u experience an energy loss it could be really catastrophic.

Ext in general is so good that even to this day android it's still using EXT2, 2!

[-] LaggyKar@programming.dev 2 points 1 year ago
[-] SinJab0n@mujico.org 1 points 1 year ago

First of all, thanks this r news for me. But I don't think is a good idea to use the swap file in btrfs.

It is supported since kernel 5.0

There are some limitations of the implementation in BTRFS and Linux swap subsystem:

filesystem - must be only single device

filesystem - must have only single data profile

subvolume - cannot be snapshotted if it contains any active swapfiles

swapfile - must be preallocated (i.e. no holes)

swapfile - must be NODATACOW (i.e. also NODATASUM, no compression)

With active swapfiles, the following whole-filesystem operations will skip swapfile extents or may fail:

balance - block groups with extents of any active swapfiles are skipped and reported, the rest will be processed normally

resize grow - unaffected

resize shrink - works as long as the extents of any active swapfiles are outside of the shrunk range

device add - if the new devices do not interfere with any already active swapfiles this operation will work, though no new swapfile can be activated afterwards

device delete - if the device has been added as above, it can be also deleted

device replace - ditto
[-] LaggyKar@programming.dev 1 points 1 year ago

Yes, there are some limitations to be aware of, with how it interacts with certain features. But EXT4 doesn't have any of those features at all. It doesn't have CoW, or balance, or multi-device, or snapshots.

If the filesystem, is single-device, and you have the swapfile on it's own nocow subvolume, preallocate the swapfile, and don't try to take snapshots of it, it should be fine.

[-] corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 year ago

ext4.

Never used arch; just slackware and then enterprise linux.

[-] Secret300@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

I like btrfs cause of transparent compression but I'm pretty sure other filesystems like ZFS have that too

[-] The_Zen_Cow_Says_Mu@infosec.pub 1 points 1 year ago

For both my home server and desktop I use XFS for root and ZFS (in some variety of raid or mirror) for /home and data storage. Any time I've tried btrfs for root (such as default fedora), inevitably it poops the bed. At this point, I stay far away from btrfs.

[-] Felix@feddit.de 1 points 1 year ago

If you really care about high performance on an SSD, use f2fs. This filesystem was made for SSDs specifically. Though ext4 and xfs are also really solid and shouldn't be that much slower. But if you do care about squeezing out every bit out of performance, f2fs is definitely worth trying.

It's a bit more experimental, yet I've been daily driving it for maybe a year or so at this point and it never caused trouble once, even with cutting edge mount options.

[-] samsy@feddit.de 0 points 1 year ago

For what? Client on a laptop or PC? Why not f2fs? On a server just trust good ol ext4 with some flash drive settings.

[-] cianmor@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

it would be for a PC and normal work/home use

[-] samsy@feddit.de 1 points 1 year ago

My current setup is fedora for the last 6 months. I started a live session, installed f2fs and then run the installer with a combination of f2fs + encryption. And it runs flawlessly and faster than any setup before.

[-] root@aussie.zone 0 points 1 year ago

Hi all. Apologies to hijack this thread. Figured it should be OK since it's also on the topic of file systems.

Long story short, I need to reinstall Nobara OS and I plan to install Nobara on my smaller SSD drive with btrfs and set my /home folder to my larger nvme. I'm thinking of using ext4 for my /home and have snapshots of the main system stored on the nvme. Looking for a sanity check to see if this is OK or if I should be doing things differently. Thanks.

[-] OsrsNeedsF2P@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago

So you're going to make snapshots of the ext4 filesystem onto the BTRFS one?

[-] root@aussie.zone 1 points 1 year ago

On the contrary, my intention is to make snapshots of the OS (btrfs) and my idea is to store the snapshots on the /home nvme drive (ext4).

I don't know if that's the standard practice or if I'm over complicating things. My SSD is only 240Gb (I think) while my nvme is a 1Tb drive, thus the intention to store snapshots on the nvme. Maybe the 240Gb is sufficient for say a month's worth of snapshots plus the OS?

[-] rocketeer8015@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 1 year ago

No, that’s a very bad idea. BTRFS has deduplication, without that the snapshots would take up way to much space. Also it’s too many writes since ext4 doesn’t use cow and would have to do distinct writes for every snapshot.

The 240 gb are plenty for a root system without /home and years worth of snapshots on a btrfs volume, only the changes take up space so the amount of snapshots hardly matters.

For /home either ext4, xfs or btrfs is fine. Personally I only use a single btrfs volume and put certain folders in their own subvolumes so they can have different settings for snapshots(no snapshots for /home, tmp and cache folders).

[-] root@aussie.zone 1 points 1 year ago

Noted. Thanks for your clear response. I'll just keep it simple have the OS snapshots on the same partition.

[-] fraenki@feddit.de 2 points 1 year ago

It's more important to backup your /home than /. /home is where you store your crucial files.

[-] root@aussie.zone 1 points 1 year ago

Yes, that's true. Then again, I'm mainly using my PC for gaming and most of what will be in /home will be game installs. I have my photos and music backups in a separate HDD.

I think at the end of the day, what I'm trying to achieve with the btrfs snapshots is to be able to roll back my OS in case a system update goes wrong, or I did something I shouldn't have. :p

[-] NegativeLookBehind@kbin.social -1 points 1 year ago

FAT32

[-] OsrsNeedsF2P@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago

Great for USBs

[-] joel_feila@lemmy.world -1 points 1 year ago

oh I just read up on this last knight. Yes ext4 is old but it is used because it is still works quite well. btrfs, dis anyone say that as butfarts, can handle much larger partitions ext4 maxes out at a few tb while btfrs can get much larger. ZFS can handle a around a billion tb but it needs a lot more resources to to even start

[-] fraenki@feddit.de 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

ext4 maxes out at a few tb

Max filesystem size is 1 EiB = 1048576 TiB.

More than enough!

[-] joel_feila@lemmy.world 0 points 1 year ago

eh which ever value it is smaller then btfrs or zfs

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this post was submitted on 20 Jul 2023
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