Working USB-Sticks

Hi all,
I get only one of my USB-Sticks working with Dockstar and Debian. All other work fine during installation but won't boot. Instead the pogo-systems starts. (by the way: How can I shutdown the pogo-system?) . Is this a know issue or can you tell me which USB-Sticks are working? For me its the transcend JetFlash 8 GB which is running.

Greetings,
Thomas

I had similar issues with the Kingston Data traveler 8 Gig pen drive

Question then is: Is the problem 8 Gig for booting? Or have we been unlucky enough to select two brands that have issues.
the same procedure works perfectly with 2 and 4 gig units, off brands even.

John Novack

I use Kingston DataTraveler 410 (4GB) and it works fine.

Roman

The Super Talent Pico-C Chrome 8 and 2 GB run just fine.

Edit: As this is sticky now, here is some speed info for the 8 GB stick:

root@fredl:~# hdparm -tT /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
Timing cached reads: 576 MB in 2.00 seconds = 287.57 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 86 MB in 3.05 seconds = 28.16 MB/sec

root@fredl:~# dd count=100 bs=1M if=/dev/zero of=./test.img
100+0 records in
100+0 records out
104857600 bytes (105 MB) copied, 15.8977 s, 6.6 MB/s



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 10/31/2010 01:12PM by hkramski.

SanDisk Cruzer Micro 1GB
Transcend 8GB Micro SDHC TS8GUSDHC6 in ultra cheap card reader (appears similar to this).
Working with no issues.

SanDisk Cruzer Micro 8 GB works fine, but is slow!

Hi,

OCZ Rally2 4GB is running fine.

thomdock.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/25/2010 06:28AM by thomdock.

Kingston Data Traveler 4 Gb. Working slow!

I have a SanDisk Cruzer Micro 4GB and another one that looks exactly alike but does not have the 'Micro' label. Both work perfectly. The one with out the 'Micro' label seems to be a bit faster.

I have a Kingston DataTraveler 4GB that does not cold-boot. It's also painfully slow.

-- Jeff

I've read elsewhere in the forum, that one should activate the sda1 partition. I did so and now sticks boot like a charme!

Maybe Jeff could give a hint in his installation guide!

Thx a lot,
Greetings, Thomas

changing the bootcmd to

bootcmd=usb start; run usb_bootcmd; run bootcmd_ubi; run bootcmd_pogo; reset

fixed the issues i had with my kingston data traveller stick for me.

riotz

A little instruction here, please
Where does one find the bootcmd and how does one change it?

Thanks

John Novack

bootcmd is a uBoot environment variable. Don't mess with it unless you have netconsole or serial access and understand what you're doing.

Let's try to keep this thread on topic. Having a list of known good/bad devices is valuable for new users.

-- Jeff

I use a 4 GB Adata flash drive. It has worked since I first set up the Dockstar/Debian in early September. It's been running 24/7 since then (except for a couple of power outages). No problems at all with the flash drive. On the newegg site here:

http://preview.tinyurl.com/2fgnple

I used a number (say 10?) of USB flash drives and micro-SD cards. I have not had a single one that didn't work. The performance/speed vary though.

The Super Talent Pico-C 8G works OK

The Super Talent Pico-C 16G does not boot from a cold boot but it will boot
if you boot into the pogoplug or rescue and do a reboot command.

SanDisk Cruzer Pattern 4GB works fine.

Two unbranded freebie 2GB drives loaded kernel fine, but then hung. Managed to get one working intermittently. Further investigation showed both had unfixable bad blocks on the disks. So check for bad blocks if you do get this issue.

Can't boot from Kingston DataTraveler 8GB :(

ARJunior Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Can't boot from Kingston DataTraveler 8GB :(


Yes, I confirm this drive do not start from cold boot but works from warm boot.

Sandisk Cruzer Micro 2GB (the orange blinking transparent silicon version) works fine.
but is very slow on write (install took over 75 minutes)

~# hdparm -tT /dev/sda
/dev/sda:
Timing buffer-cache reads: 1264 MB in 3.00 seconds = 420.83 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 58 MB in 3.04 seconds = 19.09 MB/sec

~# dd count=100 bs=1M if=/dev/zero of=/test.img
100+0 records in
100+0 records out
104857600 bytes (105 MB) copied, 52.7569 s, 2.0 MB/s

209715200 bytes (210 MB) copied, 173.895 s, 1.2 MB/s

what sticks are faster than this?

I've tried a Kingston DataTraveler 16GB and a Verbatim StoreNGo Pro 4GB and both work, but neither of them will cold boot on my PogoPlug.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/03/2010 12:02PM by RazorsEdge.

GOODRAM 2GB works fine.

RazorsEdge Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I've tried a Kingston DataTraveler 16GB and a
> Verbatim StoreNGo Pro 4GB and both work, but
> neither of them will cold boot on my PogoPlug.

Are you sure you marked the partition as bootable? (fdisk 'a' command)

-PG

Hi,

Transcend JetFlash600 4GB (Product No. TS4GJF600) DOES NOT WORK.
I checked two of them and experienced very strange filesystem errors during writing and/or reading from the stick like the lines below - not only on the dockstar - also on my desktop linux system and on another system with a different linux version.

ext2_check_page: bad entry in directory #65537: : directory entry across blocks - offset=0, inode=4294967295, rec_len=65536, name_len=255
ext2_readdir: bad page in #65537

and

ext2_check_page: bad entry in directory #121208: : rec_len is smaller than minimal - offset=4096, inode=0, rec_len=0, name_len=0

You can reproduce this behavior by running 'rsync -av /DIR_BIGGER_THAN_4GB /MOUNTPOINT_OF_THE_STICK' two times. The first time the stick will be filled with the contents of the directory (heavy write operations on the stick), the second time rsync has to compare the contents on the stick with the contents of the directory before writing (heavy read operations on the stick) which finally will bring the error messages for sure.

Edit: The 8GB Transcend JetFlash600 is reported to run fine - I am currently waiting for the shipment of this one and will report here.

thomdock.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/04/2010 07:00AM by thomdock.

Kingston DataTraveler 101 G2 - 8GB
cold boot - not working
warm boot - working

(Error: "scanning bus for storage devices... Device NOT ready" during cold boot)

partition is set to bootable

verbatim store'n go 2gb no problem works cold and warm

Update:
I found a work-around for my Kingston DataTraveler 101 G2 (8GB)
Described here:
http://forum.doozan.com/read.php?3,2075,2233#msg-2233

Kind of a hack but it lets my device boot (albeit delayed) after a cold boot/power outage.

Mike

I have an 8GB Verbatim. It ONLY boots on warm boots, not cold. I have the same model on two DS's with the same warm boot results. I assume the drive speeds would be the same. The lsusb says (if I read it correctly) that it's a Kingston product.


>sudo hdparm -tT /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
Timing cached reads: 516 MB in 2.00 seconds = 257.54 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 52 MB in 3.04 seconds = 17.08 MB/sec

>sudo hdparm -tT /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
Timing cached reads: 516 MB in 2.00 seconds = 257.54 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 52 MB in 3.04 seconds = 17.08 MB/sec
gus@debian:~$ dd count=100 bs=1M if=/dev/zero of=./test.img
100+0 records in
100+0 records out
104857600 bytes (105 MB) copied, 31.0954 s, 3.4 MB/s

>lsusb
Bus 001 Device 003: ID 13fe:3623 Kingston Technology Company Inc.
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 05e3:0608 Genesys Logic, Inc. USB-2.0 4-Port HUB
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub


ALSO: 4GB Ativa (Office Depot brand) stick does not boot correctly. Only seems to work on COLD boots, not warm. Go figure.

petergunn Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> Are you sure you marked the partition as bootable?
> (fdisk 'a' command)
>
> -PG

Both times I did as part of the initial partitioning. Unless the dockstar.debian-squeeze.sh script changes anything. I've since switched to using an HD for the main install and everything works perfectly cold and warm..

The uBoot binaries haven't really changed over the last revision. Instead, the environment settings have been adjusted slightly. The old environment started usb, then stopped it, and then started it again. This caused some USB devices to stop functioning.

You can restore the older behavior with the following command:

fw_setenv usb_init 'usb stop; usb start; run usb_scan'

If that doesn't fix anything, you can set usb_init back back to the 'original'

fw_setenv usb_init 'run usb_scan'

-- Jeff