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Who uses DOS - I do, and I make no apology for it. If you know what you want and how to ask for it, DOS is still an efficient way of getting there. Ray. >----Original Message---- >From: simon@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx >Date: 13/06/2011 20:37 >To: <list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> >Subj: Re: [LUG] More frustrations )-: > >On 13/06/11 18:55, Gordon Henderson wrote: >> >> The tool compatibility thing is odd though - it appears that having your >> partition table compatible with DOS is now deprecated - fair enough - >> who uses DOS! > >Sorry lost me there, I thought your complaint was it stuck the partition >on a cylinder boundary to be DOS compatible? Certainly that is what the >fdisk/cfdisk manual page suggests is the behaviour, but then it thinks >swap partitions are faster than swap files, so it is probably living in >the past. > >> So what that boils down to is not slaving yourself to >> "cylinder boundaries". These disks have an odd number of sectors per >> cylinder, so not aligning them is good - unless you're using DOS. Which >> I'm not. So I didn't align them - now cfdisk won't touch it. I suspect >> cfdisk hasn't quite caught up with fdisk and still wants things cylinder >> boundary aligned. Cfdisk was nice, but I don't care - I've gotten used >> to sfdisk and bc. > >cfdisk maximise option didn't do the trick? > >> It would have been - and I did consider it - but I didn't fancy >> downloading another 2.5GB for a full install. Besides, I've done it that >> way before and not had any issues... > >2.5GB? Eek I'm not sure my disk is that large at work (actually I know >it is 5GB and too small but I haven't stopped to fix it, actually simply >eyeing the better machine on the desk opposite me and thinking time to >upgrade it from XP). > >>>> Then I tried to compile a custom kernel >>> >>> Why? If it is to save a few seconds on boot, you've already spent that >>> time many times over. >> >> It's not to save time on boot. My last workstation had an uptime of 180 >> days. I do not reboot it. Apart from my laptop, I don't reboot things, >> so I don't really care about boot time. I just like things to be >> efficient - and when dealing with slow low-power processors, if I can >> squeeze another ounce out of the system, I will. (My electric bill is >> measurably less than it was last year, despite rising fuel prices) > >And recompiling the kernel reduces power consumption how? My usual thing >is having to disable power saving features to make sure other features >work reliably, which grates terribly, but usually it is all too deep to >hack away at the real problem easily. > >I'm guessing the power used in a kernel compile is probably measurable >judging by the heat generated when I left some CPU heavy process running >the other day. > >> I'm trying to understand the changes - that's what frustrating! And yes, >> I could have DD'd the filesystem and expanded it, but .. I still don't >> really trust those things and would rather copy things the way I've >> always copied - at least I learnt about UUIDs. > >The ext2/3 tools are well tested, but I know what you mean. I did >something a few months back to prove it could be done should we every >REALLY need to do it, and had to disable a whole load of grubby low >level file system options in ext3 in order to do something using an ext2 >tool, and it made me pretty nervous. > >>>> Linux from scratch is looking more and more attractive ... >>> >>> If you don't know how to build a modern kernel to boot your system I >>> doubt Linux from Scratch will make it substantially easier. Presumably >>> you forgot to compile in a required driver (SATA?), or you passed a UUID >>> to the boot loader and don't have anything clever enough to make use of >>> it in the boot process (like urm initrd kernel). >> >> You probably mean a modern kernel with modules and an initrd - in which >> case, you're right, I don't know. > >I actually meant >2.6.31 but I can't really say I've had much experience >of them either, as they've all just worked apart from ones which are >pre-borked by stupid decisions by virtualisation provider. > >> I've also no real need to know right >> now because I don't need it. Sure - it might be the way things are >> going, but not in my world right now. I build systems for a purpose - > >I assumed this was a desktop because it was running a GUI. > >-- >The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG >http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list>FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/listfaq > -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/listfaq