Install question #1 - repository location

Bill Davidsen davidsen at tmr.com
Wed Mar 12 23:15:21 UTC 2008


Tim wrote:
> On Tue, 2008-03-11 at 16:40 -0400, Bill Davidsen wrote:
>> I'm trying to find the best location for a repository to do FC8 
>> installs. My first two trials were direct from DVD and NFS mounted.
>> The NFS mount showed that the max data rate to the new machine was
>> only about 12MB/s, so transfer rate isn't an issue, it's Gbit
>> connection. Therefore, I suspect that seek time may be an issue, I'm
>> wondering if people have compared putting the repository on a USB
>> stick instead of network. 
> 
> Don't forget to take into account some speed gauges give you results in
> bits per second, other in bytes per second...
> 
> I can't speak for USB sticks, but just about anything should be faster
> than optical drives.  Well, USB 1.0 hosts or drives might be a bit slow.
> As you say, seek time, spin up and down time, reading difficulties,
> etc., all make optical drives slower to install from.
> 
> As a comparison, I found an install from RPM files on a hard drive
> (local, or network), did a complete basic install in a bit over 15
> minutes.  But, the process often took over an hour if I used optical
> media.
> 
Either you did a minimal install or something else is happening, I 
typically see double that, although my typical install has a LOT of 
optional stuff in it. But this is all network install on a virtually 
unloaded server with Gbit switched connection.

> Installs from optical media only ran quicker on some drives and
> computers.  I'm guessing the install routines can't access every DVD or
> CD drive at full speed (variations in UDMA modes for drives and hosts,
> etc.).
> 


-- 
Bill Davidsen <davidsen at tmr.com>
   "We have more to fear from the bungling of the incompetent than from
the machinations of the wicked."  - from Slashdot




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