Another one on linux.
When loading file sequences into houdini I noticed the horrible performance drawback, no matter if I open it in mplay, file COP or anywhere.
As soon as I click on the folder containing the sequence (22000 tgas in this case) I can make myself a coffee, drink it and let it out.
Also the playback is far worse than on windows.
In windows I'm able to work with cops very fast, in SUSE no.
The same is everywhere as I noticed later, no matter if it's houdini or file explorer, opening the folder takes 15 minutes.
Maybe the problem is with the file system. I use FAT to keep the OS compatibility, can this be such a drawback.
On what filesystems should we store video data in linux (ext3?)?
Full Version: SUSE 9.3 file sequence managing slowness?
Ab.so.lute.ly it is the filesystem. Stuffing 22000 files into *any* filesystem directory is pushing things, but using an ancient one like FAT is just plain mean. 
Top that off with expecting a port of a filesystem to linux to keep up with a native windows format, well…
Anyway, you should do some filesystem research. Simply put, find some other FS, and deal with the compatibility issue some other way(i.e. a removable drive or a central server). A central server is best since you have it run an FS native and optimized to the OS running, and it serves up to whatever OS you want.
ReiserFS is a good, basic filesystem for linux, it's the default for SUSE. It has better small file performance over ext3. I tend to use it for workstations. The only problem I've found with it is a weird problem with some vendors using some versions of flexlm license manager. There's something odd that can happen where the license file doesn't get read. Something about file processes happening in userspace. Next version of Reiser is supposed to deal with it. It's literally happened once to me. Other than that, no troubles.
ext3 is the journaling version of ext2 - literally the same as ext2 with a journal tacked on. Good, solid systems, especially if you're concerned about some older systems playing nicely with it. Otherwise, I'd move on.
If you're getting into film or especially servers, I'd go XFS. It doesn't do as well for smaller files, but it positively sings for big images. Great, solid system for the powerhouse machines.
Lots of info out on the net - lots of opinions too.
Cheers,
J.C.
Top that off with expecting a port of a filesystem to linux to keep up with a native windows format, well…Anyway, you should do some filesystem research. Simply put, find some other FS, and deal with the compatibility issue some other way(i.e. a removable drive or a central server). A central server is best since you have it run an FS native and optimized to the OS running, and it serves up to whatever OS you want.
ReiserFS is a good, basic filesystem for linux, it's the default for SUSE. It has better small file performance over ext3. I tend to use it for workstations. The only problem I've found with it is a weird problem with some vendors using some versions of flexlm license manager. There's something odd that can happen where the license file doesn't get read. Something about file processes happening in userspace. Next version of Reiser is supposed to deal with it. It's literally happened once to me. Other than that, no troubles.
ext3 is the journaling version of ext2 - literally the same as ext2 with a journal tacked on. Good, solid systems, especially if you're concerned about some older systems playing nicely with it. Otherwise, I'd move on.
If you're getting into film or especially servers, I'd go XFS. It doesn't do as well for smaller files, but it positively sings for big images. Great, solid system for the powerhouse machines.
Lots of info out on the net - lots of opinions too.
Cheers,
J.C.
Thanks again
It actually IS a mobile usb/firewire drive, and I am in bad situation because I need to use these sequence for xp and suse interchangeably. Thats why I have this oldboy fat.
It seems like linux deos not manage it as good as windows, because only in suse I found these issues.
Peter
It actually IS a mobile usb/firewire drive, and I am in bad situation because I need to use these sequence for xp and suse interchangeably. Thats why I have this oldboy fat.
It seems like linux deos not manage it as good as windows, because only in suse I found these issues.
Peter
Bummer. A central server on a giggie and up network would be best, but not of course if you're going from place to place. I would also double check your maximum transfer speed. We've used firewire on a SUSE Enterprise 9 server and it absolutely maxed out the connection…with FAT. I'm starting to think you're having other issues here.
Getting the firewires and USB2's running on linux can sometimes be a headache, for sure.
Oh, forgot to mention - I'm going on the assumption you have a single file sequence about 12 minutes long here - if you aren't and you're just dumping all your multiple sequence files into a single dir - don't do that. This will tax *any* journaling filesystem - NTFS on windows will grind to a halt, depending on cluster size and drive architecture, if you do that. Breaking things into separate directories is more efficient and much easier to manage.
Cheers,
J.C.
Getting the firewires and USB2's running on linux can sometimes be a headache, for sure.
Oh, forgot to mention - I'm going on the assumption you have a single file sequence about 12 minutes long here - if you aren't and you're just dumping all your multiple sequence files into a single dir - don't do that.
This will tax *any* journaling filesystem - NTFS on windows will grind to a halt, depending on cluster size and drive architecture, if you do that. Breaking things into separate directories is more efficient and much easier to manage.Cheers,
J.C.
Haha, I thought I'm the only one to have troubles wuth firewire, the case is I don't even use it on my desktop system because I'm fed up with trying to configure it and use USB2 instead
I'll check the transfer limit, unfortunately I really need to keep it in FAT.
And unfortunately it is one longlasting shot which really likes to be watched as a whole. Ofcourse I could cut it but it would be less convenient.
I thought I read somewhere FAT is the best for video sequences because it's simple, could it be true?
cheers
P
I'll check the transfer limit, unfortunately I really need to keep it in FAT.
And unfortunately it is one longlasting shot
which really likes to be watched as a whole. Ofcourse I could cut it but it would be less convenient.I thought I read somewhere FAT is the best for video sequences because it's simple, could it be true?
cheers
P
maybe you could consider NTFS instead of FAT - linux can write to it np these days (apparently 
) …
) …
I've read something about it and unless you can advice me with an easy, working, fast, noproblem solution I'll be happy to use fat
I have enough troubles getting everything to work properly, I'm not used to lay down lines of unknown characters to make my CD working
This is my 4 th month of “trying to get used to suse”
But if ntfs in linux is a real “np” I'd happily switch.
I have enough troubles getting everything to work properly, I'm not used to lay down lines of unknown characters to make my CD working
This is my 4 th month of “trying to get used to suse”
But if ntfs in linux is a real “np” I'd happily switch.
http://www.digit-life.com/articles/ntfs/index3.html [digit-life.com]
Read the conclusions section. NTFS has it's advantages and disadvantages, and NTFS in Linux is *still* not 100%. They warn you - it works, it's reasonably fast, but it's not guaranteed. Here we all agree, as crappy as it is with fragmentation and large files, FAT32 is the best for *compatibility*. And as I mentioned, we're able to max out USB2 and firewire speeds with it on certain Linux systems, so I think there may be other issues here.
If I were held down and forced at gunpoint to run a permanently installed windows-based filesystem for file sharing here(which luckily I'm not and never will be ), I would go with FAT and just reformat regularly. It has less overhead than NTFS and more OS's play nicely with it. If we were an all-windows environment(*COUGH*), I'd change that to NTFS.
Cheers,
J.C.
Read the conclusions section. NTFS has it's advantages and disadvantages, and NTFS in Linux is *still* not 100%. They warn you - it works, it's reasonably fast, but it's not guaranteed. Here we all agree, as crappy as it is with fragmentation and large files, FAT32 is the best for *compatibility*. And as I mentioned, we're able to max out USB2 and firewire speeds with it on certain Linux systems, so I think there may be other issues here.
If I were held down and forced at gunpoint to run a permanently installed windows-based filesystem for file sharing here(which luckily I'm not and never will be
), I would go with FAT and just reformat regularly. It has less overhead than NTFS and more OS's play nicely with it. If we were an all-windows environment(*COUGH*), I'd change that to NTFS.Cheers,
J.C.