Database Users

EXT4 File System?

Just wondering if anyone would know: my friend has a Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant through Bell. He told me he applied some sort of EXT4 file system to it which has resulted in a massive performance gain.
Anyone know anything about what this might be?
I'm wondering if something like this may be possible with the X10, especially with 2.1 on the way (as that's the version of Android he's running).
-edit-
I got some more info on what my friend was talking about:
I converted the native RFS file system (a stupid, stupid move on Samsung's part, it's a slow file system) to a more common ext4 file system, which is blazingly fast compared to RFS. There's many lag fixes out there, some use EXT2, some EXT3, some EXT4 and some NILFS2, I use the voodoo lag fix.
http://project-voodoo.org/
It's reverable.
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Click to collapse
So, does anyone know what file system SE is using on the X10?

saltorio said:
Just wondering if anyone would know: my friend has a Samsung Galaxy S Vibrant through Bell. He told me he applied some sort of EXT4 file system to it which has resulted in a massive performance gain.
Anyone know anything about what this might be?
I'm wondering if something like this may be possible with the X10, especially with 2.1 on the way (as that's the version of Android he's running).
-edit-
I got some more info on what my friend was talking about:
So, does anyone know what file system SE is using on the X10?
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Click to collapse
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YAFFS#YAFFS2
Don't think you can convert it to anything else..

i would better use btrfs(With compression enabled) then ext4
i have btrfs on my SSD and it is much faster then ext4

Now there are a lot of improved file system with good performance out there but I guess the FS doesn't make a great difference on a smartphone... The most important thing you need is journaling so you don't lose your data if the device crashes
Yup the lagfix on the galaxy S really improves the score in Quadrant benchmark.. but, talking about concrete phone use, does it really increase overall performance that much?

tuxo87 said:
Yup the lagfix on the galaxy S really improves the score in Quadrant benchmark.. but, talking about concrete phone use, does it really increase overall performance that much?
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No idea. I have limited experience with his Galaxy S. It seems quite fast and responsive (moreso than my X10), but then that could easily be attributed to the OS difference.

tuxo87 said:
Now there are a lot of improved file system with good performance out there but I guess the FS doesn't make a great difference on a smartphone... The most important thing you need is journaling so you don't lose your data if the device crashes
Yup the lagfix on the galaxy S really improves the score in Quadrant benchmark.. but, talking about concrete phone use, does it really increase overall performance that much?
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Click to collapse
Abso-****ing-lutely. Whatever Samsung did to the Galaxy S line with respect to the RFS filesystem was used was horrible. EXT4 instantly makes the phone one of theeee fastest (if not fastest) devices out...and I'm not talking benchmarks scores, but real world use.

You don't need to change the file system on the X10. This is only useful on the Galaxy S because of the horrid filesystem Samsung chose to use. RFS is their inbred bastard child so unfortunately it looks like they're sticking with it.
The X10 doesn't use RFS so don't worry about it.

WickedStyx said:
You don't need to change the file system on the X10. This is only useful on the Galaxy S because of the horrid filesystem Samsung chose to use. RFS is their inbred bastard child so unfortunately it looks like they're sticking with it.
The X10 doesn't use RFS so don't worry about it.
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Click to collapse
Fair enough. Thanks for all the info.

[Q]database read/write speed

Hi all,
I was doing some test with a friend of mine that have a galaxy s with ext4 lag fix.
We have noticed that in quadrant there is a huge different in time during the passages "writing database" and "reading database".
So is the desire hd filesisten not well optimized (not like the original galaxy s one ) and is there a way to speed up read/write operations?
Thank u all
Sent from my Desire HD using XDA App

by default the galaxy S out of the box uses RFS which when doing IO to DB can be very very slow....because it does a lot of journalling.
I believe ext4 does not do journalling?? correct me if i am wrong...
if your friend uses the OCLF then ...believe me over a period of 1 week..or after your friend has put more than 10 apps...it will start to degrade...
RFS in the GS corrupts the FS over time...
I have had my DHD for like 2 weeks and installed over 50 apps..
quadrant scores are always...close to 2000..
using Froyo on the GS without any lag fix u get approx 1000 quadrant score..
with lag fix you get close to 2000..but then again is temporary..
if your friend had applied the voodoo lag fix..then i thing that uses a different journalling policy.and on Froyo GS gets approx around the 1500...
so DHD is indeed optimize IMO

I came from the galaxy s. Wich i loved, after much work and tweaking. Straight out of the box it was useless. But back to topic. Of course it would be possible but i dont really see the need. Itryed all the diffrent lagfixes for SGS, OCLF wich uses EXT2, Voodoo EXT4, and Ztupys kernel with ddiferent options and on Android 2.1 they aall really boosted the Quadrant scores was getting 2200+. But on Android 2.2 it didnt have same effect quadrant about 1500-1700 still good fix. But when i run Quadrant on DHD, in I/O section it stops a little while r/w data but it did that with lagfix on SGS also. Only lagfix that made it run thru with out pauseing was OCLF wich uses EXT2, and Ext2 gets corrupted or something after a while and performance slows down.
I think we have a good stable device and i dont see the need.

nandihno said:
I believe ext4 does not do journalling?? correct me if i am wrong...
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Click to collapse
I am afraid not, ext4 is basically ext3 with journalling c.f Wikipedia

thank u all for replies. Mine was just curiosity more than need because DHD in every day use is really fast and responsive (not like my old iphone 3g....)
I think i has applied the OCLF so it will be degraded in some times, and he said also that he reboot the phone once a day..
Sorry to mod if i posted in the wrong section
muffy

"lagfix" does nothing to Epic?

I've always been curious about other file systems rather than rfs on OneNAND devices and their performances.
For example, supercurio, a famous developer of voodoo lagfix/color/sound, formatted /dbdata on i9000 Galaxy S (which is also OneNAND) and reports better performance, although I can't find any evidence.
Since rfs is basically FAT with POSIX and some other stuffs, other "advanced" file systems will do better performances-- this is what I thought. Yes there is no lag that occurs on other Galaxy S on Epic 4G, and it's because our OneNAND is physically superfast NAND flash with SLC NAND, NOR logic and SRAM buffer. Much faster than moviNAND(of Galaxy S) or other NAND flash. That's all. That doesn't mean changing file system from rfs to another will do nothing. With rfs the performance is good enough already. The question is does other file systems increase the performance.
(and Yes quadrant is a terrible benchmark software. It does not give any criterion about its benchmark, and boosts too much points on I/O.)
Deceived by Quantum Rom's quadrant tmpfs trick, I decided to install VIPERrom's ext2 "lagfix" (although I don't want to call it "lag fix" because there is no lag on our Epic 4G) and run RL benchmark of SQLite performance. Since SQLite is sometimes quite relevant to real usage in our Android life, especially for database-using applications, please don't call it mere benchmark. Anyway, the result gives:
In order of
1000 INSERTs /
25000 INSERTs in a transaction /
25000 INSERTs into an indexed table in a transaction /
100 SELECTs without an index /
100 SELECTs on a string comparison /
Creating an index /
5000 SELECTs with an index /
1000 UPDATEs without an index /
25000 UPDATEs with an index /
INSERTs from a SELECT /
DELETE without an index /
DELETE with an index /
DROP TABLE /
Overall
Normal, rfs, DK05 FroYo:
11.738 / 2.91 / 2.903 / 0.096 / 0.076 / 1.095 / 2.442 / 6.618 / 6.908 / 2.524 /
2.991 / 2.651 / 1.998 / Overall 44.95
VIPER ext2 patched, DK17 VIPERrom FroYo:
0.971 / 2.758 / 2.745 / 0.091 / 0.073 / 0.989 / 2.488 / 6.749 / 6.951 / 1.68 /
1.21 / 1.227 / 0.308 / Overall 28.24
(For comparison:
Normal, rfs, Korean M110S Galaxy S, SK22 FroYo (moviNAND)
81.281 / 5.857 / 4.107 / 0.251 / 0.117 / 1.221 / 2.26 / 7.181 / 13.065 / 4.359 / 7.754 / 10.481 / 11.135 / Overall 149.069)
The answer is obvious: ext2 increases I/O performance.
The new questions are:
1) is ext3 or ext4 better than ext2?
2) is it safe to use ext2 on OneNAND devices?
(there are several debates about ext's on moviNAND as well.)

Forgot to mention: it is not possible to support ext3 or 4 at the moment for FroYo now, since there is no source code released yet. (which is of course thing; there is no official froyo yet lol)

chocoberry said:
Forgot to mention: it is not possible to support ext3 or 4 at the moment for FroYo now, since there is no source code released yet. (which is of course thing; there is no official froyo yet lol)
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If you had been following the Quantum Rom thread, you would have seen that the "Lagfix" was nothing more than a joke to prove a point about Quadrant, and other epic roms using a lagfix.
Froyo is not complete yet, there is no source, there is still debugging code, and it is not optimized for release. This will explain all low scores. Also; issuing a ton of sqlite queries hardly amounts to real life performance on a phone, and once again it is all I/O. (As sqlite is stored in files.) (And yes, I am aware that we use sqlite to store data. But we don't do thousands of transactions in an operation... ever) The same thing happens when you loop an ext FS over RFS, you get inflated values because of the ram buffer between RAM and ext filesystem.
When froyo goes official; I will try my hand at porting a ext4 fs to the epic (Minus journaling, as it kills performance); but Samsung is making improvements to rfs, and the results are getting better. However, you need to realize that I/O performance is not all that matters on a phone, and regardless there are other aspects that will throttle you anyway.

Dameon87 said:
you need to realize that I/O performance is not all that matters on a phone, and regardless there are other aspects that will throttle you anyway.
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Yes you are true. For epic it's not the I/O which makes bottleneck (not like other SGS), obviously, because it is already on top of all Android devices even with rfs, thanks to OneNAND flash.
But the purpose of thread and benchmark is to test "if" the file system change will increase I/O performance or not on OneNAND devices (which now runs on Sammy's propriety driver). And my conclusion is that it "does" increase performance. That's all. I know that you are a ROM developer (and I'm a Quantum ROM user also) who hears tons of useless quadrant things, but you don't have to do that to me. You overinterpreted the data; I don't want to emphasize or imply anything.

chocoberry said:
Yes you are true. For epic it's not the I/O which makes bottleneck (not like other SGS), obviously, because it is already on top of all Android devices even with rfs, thanks to OneNAND flash.
But the purpose of thread and benchmark is to test "if" the file system change will increase I/O performance or not on OneNAND devices (which now runs on Sammy's propriety driver). And my conclusion is that it "does" increase performance. That's all. I know that you are a ROM developer (and I'm a Quantum ROM user also) who hears tons of useless quadrant things, but you don't have to do that to me. You overinterpreted the data; I don't want to emphasize or imply anything.
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Oh no. I wasn't trying to come off as an ass at all. I was just giving some information.
We will not know any concrete evidence until official 2.2 is released as sammy has been working on rfs.
Sent from my SPH-D700 using Tapatalk

As I said before..the lagfix would make the phone into a nice database server lol
But part of deploying a database has always been choosing the right file system...:/
Its not like you won't get any increase at all in real life performance...I'd probably guess at around 1% or so..but obviously not enough to justify what people perceive Quadrant shows...hence if your not using Quadrant Pro..really no point of using Quadrant much :/

Dameon87 said:
When froyo goes official; I will try my hand at porting a ext4 fs to the epic (Minus journaling, as it kills performance); but Samsung is making improvements to rfs, and the results are getting better. However, you need to realize that I/O performance is not all that matters on a phone, and regardless there are other aspects that will throttle you anyway.
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isnt ext2 the fast one, ext 3 the data secure one, and ext4 the best of both worlds? when you removing journaling isnt that basically going to just drop it down to ext2?

What's the big deal about EXT4?

Ok can someone explain the difference between EXT4 and the regular software the I'm running..... right now I'm using roto jmi firmware version 2, my tab feels fast, quadrant score of 1006 but I hear everyone saying converting to EXT4 will make it that much faster......
......basically is it worth me doing it?
Sent from my GT-P1000 using XDA App

EXT4 is a filesystem, not software. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ext4
Its faster than the rfs filesystem the galaxy tab uses by default because of the way it manages **** writes.
So yeah, if you experience random lagging, this will fix it and should make it generally more fluid

KingofXings said:
Ok can someone explain the difference between EXT4 and the regular software the I'm running..... right now I'm using roto jmi firmware version 2, my tab feels fast, quadrant score of 1006 but I hear everyone saying converting to EXT4 will make it that much faster......
......basically is it worth me doing it?
Sent from my GT-P1000 using XDA App
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Personally, I think you see more performance gains going from stock to a JMI ROM, than you will going to EXT4 from RFS on a JMI ROM.
Yes, quadrant appears much faster, but in real world usage there isn't as much difference.
So my advice is, if you're happy with what you've got, leave it alone for now.
Regards,
Dave

I disagree, I ran on a JMI rom with the original file system for about 2 weeks and then upgraded to EXT4 and I definitely noticed a speed improvement. Well worth the conversion since it only took about 10 minutes and went very smoothly.

this is my point exactly, my tab runs smooths, feels fast enough so i wonder how much faster can EXT4 make it??
i suppose theres a part of me inside thats never satisfied and even knowing that there is a possibility that i could potentially make my tab faster makes me wanna switch to EXT4.....
but i have 3 questions..
1) what does quadrant scores actually mean in real life?
2) does using EXT4 over the standard RFS effect or improve battery life?
3) and will samsung revert back to RFS if i ever decided to change roms?

KingofXings said:
this is my point exactly, my tab runs smooths, feels fast enough so i wonder how much faster can EXT4 make it??
i suppose theres a part of me inside thats never satisfied and even knowing that there is a possibility that i could potentially make my tab faster makes me wanna switch to EXT4.....
but i have 3 questions..
1) what does quadrant scores actually mean in real life?
2) does using EXT4 over the standard RFS effect or improve battery life?
3) and will samsung revert back to RFS if i ever decided to change roms?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
In my experience, converting to EXT4 (first) made a remarkable improvement even on the stock ROM, then installing the Overcome ROM was icing on the cake.
1) quadrant scores don't mean squat (IMHO)
2) possibly -- due to more efficient I/O
3) doesn't matter -- once you do change ROMs, you will never go back to any "Samsung" (oem) ROM.

gwbard said:
In my experience, converting to EXT4 (first) made a remarkable improvement even on the stock ROM, then installing the Overcome ROM was icing on the cake.
1) quadrant scores don't mean squat (IMHO)
2) possibly -- due to more efficient I/O
3) doesn't matter -- once you do change ROMs, you will never go back to any "Samsung" (oem) ROM.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
ok ur making me wanna make the switch but does it matter that my tab is already running the roto jmi firmwire v2 b4 i make the conversion to EXT4?
plus is overcome that much more better suited to EXT4 than roto jmi?

KingofXings said:
ok ur making me wanna make the switch but does it matter that my tab is already running the roto jmi firmwire v2 b4 i make the conversion to EXT4?
plus is overcome that much more better suited to EXT4 than roto jmi?
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Click to collapse
I can't really answer about Roto's for sure -- I started with the stock (JJB) ROM and first applied MoDaCo's r3 kernel
(+ext4 conversion +clockwork recovery).
The MoDaCo conversion was very easy & I rebooted back to the stock ROM with no problem -- then flashed Overcome via CWM a day or so later.
The Overcome (and MoDaCo) ROMs were meant for EXT4 specifically -- not sure about Roto's, maybe someone else can answer that. If I were you I would have the Overcome zip ready to go on the sdcard, so you can easily get back to CWM and flash it if Roto's doesn't work out.

If I switch to EXT4, will this cause a compatibility problem with my PC which runs windows vista? More specifically, can my windows vista laptop read the EXT4 formatted microSD in my gtab ?

Converting to EXT4 only converts the OS partition. It does nothing to your SD cards, which I believe are in the FAT32 file system.

....So while we are talking about EXT4...Has anyone considered EXT4 on android with consideration of read/write cycles?
Some background: I've had several netbook and still have a dell mini 9. They have always run linux (specifically fedora). All have had SSDs. SSD have (and I guess newer SSDs still have) and number of read/write cycles that are finite (before you should expect failure). This is somewhat like the mean time to failure for spinny/mechnical HDs.
There was mild concern in the netbook forums that journalling filesystems would 'encourage' premature failure of SSDs. By 'premature', I mean happen sooner than expected as journalling FSs do all sorts of read/writes for the journal maintenance....For many, my self included, it was felt that this is not a huge issue as the number of read/writes was pretty big and that you would 'grow out' of the device before the time it takes to get to the number (or the device is obsoluted).
So, SSDs are flashed based. Is the android file system devices like an SSD? No idea and I think not. I bet many internal android storage devices, including SGT's, are flash based. I suspect the read/write cycles are a characteristice of flash memory and not an SSD thing.
So are journalling filesystems (specifically ext4) a concern on andorid for this reason? For me, probably not (i'll want something new in a year anyway...)
FWIW: ext4 and probably other journalling FSs have a way to turn off the journal features. The idea is that you'd get the other good stuff of ext4, but not the excessive read/writes (i.e. wear and tear on HD or SSD). Some netbookers, opted to do this while using EXT4; I never did. I wonder if the android ext4 'stuff' has this on or off?

Well, the Samsung RFS stands for Robust FAT File System, and it is basically FAT with Journaling slapped on top for protection, so I am guessing the journaling isn't too big a problem
But, this is exactly where the problems with RFS come in, it is a rather slapped together filesystem, and the drivers are none too great either. Whereas, EXT4 is a filesystem made for linux, and all the drivers etc are a heck of a lot better.
To the OP, the major benefits come in when writing files, such as installing programs etc, which is a LOT quicker. One of the main problems with the RFS setup is it takes comparatively forever to sync/write each file to the flash because of the slapped on journaling on a filesystem not really meant for it. There is a slight increase in speed/responsiveness all around because of the more efficient I/O, but yeah that is the major benefit.
Personally, I have gone to Overcome's v1.2.0 rom and kernel, ext4 filesystem etc, and will not be looking back. I also have the good fortune of being in a household with 2 tabs, the other being my father's which he does not want to even root let alone flash, so I will be doing a video comparison between stock and mine in the next few days, for all those interested in seeing the benefits compared to stock.

Best Lagfix for SGS Android 2.3.3/2.3.4

What is Best Lagfix for SGS Android 2.3.3/2.3.4

I dont think you need lagfix anymore on 2.3.3 and 2.3.4. It is already fast, smooth and stable. Though there are some bugs that are not related to lags

Modern lagfixes are mostly just kernels supporting an ext-4 conversion - they all will do more or less the same job. Pick one you like the features of, install and convert.
However as has been mentioned lag has been reduced a lot without it so the improvement is a lot less noticeable than it used to be.

since the GB roms there is no real need for "lagfix"
If you want you can still convert to ext4, just flash any kernel supporting it

Actually there is no noticeable difference between ext4 and rfs fs on gb roms in terms of UI smoothness and speed. And yeah I am using ext4 right now so that is just my personal observation.

jbdroid said:
Actually there is no noticeable difference between ext4 and rfs fs on gb roms in terms of UI smoothness and speed. And yeah I am using ext4 right now so that is just my personal observation.
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Click to collapse
I second this. Lately I've just been using RFS, and I feel it's just as fast as when I ran ext4.

EXT 4 Voodoo lagfix

ext4 rules!
I think ext4 conversion still matters.
I use feedR to follow my google reader feeds. With rfs I can't open posts smoothly and fast as it is with ext4. Actually with rfs it's annoyingly laggy that I can't catch up with all the posts in the feeds.

I'm using feedr to follow 15 websites with rfs, and there is no problem with smoothness or feeds.
Sent from HAL-I9000 using Tapatalk

between rfs n ext4, in GB , yes they r not laggy.
but , how about battery consumption? rfs or ext4 that use alot of battery?

syamsoul said:
between rfs n ext4, in GB , yes they r not laggy.
but , how about battery consumption? rfs or ext4 that use alot of battery?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I didnt notice any difference in battery consumption. RFS or EXT4, i usually get 2-3 days of mild usage, 1-2 days of heavy usage, on both.

K0v4L said:
I'm using feedr to follow 15 websites with rfs, and there is no problem with smoothness or feeds.
Sent from HAL-I9000 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Try opening post one after other immediately.

i've been on ext4 ever since eclair, never complained. I keep it like this

Try voodoo lagfix,but on gingerbread i think you don't have to use any lagfix.
Sent from my GT-I9000 using XDA App

Well, my JVH lags as hell...

I don't think you will notice any real difference with different lagfixes. I tried most types and didn't even notice real difference with rfs.
Most devs think ext4 is better so I do apply a lagfix, but not really sure why (better quadrant score? doesn't say anything but still)

I used couple of ROMs from XDA (F1, F1 SGS2, Ficeto, MIUI..) without lagfix... I am using phone a lot (battery lasts max 15-20hrs)... So, There is small diferences between them... I used them without lagfixes... Now, I installed JVP 2.3.4 Stock, Galaxian Kernel, and Converted to EXT4...
Personal opinion:
1. STOCK 2.3.4 JPV - Not bad, Fast, Works fine
2. +Galaxian Kernel - Faster 20-25% at least (using CPU Master because of OC 1.4GHz)
3. EXT4 Convert -> This speeded up my system by 20-30% more...
Explanation.. RFS file system is better with small files (under 5KBytes), and EXT4 is faster and a lot better with larger files... So, when you work with pictures, videos, and applications that uses bigger files then text, EXT4 shows its best side...
Now, my device is focused on Bigger apps, Pictures and HD Videos, so EXT4 is much faster for me...
Use FS that is better for your use...
P.S. EXT4 has faster R/W rate, so when recording, copying and similar, you will see difference...

can't wait until someone gets ubifs file system working, by all accounts should be awesome
Sent using geek power

Am on gb but i use ext4 lagfix because after number of apps increases, it lags!!

I've tried out 2.2 with lagfix and 2.3 without lagfix, but I find that now 2.3 is slower than 2.2 with lagfix. Not sure why this is true, but I noticed that starting apps was slower.