Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

[greengeek]

I am booting an Acer netbook from USB (trying puppies Saluki, RacyNOP 5.2.2, Racy 5.3, Slacko "Fat" 5.3.3.x) and it seems to take a very long time to update the savefile at shutdown. Even if I just boot up, do nothing else, then shut down, it takes about 3 minutes to save the savefile.

Even a totally fresh install takes a long time for shutting down - no extra programmes loaded.

Does the system have to save so much data EVERY time? Will the savefile saving take the same length of time regardless of how much work I do?

Also, I wonder if it is possible that some setting may have changed on my USB ports to make the data rate slow. Do they have something like a DMA setting that would make the data slow to create the savefile? (I have tried several new usb sticks and all take the same time to save the savefile so I don't think a slow stick is the problem).

I have 1Gb of RAM, and a 512Mb savefile. Is that ok? If I reinstall with a smaller savefile (say 256Mb?) will that work ok, and if the savefile is half the size, should it take half the time to save? Or does the save time involve some processing/compression of a certain amount of data, so that the delay is due to cpu processing time, rather than "USB_Writing" time?

[`f00]

@greengeek disclaimer: I haven't done xfce4 recently, so 'wild guess'ing

xfce4, thunar, pcmanfm (among many processes) could possibly bottleneck/throttle events in a minimal test. They are meant to be loaded and used, so normally hardly noticed in a typical session (this is one of the reasons for the splash like in e17). I recall xfce4 logout to have some oddnesses as well in a normal setup but this may have been streamlined.

compare medium-weight wm startup with a light (miwm) or ultralight (mcwm), trim non-essentials like the rox pinboard (true, some wms use their own setup) and so on. All kinds of ways to shave seconds and still be comfy.

yah, check your transfer speed (there should be a tool for that, was anyhow) - 2 is quicker than 1 by a good bit and pretty sure it goes by the bus.

fresh installs are slower by nature - it takes a save or so to pick up the pace.

512 could be your sweet spot, I aim at a max of 128 (mileage varies for everyone) and start with 32 just to see how things bump up. For sure time is saved with a smaller savefile. Reading/checking may be involved if I recall correctly.

As a final note, some users go the full install route (and that's a different topic )

[rmcellig]

I have a 3.4GB save file (maybe it should be smaller?) Advice please.

I am using Openbox. When I look at the icon for my pupsave, it's orange instead of green with 1GB of free space. What is eating up the rest of the space? I went through the guide above, which excellent by the way, and did everything mentioned but still the icon is orange. What should I do? Create a new smaller save file? Options?

Thanks!!!!

[bill]

Here is one that maybe a new user would like to tinker with.

[shinobar]

[rmcellig]

I tried those and could not see any large files that were eating up space. For the time being, I rebooted puppy using a 10GB save file that I have. This one works fine. I know it's a large save file but I just want to make sure I am not always having to continuously check what is the status of my save file.

[rmcellig]

What is the difference between using gdmap to search:

/initrd/pup_rw

As opposed to just searching my root directory?

[bill]

Hi rmcellig,I would believe that whatever program you are using to view videos
or music is the reason your "savefile" keeps getting bigger.Yes this program (Gnome-Mplayer comes to mind ?) as it will not only allow you to view them,but
puts them in ram,then "saves" them in "Savefile" on shutdown.Just one of my
SWAG observations aka Scientific Wild Arse Guess . cheers

[rmcellig]

Thanks Bill!! Appreciate it!