Format N900 into NTFS
 

I was tranferring a large file and it said not compatible.

Any ideas if formatting it NTFS would be ok?

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

No, that wont work, you might be able to format a microSD on the device as NTFS when connected to a computer, but im not sure if the device has NTFS support built into the kernel.

NTFS is proprietary microsoft crap, and has only recently been reverse engineered well enough to be usable on any linux system.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

So I guess no way of having files over 4gb then?

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Only lately the kernel drivers support writing (and it is unstable yet I think). ntfs-3g is more likely to work...

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

How about ext3? There's kernel support for that.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Can't realy use the device as USB stick then for large files...

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Format a microSD card as ext2 and put it in the n900. You might have to mount it yourself. Transfer the file with scp.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

I'm kinda bummed that so much of the device is tied up in fat32 as well.

Personally, I'd much rather see the whole internal storage be ext3, and optionally fat32/ntfs/whatever for the microsd for those who want usb stick functionality

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Has anyone ever asked microsoft why there is still no native support in windoze for mounting ext2?

The specs have been fully and publicly documented for many years.

I am not a customer, so I do not interact with them at all.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

I believe you'd have to ask the same question to Apple.

It's a shame that after all these years FAT32 is still the de-facto standard for mobile storage.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Maybe the new exFat would be the best fit here? It has specifically been created for these problems. Not sure if they kernel has support for it allready.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

I haven't contacted MS, but from my experience with other big companies replying to requests from mere mortal, and considering MS's arrogance, i'm betting my bank account the reply will be something to the tune.
They can barely make their own systems work, they have no reason to implement something that will only benefit the competition (*nix systems are pretty much the only ones using ext_ )
There are 3rd party apps to do the mounting, like these, though i screwed up my ext3 by using this one

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

If anyone wants a desktop OS that supports modern open filesystems, doesn't try to lock their data into secret proprietary formats, and is written by people that will listen to their users, they can, of course, just get one.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

OK. By anyone, I suppose that I mean any large corporation. M$ claim that they are listening and responding to customer clamors for interoperability, which they seem to define as providing peeks at their sooper sekrit interface specifications. Oh, and agreement not to sue (for a limited time) for merely implementing an interface. They seem to be either blind or clueless that interoperability is a 2-way street.

I have opted out of dealing with them (or Apple) and have been doing heavy voting with my wallet. But, after all these years, I still have to deal with limitations in usability and convenience in even the most open devices/platforms that jump through hoops while bending over backwards to pander to people that demand (without even having to voice it) to be able to plug in all sorts of secret, proprietary crap and have it just work.

Even all the above would be a bit more bearable if it weren't hard coded and tedious to work around.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Well, reverse engineering is a lot of work, MS didn't bother for quite a long time to update FAT32 (it almost died), but now, since it became the de-facto standard for SD, why shouldn't they throw in a new, updated and "free" FS to support it? :)

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Mac OS X does at least support reading ext2/ext3 file systems out of the box.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

I ain't no Kernel hacker or Linux expert, but I think it should be possible to compile fuse+ntfs-3g to work on Maemo. It probably would be a lot slower and power hungry than FAT. Anybody willing to give it a shot?

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Since he is talking about big files, ntfs-3g will be a problem... Performace degrades drastically over 4GB even on my 4X core desktop, especially writes. So probably a waste of time.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

can you explain this a bit further please

how can i format an sd card to ext2 on a windows machine and what lis 'scp'?

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

scp is secure copy, it is used with ssh (secure shell). Once you climb a bit of a learning curve and maybe go through a bit of configuation pain, they make using a bunch of computers from each other much easier.

Formatting an SD card as ext2 from a windoze computer is probably easy enough with www.cygwin.com installed. Asking on a cygwin mail list or searching google is probably the best way to find out how.

You have just goaded me into trying it on my n900 since I want to save wear and tear on the n900 back cover and its SD socket. This is the first time I've used sfdisk, which seems easy to make a mistake on. I use linux fdisk all the time, and am much more comfortable with it, but it is not on the n900.

I used ssh to log in to the n900. The thought of using the n900 keyboard and display for this was just too painful.

First I copied the card to my laptop, the DCIM directory that the n900 hijacked without permission for n900 pictures and videos, and my podcasts directory. After I mounted the SD card with an ext2 partition, the n900 picture application no longer saves pictures there. I consider that a feature.

I doubt that the n900 will automatically mount an SD card with an ext2 partition. I guess I will find out the next time I boot.

Following is a list of the sequence of the commands used. gainroot is required. All other commands are standard on the n900. I will follow with a description of the steps. Make sure no applications are using the SD card before starting. All commands have been copied and pasted from the ssh session used to format my SD card to ext2 in my n900.

Slight changes of some of these commands can trash the OS or your data on the n900. It would be safer to use some other computer with an SD card reader. Windoze users might consider booting from a knoppix CD. Device names would be different.

root ( become root), then unmount the SD card,
list its partition table, print the type of the first partition, change the tpye to 83 (linux))
format the ext2 partition and mount it.
Everything after the mount makes my particular directories and changes the owner from root to user.

It took 32 minutes 48 seconds to copy the data off the SD card over wifi and 58 minutes 12 seconds to copy it back. On the 8GB card with FAT32, the data took 3.1GB. On ext2, it took 2.5GB. So ability to store large files and need 20% less space to store the files.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

@Quindor: I believe there are still some patent minefields related to any potential 3rd party implementation of exFat.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

I am a linux noob, but I will save this post, thanks a lot for your advice.

Just a question though, if format a microSD in NTFS, would the N900 recognise it?

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

No, the n900 assumes the microSD is formatted FAT, and will fail to automatically recognize/mount it on boot/insert. (For instance my microSD is ext3, I have to mount it manually in Xterm)


If you or someone else compiles the necessary kernel modules, you *may* be able to manually mount the microSD, but this is deeply in "at your own risk" territory.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

go1fish,

You mentioned that you have an ext3 microSD card (I assume it's 100% ext3 and not a small fat partition and a large ext3 as is recommended by Easy Debian for automounting) that you have to mount manually in Xterm - can you tell us how you go about mounting it in Xterm? Have you noticed any other inconveniences besides the mounting not being automatic? Have you tried to automate this process in anyway? I know in regular linux you have some init scripts in which you can systematically put such a mount command but I'm not so familiar with the Maemo flavored linux...
Thanks

-=AC=-

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

mount -t ext3 /dev/mmcblk1p1 /media/mmc1 or something like that. There are init scripts in /etc/init.d, not sure exactly how they work and don't have a device to test on.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Pure speculation, but wouldn't modifying /etc/fstab accordingly help the N900 to automatically recognize/mount the drive as ntfs?

something like replacing this line:
with:
Warnings:

• I don't know enough about ntfs-3g to know which flags it can except
• It is not recommended that you try this directly on your N900 (or at all).
  
• If you are crazy enough to try this, backup all of your data.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Mine is ext2 and I use:
mount -t ext2 -o noatime,nodiratime /dev/mmcblk1p1 /media/mmc

The noatime,nodiratime is to reduce wearing out the SD card. I have been mounting it by hand in the xterm. I reboot so seldom that I haven't got around to automating yet.

The annoyance is that the file tracker ignores it when it isn't automatically mounted, so the tracker has to be restarted after the SD card is mounted.

Just substitute ext3 for ext2.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

I only use the ext3 partition for my chroot, and the easy debian scripts handle the mounting for me whenever I try to do something with the chroot.

Normally you would be able to edit fstab to make the thing automount to, but as I understand it fstab gets regenerated at boot.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

That's disappointing.

The timestamp on my /etc/fstab is 1999-12-31. If I do TZ=UTC,
it is 2000-01-01. hosts and hostname are the same, so I guess that they get clobbered^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hregenerated at boot as well.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

It's not a good idea to use ext2/3 or ntfs on a flash drive.


Instead use JFFS2.
This filesystem is designed for flash drives and prolongs the service life of the flash drive by using some sort of software wear leveling.

The 256 MB partition on a N8x0 device is using JFFS2 by default.
So the kernel on the device should be able to read the filesystem out of the box.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

There is no need for (or point in) using JFFS2 on a consumer flash medium (SD/CF/USB-Stick/etc.), since all of these already implement wear levelling internally.

Regards,
Chris.

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

So there is no way of transfering a file over 4gb the phone than?

Re: Format N900 into NTFS
 

Split it into chunks...