# (solved) Gentoo on SSD

## <3

So my gentoo hard drive died not to long ago and I've always wanted to try out using a SSD. So my question is how reliable is Gentoo on a SSD given that compiling packages will write to the HD quite a bit and could kill the HD. I usually update packages twice a week but with a SSD i will probably not do that so often.Last edited by <3 on Sat Jul 13, 2013 11:37 am; edited 1 time in total

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## TomWij

How much memory do you have? You could attempt to put /var/tmp/portage in tmpfs and not write to your SSD that way.

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## <3

4GB

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## TomWij

In /etc/fstab you can add:

 *Quote:*   

> none                    /var/tmp/portage        tmpfs           noauto,defaults                                     0 0

 

You have to be cautious with big packages though, which might not fit in memory.

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## <3

I'll look into upgrading to 8GB of ram too. Good Idea!!! Hmmm Or I could mount that Directory to an old HD that I have laying around That way I won't have to buy new memory. THxLast edited by <3 on Sat Jul 13, 2013 9:52 am; edited 1 time in total

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## TomWij

You can also change PORTAGE_TMPDIR in /etc/portage/make.conf.

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## comprookie2000

Solution for those big packages

http://blog.jolexa.net/2011/09/gentoo-per-package-portage_tmpdir-settings/

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## Ion Silverbolt

A USB hard drive comes in handy. I installed gentoo on one and it builds all the binaries I need for installation to the SSD. Having all your downloaded packages and binaries on a usb drive also saves a lot of space on your SSD.

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## vaxbrat

I've been using 2 80gb Intel SSD drives now in different boxes for probably more than 3 years and both are going fine still.  That includes having /var/tmp onboard.  I emerge once a week usually.  OTOH I always lose the swapfile except for one place on a laptop where I might be hibernating.  That one is an OCZ vertex 3 that shares with a win7 install and is only about 1 1/2 years old.  I don't bother updating that one that often.

Am up to about 8 ssd drives (2 intel, 2 vertex 3, 1 vertex 4, the rest samsung 840 250gb) and have yet to lose one.

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## <3

I just bought 8GB more ram so I will have a total of 12GB which should be plenty (Hopefully). My guess is, it will be enough to put /var/tmp/portage in tmpfs. I will probably mount swap to an old mechanical hard drive (not sure I will even be using swap much with 12GB of ram but since it is required for hibernation I will enable it).

also thx guys

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## drescherjm

BTW, I have run my gentoo / mthtv htpc on an 80GB Intel G1 SSD every single day since 2009. At last check it had 95% life left in it. So I would not worry so much. For the last 2 or so years I use btrfs for the OS and portage.

Edit: 94% life left

```

jmd0 virt-root # smartctl --all /dev/sdb

smartctl 6.0 2012-10-10 r3643 [x86_64-linux-3.9.9-gentoo-jmd0] (local build)

Copyright (C) 2002-12, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, www.smartmontools.org

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===

Model Family:     Intel X18-M/X25-M G1 SSDs

Device Model:     INTEL SSDSA2MH080G1GC

Serial Number:    CVEM848601V3080DGN

LU WWN Device Id: 5 001517 95878760b

Firmware Version: 045C8820

User Capacity:    80,026,361,856 bytes [80.0 GB]

Sector Size:      512 bytes logical/physical

Rotation Rate:    Solid State Device

Device is:        In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]

ATA Version is:   ATA/ATAPI-7 T13/1532D revision 1

SATA Version is:  SATA 2.6, 3.0 Gb/s

Local Time is:    Tue Jul 16 23:09:24 2013 EDT

SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.

SMART support is: Enabled

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===

SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED

General SMART Values:

Offline data collection status:  (0x00) Offline data collection activity

                                        was never started.

                                        Auto Offline Data Collection: Disabled.

Self-test execution status:      (  32) The self-test routine was interrupted

                                        by the host with a hard or soft reset.

Total time to complete Offline

data collection:                (    1) seconds.

Offline data collection

capabilities:                    (0x75) SMART execute Offline immediate.

                                        No Auto Offline data collection support.

                                        Abort Offline collection upon new

                                        command.

                                        No Offline surface scan supported.

                                        Self-test supported.

                                        Conveyance Self-test supported.

                                        Selective Self-test supported.

SMART capabilities:            (0x0003) Saves SMART data before entering

                                        power-saving mode.

                                        Supports SMART auto save timer.

Error logging capability:        (0x01) Error logging supported.

                                        General Purpose Logging supported.

Short self-test routine

recommended polling time:        (   2) minutes.

Extended self-test routine

recommended polling time:        (   5) minutes.

Conveyance self-test routine

recommended polling time:        (   1) minutes.

SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 5

Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:

ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME          FLAG     VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE      UPDATED  WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE

  3 Spin_Up_Time            0x0000   100   000   000    Old_age   Offline      -       0

  4 Start_Stop_Count        0x0000   100   000   000    Old_age   Offline      -       0

  5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct   0x0002   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       0

  9 Power_On_Hours          0x0002   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       34524

 12 Power_Cycle_Count       0x0002   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       453

192 Unsafe_Shutdown_Count   0x0002   100   100   000    Old_age   Always       -       282

232 Available_Reservd_Space 0x0003   100   100   010    Pre-fail  Always       -       0

233 Media_Wearout_Indicator 0x0002   094   094   000    Old_age   Always       -       0

225 Host_Writes_32MiB       0x0000   199   199   000    Old_age   Offline      -       188425

226 Intel_Internal          0x0002   255   000   000    Old_age   Always       -       4294967295

227 Intel_Internal          0x0002   000   000   000    Old_age   Always       -       281474976710655

228 Intel_Internal          0x0002   000   000   000    Old_age   Always       -       4294967295

SMART Error Log Version: 1

No Errors Logged

SMART Self-test log structure revision number 1

No self-tests have been logged.  [To run self-tests, use: smartctl -t]

SMART Selective self-test log data structure revision number 0

Note: revision number not 1 implies that no selective self-test has ever been run

 SPAN  MIN_LBA  MAX_LBA  CURRENT_TEST_STATUS

    1        0        0  Not_testing

    2        0        0  Not_testing

    3        0        0  Not_testing

    4        0        0  Not_testing

    5        0        0  Not_testing

Selective self-test flags (0x0):

  After scanning selected spans, do NOT read-scan remainder of disk.

If Selective self-test is pending on power-up, resume after 0 minute delay.
```

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