> -----Original Message----- > From: Bill Gatliff [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Monday, August 18, 2008 12:05 PM > To: Jonsen, Dan > Cc: [email protected] > Subject: Re: "offline" install of Etch to SATA HDDs for MyBook World? > > Jonsen, Dan wrote: > > > > Do any of you know of a way to use an i386 Etch workstation to install a > > binary ARM distribution onto an "additional" set of HDs? > > I don't know about etch, but I use sid/lenny and debootstrap to create armel > images all the time. Use the --foreign parameter. > > The tricky part might be how to invoke the --second-stage. Maybe you could > pass > init=/debootstrap/debootstrap --second-stage on the kernel command line, but > it > will probably be more complicated than that because you need to mount proc and > export $PATH before debootstrap will complete. On all the targets I work > with, > I have a console of some type (usually serial) to control the device with.
Thanks for that; since I'm an IT guy and haven't done any embedded work (gee, am I on the wrong platform here? ;-) ) , I'll have to dig into that one a bit more, but it does look quite promising. > > Also, WD does put the source code for everything on the MyBook WEII on > > their website > > Wow, I had no idea.... :) > > Is this thing a better option than an NSLU2, for those with the budget? > Hmmm... Actually, I just got the MyBooks b/c I saw them on the shelf at Costco and needed quick, abundant storage for a backup job. Then I found out that these units SUCK as NAS boxes in a Windows environment (which isn't to say that they suck altogether, just as NAS boxes on a Windows network): (1) they don't use an NTFS filesystem, and therefore have no way of storing NTFS ACLs (unless Samba is more sophisticated than I think); (2) they use an EXT3 filesystem, which in itself is fine, but ext3 has different timestamp granularity than NTFS, so when I go to use Robocopy on Windows to put stuff onto the MyBook, I have to use the "/FFT" (fat file time) switch to loosen-up on the FT granularity; and most of all, (3) I read plenty of places that this device doesn't even come close to true gigabit throughput on the NIC - after some digging, I found that the weak link in the system is the clock rate of the ARM CPU, which can only get the transfer speed up to a few hundred Mbps. Not what I want to hear for a NAS device. Anyone ever tried overclocking a MyBook?!?... Then I started digging into the various "hack your MyBook" web sites and thought that it would be nice to put smaller HDs into the boxes and make a web server from one and an FTP server from the other; in any case, I think the ARM should be able to keep up with the maximum throughput that our Internet connection bandwidth will allow ;-) Anyway, I never heard of the NSLU2 until now; after looking at its Wikipedia entry, it seems that the NSLU2 would be infinitely better as a NAS box on a Windows network (NTFS, for one), if its CPU can pull 1 Gbps through the NIC, or at least the majority of it... Thabnks again. -Dan Jonsen > b.g. > -- > Bill Gatliff > [EMAIL PROTECTED] ================================================================= Daniel E. Jonsen I.T. Systems Manager Implant Sciences Corporation 107 Audubon Road #5 Wakefield, MA 01880-1246 Phone: 781-246-0700 x 211 Fax: 781-246-1167 [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.implantsciences.com/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
