eMMC Write endurance

stephenw10

Enabling RAM disks in ZFS does reduce drive writes significantly. But it's still higher than UFS with RAM disks.

The new Net Installer can install to a second USB drive in the 1100 allowing pfSense to run from that should the eMMC fail.

patient0

@stephenw10 I reinstalled the SG-1100 now on UFS with RAM disk and if eMMC fails I'll use an USB stick or disk, that'll do, thanks.

kenw

I have:

SG-1100, about 4 years old using ZFS
24.03-RELEASE (arm64)
built on Mon May 13 8:17:00 EDT 2024
FreeBSD 15.0-CURRENT
Only eMMC write intensive package is nmap which is run on demand infrequently.

Just checked my pfsense and found:

eMMC Firmware Version: 73103517
eMMC Life Time Estimation A [EXT_CSD_DEVICE_LIFE_TIME_EST_TYP_A]: 0x06
eMMC Life Time Estimation B [EXT_CSD_DEVICE_LIFE_TIME_EST_TYP_B]: 0x0b
eMMC Pre EOL information [EXT_CSD_PRE_EOL_INFO]: 0x01

Not sure how long Estimation B has been at 0x0b, but guess I'm living on borrowed time. I've bought a mini pc and will be running pfsense on that as soon as it comes in.

Any other suggestions are welcome

stephenw10

Enable RAM disks to minimise drive writes.

You can now install to a USB drive and run from that if it fails.

Cabledude

@stephenw10 said in eMMC Write endurance:

The new Net Installer can install to a second USB drive in the 1100 allowing pfSense to run from that should the eMMC fail.

Would it also be possible to attach a USB-powered SSD?

stephenw10

Theoretically yes. Though it's not something I've tried.

Cabledude

@stephenw10 said in eMMC Write endurance:

Theoretically yes. Though it's not something I've tried.

I will try it for you as soon as I have some time

beckp

Running pkg install mmc-utils on a SG-1100 gives me an error.
ld-elf.so.1: Shared object "libssl.so.30" not found, required by "pkg"
What did I do wrong?
Also tried pkg install -y mmc-utils; rehash per the Troubleshooting Disk Lifetime webpage. Same error.

stephenw10

Library errors like that usually imply it's using a pkg built for a different version.

So check your pfSense update branch matches the current version.

Cabledude

@Cabledude said in eMMC Write endurance:

@stephenw10 said in eMMC Write endurance:

Theoretically yes. Though it's not something I've tried.

I will try it for you as soon as I have some time

Hi @stephenw10,
I'm running into an issue using the net installer to install to USB-powered external SSD. Steps I've taken:

connect USB thumb drive with net installer to SG-1100 USB2 port (next to WAN port)
connect USB-powered external SSD to SG-1100 USB3 port (next to OPT port)
Note: the USB SSD drive is formatted in macOS using MS-DOS (FAT32)
power up device
run usbrecovery
The net installer halts. This is the output I get:

Hit any key to stop autoboot:  0 
Marvell>> run usbrecovery
switch to partitions #0, OK
mmc1(part 0) is current device

MMC erase: dev # 1, block # 0, count 4194304 ... 4194304 blocks erased: OK
resetting USB...
USB0:   Register 2000104 NbrPorts 2
Starting the controller
USB XHCI 1.00
USB1:   USB EHCI 1.00
scanning bus 0 for devices... 2 USB Device(s) found
scanning bus 1 for devices... 2 USB Device(s) found
       scanning usb for storage devices... 2 Storage Device(s) found
** Invalid partition 2 **
Marvell>>

FTR when I try without the ext USB drive the net installer does proceed as normal.

Please advise.

Edit: hang on, when I swap the USB drives the net installer does continue...

So now I get an option to select the ext USB SSD:

But when I hit Enter I instantly get this error message:

Any thoughts on why this happens? USB bus power issue? This SSD is known to only consume 1-2Watts.

...

So I tried an ordinary 8GB USB thumb drive, same kind I used for preparing the net installer. I get the same error message, i.e. "Failed to select the installation disk"

Okay I get it now. I should have put an X in front of the drive I wish to select. Duhhh. My bad.

stephenw10

Yup hit space to select it.

And, yes, it boots the USB3 drive as priority so if you have both connected at boot the installer must be there. But you can swap it back after install to get better drive speeds.

To boot from USB every time you need to change the bootcmd uboot env to run usbboot;

So at the Marvell>> prompt:

setenv bootcmd='run usbboot;'
saveenv
reset

Cabledude

@stephenw10 said in eMMC Write endurance:

Yup hit space to select it.

And, yes, it boots the USB3 drive as priority so if you have both connected at boot the installer must be there. But you can swap it back after install to get better drive speeds.

Cool

I seem to be out of luck again. I tried two different USB drives but I get new error messages which halt the installation process:
#1 installation 24.03 on a different thumb drive:

#2 installation 24.03 on the 120GB SSD:

Not sure if the screen shot is readable. It says "Child process terminated abnormally" and "Failed to reclaim memory"

What could be happening here now?

stephenw10

Hmm, I hit that once but just ran it again and it worked. The 1GB ram on the 1100 is near the limit.

Cabledude

@stephenw10
Yes I was starting to think it could be RAM full. Is it the net installer that occupies extra space in RAM? Is the SG-1100 even a viable option moving forward into 2025 and beyond? Especially if every new release may need more RAM to install?

Might it be an idea to install 23.09 through the net installer (maybe less/smaller files?) and then perform upgrade to 24.03 via GUI?

stephenw10

I would have expected a direct install to 24.03 to be lower requirement. I have been installing images to an 1100 for a few days and it should work.

JonathanLee

Disable logging that is not needed all the time, and or use a usb drive and set the system to log to it..

Cabledude

@JonathanLee said in eMMC Write endurance:

Disable logging that is not needed all the time, and or use a usb drive and set the system to log to it..

Thanks Jonathan. However this issue is about a fresh install to USB storage, bypassing the eMMC. Here, the installation fails i.e. RAM appears to be full during file copying to USB drive.

stephenw10

Is it consistently failing at the same point?

Cabledude

@stephenw10
No is failed at two different points. But installation finished successfully on the 3rd try, 2nd try with the external SSD as target drive.

Strangely, in the console startup of the new installation, the unit requires to change the default admin password from pfsense to a user chosen password. I've never seen that before.

Main thing is I got it working now.

So basically adding the SSD turns an EOL SG-1100 (EOL due to broken eMMC) back into a MINT unit, if I understand this correctly.

Cabledude

@stephenw10 said in eMMC Write endurance:

To boot from USB every time you need to change the bootcmd uboot env to run usbboot;

So at the Marvell>> prompt:
setenv bootcmd='run usbboot;'
saveenv
reset

Thanks for this by the way, yet at this point I don't understand what it's for. After the installation finished I unplugged the net installer thumb drive and swapped the SSD to the 1100's USB3 port and it is consistently booting from the SSD now.