PC Engines APU4C4 Experience
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@gtrdriver Looking at the error message again... could there be an issue with the partition? Did you remove the existing partitions and try a clean installation?
I did read about the attempt to reinstall in your comment - but it once happened to me that I accidentally didn't boot from the USB stick but straight from the SSD... It looked like I was booting from USB but I wasn't. This happend after a power issue some time ago.
I am running BIOS 10.0.0. I am using one of those mSATA SSDs of 16 GB.
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Hi
First of all - im sure that this happen on USB Boot !
I tryed this 5 Fimes and for security i created a new USB Media ...Perhaps The Installer "see" the bad Partition and Crash - dont know ...
Booting from the Debian Live Stick worked fine - then downgraded Bios and Attemp new Boot works fine then ... (Still with the bad parition ...)
So - after all - im nocht 100% sure but 95% ...
Second:
After some Tests im realy Impressed about this box:
Here we have 2 100Mbit VDSL Modems and use Wan1 and Wan2 with Load Balancing - works fine.
But more Impressed im about the OpenVPN PerformanceI use the Box to Connect to a Virtialised PFSENSE (Fat Host Hardware) in a DataCenter for S2S VPN
Do some Tests with Iperf:
85Mbit Down / 32Mbit Up in TcpIp Mode
88Mbit Down / 34Mbit Up in UDP ModeI think when i put the Overhead of OpenVPN to this results im Near to the Max Cap of one of our Lines (and we dont get 100/40mbit - i think its 98/36Mbit)
The Results are Steady even after much more Tests.
The Best thing is that in Real User Practise (We use RDP 8.x to Connect to Remote Windows Server in Datacenter i can Stream a Youtube Video over RDP in Fullscreen with arround 40-60Mbit/s over VPN in UDP Mode without any Issues
And RDP is not the Best Way to Stream a video ...This is not our Business Case but when a Fullscreen Video run Smooth than 15 RDP Workers can run Office and Craphical Tools smooth over a simple 100Mbit Connection with VPN.
With our old Hardware we had Dropouts on such Payloads.
Now i Hope this Kind of Box runs stable....
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@gtrdriver
That is a filesystem error. Almost certainly nothing to do with the Coreboot update.https://docs.netgate.com/pfsense/en/latest/hardware/troubleshooting-disk-check-errors-fsck.html#manually-run-fsck
Steve
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Just a hint:
To the best of my knowledge the APU family has no power button, but from time to time one has to power down, certainly after a bios update, as this is highly recommended. I have encountered many that power down using the power cord, which is understandable, but this may result in file system damage. The best way is to use the "Halt System" option in the GUI and wait until the system is powered down fully. It can take up to 5 minutes until all LED's are off, but this way you are certain that the system powers down gracefully.
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Hi
I think (but don't know) that this is one of the differences to their own negate devices (special arm)
I think they use other file system methods to avoid this. (Ro temp and so on....)
I also think not every power loss will END ON A damaged file system.
Here I use usv ....
Does anyone know if those apu devices have a watchdog which works with pfsense ?
Or does the original arm netgate devices have a watchdog ?
In terms of price this kind of apu devices are same price as the sg1100
If I'm understand right the sg1100 have also a 2.5gbps backplate for the 3 Ethernet devices ...
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One of the things I personally like about the APU is that they use Intel NIC's
https://pcengines.ch/apu2.htm
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Personaly i agree but I think if you have original pfsense hardware I think this should also be stable
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Such filesystem errors due to power outage seem to occur with UFS only.
Install pfSense with ZFS and you will be relaxed. That was recommended here already many times. -
@viragomann Please see the following excellent document: https://teklager.se/en/knowledge-base/pfsense-ufs-filesystem-corruption-after-power-loss/
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@bouke
I agree with that. That affirms what I wrote above.ZFS seems to be very robust against power outage (incomplete write processes). I'm running pfSense on ZFS at home for almost two years and had recently multiple power outage due to a fault device a week ago with no effect to pfSense. It boots up and does its job every time when the power come back.
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Did a
/root: fstyp -l /dev/gptid/091891e1-98b3-11e8-9310-000db9416710 ufsBummer, seems I did not choose ZFS during install
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Yes, try to halt the box before powering off (unmount the filesystem) if you can.
If you are installing somewhere that cannot guaranty power stability then I suggest moving /var and /tmp to RAM drives minimising drive writes and therefore the chances of writing a critical file when power is lost.
Steve
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Is there any reason why Auto (UFS) Guided Disk Setup is on top in the partitioning setup and Auto(ZFS) Guided Root-on-ZFS is way below in the pfSense Installer, as most will enter through the setup and thus choose the first?
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That Question ist very Interesting.
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UFS is the supported install type at this time. It's likely we will move to ZFS as the default at some point but currectly the vast majority of installs are UFS and that's what we test against.
I'm not aware of any issues with ZFS though, I have several boxes running that.Steve
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Thanks Steve, from what I remember UFS is the default Unix file system and ZFS is open source, but that's al I know, as I have more experience with ext3/4. So as those filesystems are a bit out of my wheelhouse, is there anything to say pro or contra, apart from the "auto repairing" that ZFS seems to have, when using a 16GB SSD durable and fast Solid state drive?
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Well not much beyond UFS is far more tested and uses less resouces. ZFS uses significantly more resources but is far better at recovering from data loss or not losing it in the first place!
I'm far from an expert there either.Steve
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Hello
I just made some tests today - on APU Board with a mSata ZFS Installation works like a Charm - fine !
I also Tryed to install ZFS VErsion on a APU Board with a SD Card and here it seem that ZFS dont work - is that possible ?
The ZFS Installer report a Error - but no more ...Installation on SD witz Default UFS runs fine ...
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Not sure I've ever tried that. What size/type of card? What was the error?
Steve
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@gtrdriver said in PC Engines APU4C4 Experience:
Hello
I just made some tests today - on APU Board with a mSata ZFS Installation works like a Charm - fine !
I also Tryed to install ZFS VErsion on a APU Board with a SD Card and here it seem that ZFS dont work - is that possible ?
The ZFS Installer report a Error - but no more ...Installation on SD witz Default UFS runs fine ...
I would not recommend to use a SD card like this. My estimated guess is that the SD card will wear out very soon if you are able to format it ZFS. That said: I guess the SD card is too slow compared to an SSD. I would UFS format it and use RAM disk. On the other hand: a RAM disk isn't really feasible with 4GB RAM.
I would stick with an SSD. I normally format these UFS if there's a UPS available. I will format ZFS if there isn't any.
