The best OS to deal with Flash Cards

[Christopher Browne]

On 8/25/05, Jamon Camisso <jamon.camisso-H217xnMUJC0sA/PxXw9srA at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> Sy wrote:
> > On 8/23/05, Howard Gibson <hgibson-MwcKTmeKVNQ at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> >
> >>   If only XP understood ext3.  Or would that make ext3 evil.  :(
> >
> >
> > Does anyone know of an ext2 driver for Windows.. I seem to remember
> > hearing about such a thing...
> > <google>
> > http://e2fsprogs.sourceforge.net/ext2.html
> >
> > http://www.yipton.demon.co.uk/
> > # FSDEXT2 --- A (read-only) ext2 filesystem driver for Windows 95,
> > implemented as Windows 95 File System Driver (FSD). This driver is
> > maintained by Peter van Sebille (pese-Cy+3ovh/KPEjqkaaLfIQMvP6llvjuJOh at public.gmane.org).
> >
> > http://www.sourceforge.net/projects/ext2fsd
> > # Ext2fsd, An ext2 filesystem driver for Windows NT/2K/XP. The most
> > recent version has read-write support.
> >
> How about reiserfs? Anyone familiar with this driver?
> http://rfsd.sourceforge.net/

It seems to me that a journalling filesystem is the very last thing I
want to use on a flash card which has the vital property of limited
numbers of writes that can be applied to it.

The journal is, by its nature, designed to be a "hot spot" on the disk
that is updated extremely heavily, which will, by its design, shorten
the lifespan of the flash device.

For a flash device, there are only three filesystems I'd consider:

1.  VFAT - because so many kinds of devices understand it including my
PalmOS device and even my digital camera

2.  ext2 - because various OSes can mount it, including Linux,
Windows, and *BSD.

3.  minixfs - not as easily portable, but a very simple filesystem for
what amounts to a "big floppy disk".  And there are "minitools" for
DOS as well as a FreeBSD 4.x driver...

VFAT is at the top of that list, BTW...  I may despise it as a choice
for use on one's "system hard drive," but as an extension of the CP/M
filesystems originally created for use with small disks, there is
actually a decent fit between design/purpose and use, for this
application...
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