Thumb drive ext2 slow write speed

[Nils Kassube]

Nigel Ridley wrote:
> It is a 'SanDisk Cruzer Micro Skin' 

I couldn't find technical specifications for it's write speed. Therefore I 
would assume it should be the same speed as other low cost flash disks. I 
found several different low cost USB sticks which were rated at 5MB/s 
write speed. Only expensive ones were rated at higher speeds. So your 
1MB/s might be really too slow. I would suggest you try FAT32 because USB 
sticks are usually made for FAT32. Maybe there is some extra logic inside 
which improves FAT32 write speed. If it doesn't improve your write speed 
you might return to ext2.

> and it specifically says that it is 
> "Hi-speed USB 2.0 Flash Drive" and that it "Hi-speed USB 2.0 port
> required for high speed data transfer".
>
> My Inspirion 1525 definitely has a hi-speed USB 2.0 port.

Well, high speed is really vague, isn't it? OTOH, 1MB/s would be 8Mbit/s 
and if you add the USB protocol overhead you are near the 12Mbit/s limit 
of USB 1.1. Which reminds me of the USB hub I once had. If you have the 
USB stick connected via a hub, check that the hub really is USB 2.0 
capable.

But you need USB 2.0 even if the maximum write speed really is 1MB/s 
because the read speed of flash memory is much higher than the write 
speed.


Nils