[SOLVED] gvfs: USB transfer slow

[wuxmedia]

Just to butt in after all the fun, thunar still seems to mount stuff after a gvfs purge.

[machinebacon]

Because it uses udisks2.

[wuxmedia]

ok for my own reference, after a reboot, no gvfs makes thunar no worky, put the gvfs backends in and thunar can see/mount my tablet.

[ivanovnegro]

Solved but I will jump in. The slow tranfer rate is something I am living forever with. I stopped to care on this old laptop.

But gvfs-backends is indeed not needed for Thunar to work properly or even to automount stuff. Gvfs only seems to be needed for non-Grillmeisters. ;)

[GekkoP]

After other random tests on Elektra (always via CLI):
- ntfs: mounting with ntfs-3g, fast and smooth;
- fat16: transfer works. Slow, but it has always been like this AFAIR, and I got only one old fat16 USB stick so whatever;
- fat32: weird beast. Sometimes it works (though on Coal is faster, despite PC's older than my laptop), others it just goes slow.

kernel's not the issue, gvfs changes speed transfer only with fat16.
Since I don't need fat32 sticks, I'll just format them all to ntfs. It's the only one giving me no problems at all.

[xaos52]

^ Could be a driver problem. when it is slow check if kernel module uhci is loaded instead of ehci using the 'lsmod' command.

[GekkoP]

Here's what I got.

Code: Select all

uhci_hcd               16306  0 
ehci_pci                2664  0 
ehci_hcd               29572  1 ehci_pci
usbcore               113052  6 uhci_hcd,uvcvideo,usb_storage,ehci_hcd,ehci_pci,usbhid

[GekkoP]

Again, other tests, and now I got decent transfer speed mounting fat32 stick with this line

Code: Select all

sudo mount -t vfat /dev/sdb1 /media/usb -o async,uid=1000,gid=1000,utf8,dmask=027,fmask=137

[xaos52]

Code: Select all

usbcore               113052  6 uhci_hcd,uvcvideo,usb_storage,ehci_hcd,ehci_pci,usbhid

This is the one that matters. uhci_hcd has been loaded before ehci-hcd, and you will get poor performance.
In that case try to unload uhci_hcd.

In some circumstances - perhaps depending on which usb slot you use first, or which usb device, the slower driver will be loaded - and used - first.

Search for 'uhci ehci' for more information.

Ah, the 'async' mount argument plays an important role too. Mounting a usb device 'sync' will make it a lot slower.

[GekkoP]

Thanks, I'll check those modules then and remember to use async.