USB on Retropie , Can they over heat ?
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Hi Guys,
Im looking at moving my ROMS to a USB on my PI B3+. I have purchased the below from amazon.
Has anyone tired these USB's out , should I be worried about heating issues?
I picked the below as it will be well hidden in my retroflag case. -
I’ve used “Ultrafit” Sandisc before- they do overheat somewhat, but only the usb, which I can’t help but think isn’t healthy. The model you’re looking at is different to mine so perhaps they’ve resolved that issue. I use a 4tb drive now, which has the advantage of going into rest mode as I leave it on all the time but won’t help with fitting in your case:( (mine looked like this
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i really do not understand why anyone would use a usb stick instead of just getting a larger sd card.
is there even anything to be saved money wise these days?
i doubt it be faster to load from usb and having over 60-100gb of games on a raspberry will just result in longer boot times and a somewhat laggy menu anyway. -
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@Rion
that doesnt change the fact that using a usb stick is most likely slower than an sd card and that you can get an sd card same size for about same price.
not to mention all the problems that (can) come with it.also, the menu will still be more sluggish the more games you have installed, especially on a raspberry with limited resources.
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The difference is negligible.
If you setup is running slow inside emulationstation then you should probably re- scrape you're assets to a lower quality, you can't hardly see the difference on a TV.
I'm going to quote @pjft from this thread.
I find that reading from the SD card is in general slower than reading from the USB drive so if you'd have the chance to move the images and the gamelist paths to point to the USB drive, just to test for one of the systems, for instance, that would be interesting to see.
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@Halvhjearne said in USB on Retropie , Can they over heat ?:
@Rion
that doesnt change the fact that using a usb stick is most likely slower than an sd card and that you can get an sd card same size for about same price.
not to mention all the problems that (can) come with it.https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/19058/microsd-vs-usb-thumbdrive probably has discussed the things in detail as well, with more informed people than me.
But @Rion is spot on - these days the difference is negligible, though I have had better experience with them running from a USB drive.
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@Rion said in USB on Retropie , Can they over heat ?:
The difference is negligible.
really?
... do you even read my posts?that was exactly my point, when i statet this:
@Halvhjearne said in USB on Retropie , Can they over heat ?:
i really do not understand why anyone would use a usb stick instead of just getting a larger sd card.
is there even anything to be saved money wise these days?also its more of a hassle to install retropie with a usb stick that will reliable mount on every boot.
this is what i said from the beginning, not exactly sure what rion is trying to prove.
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@Halvhjearne said in USB on Retropie , Can they over heat ?:
... do you even read my posts?
you said:
that doesnt change the fact that using a usb stick is most likely slower than an sd card
anyway, forget speed if you want. there's a load more reasons: https://github.com/RetroPie/RetroPie-Setup/wiki/Running-ROMs-from-a-USB-drive
also its more of a hassle to install retropie with a usb stick that will reliable mount on every boot.
hardly. see link.
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@Halvhjearne said in USB on Retropie , Can they over heat ?:
also its more of a hassle to install retropie with a usb stick that will reliable mount on every boot.
I personally never had any issue mounting a USB stick that reliably mounts, and have been at it for the better part of 2 years across 3 Raspberry Pis. Happy to try to help - one thing that did stump me at one time was the fstab flag "1" for running fcsk on the volume before mounting as it would indeed cause the drive to not mount in time on occasion. Changing it to zero solved it.
Also, the SD cards would fail more frequently, and it'd be a pain to restore all the ROMs, videos, etc whereas right now if the SD card fails I just reinstall RetroPie and with minimal configuration changes I have things up and running as intended.
The USB drive is also formatted in a format that's readable in my computer (ExFAT in this case) and that makes it a lot easier to transfer ROMS and media, as well as back it up.
So, for me, given the option, I'd go for USB drives all the way. But it's personal preference.
I don't think anyone is considering a USB drive because of price. I believe @Rion 's comments were in regards to you stating
@Halvhjearne said in USB on Retropie , Can they over heat ?:
i doubt it be faster to load from usb and having over 60-100gb of games on a raspberry will just result in longer boot times and a somewhat laggy menu anyway.
and
@Halvhjearne said in USB on Retropie , Can they over heat ?:
that doesnt change the fact that using a usb stick is most likely slower than an sd card and that you can get an sd card same size for about same price.
not to mention all the problems that (can) come with it.
also, the menu will still be more sluggish the more games you have installed, especially on a raspberry with limited resources.I'm pretty sure he was trying to help and also clarify any misconceptions around the USB being slower.
As for the original topic, I have a 64GB sandisk drive, USB 2.0, not quite that one, and it has been extremely reliable. It heats up a bit but not a lot.
I have one of the Pis with a Lexar 128GB 3.0 ultra fit drive and that one heats up a bit more. Never really worried me a lot, but worth mentioning. I don't think it'll heat up to a point that it becomes dangerous though.
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@pjft said in USB on Retropie , Can they over heat ?:
Also, the SD cards would fail more frequently, and it'd be a pain to restore all the ROMs, videos, etc whereas right now if the SD card fails I just reinstall RetroPie and with minimal configuration changes I have things up and running as intended.
Exactly! That's the main reason!
Also, the SD cards would fail more frequently, and it'd be a pain to restore all the ROMs, videos, etc whereas right now if the SD card fails I just reinstall RetroPie and with minimal configuration changes I have things up and running as intended.
Well not at all. It's very likely that the controller on the USB device is more advanced in organizing write sessions as the odd (afaik) often not specified "wear leveling" on SD cards (cheap ones)
The USB drive is also formatted in a format that's readable in my computer (ExFAT in this case) and that makes it a lot easier to transfer ROMS [...]
Exactly! And ExFAT orFAT32 should be the choice for exchange with Windows and Mac systems. If you use NTFS your read and write speed goes down if it's put in the Raspberry to a few KB/s.
As for the original topic, I have a 64GB sandisk drive, USB 2.0, not quite that one, and it has been extremely reliable.
+1 - I've the 64GB Sandisk MiniCruser, fits inside the Retroflag SNES housing!
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wow, you guys are really in love with your usb sticks, defending them with life and limbs ...
so what you are saying is that usbmount reliable mounts on every boot or that it is easier for a newcommer to linux to edit fstab than just transfer roms over network?
if you edit fstab it will obviusly mount perfectly on each boot, but imo you cannot rely on everyone to know or understand how to edit fstab.
tbh i doubt that there is really much of a diffrence today in speed, cost or reliability using a brand new usb stick vs sdcard considdering it is most likely using somewhat same chips and it is therefore up to the sdcard reader vs the controller on the usb stick which could arguably be marginally better on a usb stick than the raspberry, considdering it might be newer/better.
however, considdering that it will be using usb 2.0, i doubt there will be a major diffrence if any anyway.
a really high end sd card will most likely outperform a low end usb stick and vice versa,, high end sd card and high end usb sticks will most likely perform somewhat the same at about same price range, so in my oppinion it is just easier to just use a decent sd card and not have the hassle of editing anything (more than neccessary).however i do agree and see your point, that it might be easier for a windows user to have a drive you can actually read in windows.
but considdering i dont use windows it isnt really a problem for me personally as i can just pop in the sd card in my computer and read it.
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