disk usage questions

cloud9

Member
We are always running very close to maximum disk usage on our 500G HDR.

I notice that the disk usage the web-if displays is different to what the HDR shows on the TV. And that the web-if can be zero and stay at sero even after deleting some things (while the native free space goes up after each delete. Is it a miscalculation, or is it allowing for some potential custom use, or some other reason?

I know I can telnet in and use du -sk, but it would be great if the dspace page would show the directories in the size order to see that info more easily.
 
I notice that the disk usage the web-if displays is different to what the HDR shows on the TV. And that the web-if can be zero and stay at sero even after deleting some things (while the native free space goes up after each delete. Is it a miscalculation, or is it allowing for some potential custom use, or some other reason?
By default the ext3 file system reserves 5% of free space for use by root (which is probably nott needed in this application) and I think this what is affecting the calculations.
 
Hmmm, it might be 5%, though I thought smaller than that, but will have to see when I get a chance to delete and check again.
e.g at present the web-if shows.
Total space: 447.6G
Used: 434.0G (100%)
Free: 0 (0%)
I can't check the native display at the moment but will try to record both figures next time I am deleting (if my wife doesn't wipe some).

Also, clearly the space is available, since as far as I know it is recording OK but the web-if stays at 0 even after some has been deleted (no undelete package). i.e. it seems to be a difference in how it is calculating free space.
 
The absolute values on the Humax and Web-If might be different due to the GB/GiB thing (1 GiB = 1.074 GB). I think in Web-If, 95% is regarded as full (due to the 5% reservation described by MartinLiddle): you have 3% of empty disc, hence Web-If shows 0% free.
 
So presumably some of that 5% reserved for for root, is being used then. I'm not so bothered about the %age but the absolute GB remaining. i.e. the web-if claims 0, which if true means I need to do some emergency deletion/moving. If I actually have 5 hours (SD) left then I can be a bit more relaxed (I might have until Wednesday to delete or move. I suspect it is using the figures from the OS since I notice the large partition sda2 claims 100% in df (though seems to be about 14 GB) -

humax# df -m
Filesystem 1M-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/root 17 17 0 100% /
tmpfs 61 0 61 0% /tmp
tmpfs 61 0 61 0% /media
/dev/mtdblock1 2 1 1 26% /var/lib/humaxtv
/dev/mtdblock2 2 1 1 61% /var/lib/humaxtv_backup
/dev/sda1 1011 48 912 5% /mnt/hd1
/dev/sda2 458343 444400 0 100% /mnt/hd2
/dev/sda3 10084 223 9349 2% /mnt/hd3

I suspect the Humax TV view shows the 14GB i.e. does it's own calculations.
 
We are always running very close to maximum disk usage on our 500G HDR.
Why? Are you using it as a FIFO buffer and now have 100+ hours of material waiting to be watched? Do you have time in your diary when the material will fill the gap? Maybe you're worried the broadcasters will stop supplying anything worth watching and need a filler.

I realise this sounds cheeky but it is meant to be. If you accumulate stuff that fills a 500GB disk, it's only a matter of time before you fill a 2TB disk. Most likely you have a library of films that you have already seen but don't want to delete. The key is to archive material such as this onto an external drive (500GB portable drive, approx £50) and free up your Humax for time-shifting. If you have not watched that soap a week after recording it, chances are you won't watch it at all and can delete it. Running at (on average) 50% capacity saves many headaches.
 
I thought someone might comment. Yes, we have a problem of recording faster than we watch at the moment. Mostly due to children (that increases the amount recorded and decreases the amount of time to watch stuff). I wasn't asking for more space (though that may end up being the slightly longer term solution of I can figure out a reasonable way), I just run at 90-95% of the disk most of the time. So the difference between 5% and 0% free is huge to me.
 
!?! that's a rather strange view of it. Yes I only have max 25G leeway at present on how much to record more than deleting (or vica-verca really since I don't have a lot of control over recording). But as you point out, no matter how much space you have you need to be deleting as much as you record or eventually you will have a problem. I get forced into doing smaller tidy ups more often. Or my wife does more major clear outs of dramas, documentaries, etc she has recorded (no soaps that I can think of). If I had more time to sort it out, it might have more space free (one way or another).

Anyway, any comments on my second point, could the dspace page show the items in usage order?
 
One solution is to use Undelete and delete everything as soon as it records. Then you know you have limited time to watch it or lose it.

Bit like iPlayer actually :)
 
Actually, for serial squirrels perhaps af could make a package called 'Half-life' that runs the Undelete timeout system on the whole disc automatically.
 
@MikeSh, hah - no that's not what I want, though an interesting suggestion.
Perhaps a dummy run of expire would be useful to see what I should consider deleting manually (or asking my wife about).

(And possibly look into an external drive as BH suggests - sorry didn't pick up that properly before, but not sure how much we could "archive").
 
If you have undelete installed, the WebIF auto-expire setting (available for any particular folder; I use it to keep a rolling set of news programmes) would normally send deleted items to a wastebasket folder, but with hardly any disk space left undelete shuts down and any deletions become unrecoverable.

Particularly if you are a CF user, and even if you are not, I am entirely serious in saying that 90% disk utilisation is cramping your usage. You are forced into a 500GB limit by the physical capacity of the disk, so you must be making choices at this stage what to keep and what to ditch. It's only a small step to accept a notional 400GB limit and thus have some disk capacity for undelete or other emergencies.

Don't record anything you don't have time to watch. If it's recorded, watch it. When you've watched it, delete it. If you've watched it and want to keep it for the future, off-load it. Otherwise you will be forever maxing out your capacity, however big the disk is.
 
Sound advice, BH.

Although, SWMBO, trawls through the TVTimes and asks me to record things that takes her fancy. Needless to say, there is rather a lot of what I would classify as dross recorded. For example, the WHOLE of Dancing on Ice 2010!!! She will not let me delete it.

Each to their own.

That is one reason why I have a HDR for her and one for me! (plus a spare).
 
A possible solution in a single-HDR situation (sad, I know) is for each user to have a USB drive, and anything they want to keep for "later" must be transferred to that drive (forcing a decision what is worth keeping and what is not).
 
A possible solution in a single-HDR situation (sad, I know) is for each user to have a USB drive

Or a NAS. Or two. Or FTP the files off and compress them to WMV or such like. That way you can store more than you could ever watch. How many of us keep all those books we ever bought and read, just in case we might want to read them again one day?
 
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