Messages in this thread | | | Date | Tue, 21 Mar 2006 12:01:45 -0500 | From | John Richard Moser <> | Subject | Lifetime of flash memory |
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I have a kind of dumb question. I keep hearing that "USB Flash Memory" or "Compact Flash Cards" and family have "a limited number of writes" and will eventually wear out. Recommendations like "DO NOT PUT A SWAP FILE ON USB MEMORY" have come out of this. In fact, quoting Documentation/laptop-mode.txt:
* If you're worried about your data, you might want to consider using a USB memory stick or something like that as a "working area". (Be aware though that flash memory can only handle a limited number of writes, and overuse may wear out your memory stick pretty quickly. Do _not_ use journalling filesystems on flash memory sticks.)
The question I have is, is this really significant? I have heard quoted that flash memory typically handles something like 3x10^18 writes; and that compact flash cards, USB drives, SD cards, and family typically have integrated control chipsets that include wear-leveling algorithms (built-in flash like in an iPaq does not; hence jffs2). Should we really care that in about 95 billion years the thing will wear out (assuming we write its entire capacity once a second)?
I call FUD.
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