SD card format woes

[Godmil]

TLDR: What is the best way to format a SDXC 128GB SD card for the pandora?


I'm dying to get Box86 working but first I need to download codeblocks.pnd, however I'm having no end of problems trying to get it. First the install from pnd manager kept crashing, I eventually worked out my old SD card was corrupt and windows can't fix it.
So I bought a new SD card, 128GB was really cheap, but I didn't realise it had formatting issues on the pandora. It came as exFat which the pandora couldn't read, the Panasonic SD formatter only seems to lets me format it in exFat. Windows lets me use NTFS which after installing the pandora codec pack, could be read by the Pandora.
I then used the pandora SD card utility on the card. However the Fat32 option makes the SD card be seen as 2GB (which is too small for codeblocks), so I tried the ext2 and ext4 options. However I had trouble staying on wifi long enough for the near 3gig download to complete. So tried transfering the pnd file from a PC, however the ext formats aren't detected by my PC.
So.... my question is: How should I format my SD card? Should I download some software to see if it can be done as Fat32 (but full size)? or should I keep it as NTFS, in which case can I use it properly with the pandora without putting it through the pandora SD card utility? (like can I just copy the default folder names and it will work?)

 

[ElPoco]

First of all, you have to be careful with cheap SD card. Unless they come from reliable sellers, they are often either corrupt cards or lower density cards that lie about their size.

You can find some information about sd card formatting for the Pandora here: https://pandorawiki.org/Formatting_SD_cards
I'd recommend using ext4 for codeblocks, because ext formats support features (like symbolic links) that might be needed.

FAT32 should support more than 2GB but I'm not sure if it supports 128GB.
Personally I have a 8GB FAT32 card that I use when I need to transfer stuff from a Windows computer to my Pandora

 

[Godmil]

Cool, thanks for the tips. It's a Sandisk card, I just couldn't believe how cheap cards are now compared to the last time I bought one

 

[elw3]

Reality check: If you keep insisting using windows somewhere in the process you wont accomplish anything in the software direction.
There is executive flag/file permissions and name collisions which will trouble you if you dont use a proper linux compatible file system.
Its this little annoying nags for example autocomplete in terminal will fail if your FS is fat simply because it cant tell if a file is runable. (let alone it will also refuse to run without force.)

So yee, use ext, none of the others make sense.

 

[TrashyMG]

I then used the pandora SD card utility on the card. However the Fat32 option makes the SD card be seen as 2GB (which is too small for codeblocks), so I tried the ext2 and ext4 options. However I had trouble staying on wifi long enough for the near 3gig download to complete. So tried transfering the pnd file from a PC, however the ext formats aren't detected by my PC.

Yeah I always need to download codeblocks on my laptop or desktop, just never have been successful downloading it on the Pandora...

If I recall I'm not sure if the Pandora can use ext4, ext3 was the newest I could run. I had to deal with this on my 1GHz the other day as it didn't read my Pyra SD cards, I have the latest superzaxxon and updated, but didn't have any of the ext4 options with mkfs and such. The Wiki says it can, but It may be drunk...

 

[HelenF]

There were issues with booting from EXT4 which are resolved in more recent OS versions. Code::Blocks will work best on EXT4. If the Pandora doesn't have the EXT4 formatting tools in the base OS (as TrashyMG suggested it might not), you can use the gparted PND. But do test your card first as ElPoco mentioned. You can use h2testw in Windows (with the card formatted as something usable by Windows) or f3 on the Pandora (no PND for that AFAIK but there are binaries around somewhere).

 

[Letalis Sonus]

FAT32 should support more than 2GB but I'm not sure if it supports 128GB.

With 4K sectors you can go up to 16 TiB with FAT32. Windows will just refuse to create it, so you need a different formatting tool that doesn't enforce such an artificial limit. The file size limit of 4 GiB is more of an issue.

Some cheaper SD cards may have some dirty FAT-specific optimizations in their FTL that can corrupt non-FAT filesystems (NTFS is also FAT-based).

 

[TeDaDeS]

With 4K sectors you can go up to 16 TiB with FAT32. Windows will just refuse to create it, so you need a different formatting tool that doesn't enforce such an artificial limit. The file size limit of 4 GiB is more of an issue.

Some cheaper SD cards may have some dirty FAT-specific optimizations in their FTL that can corrupt non-FAT filesystems (NTFS is also FAT-based).

I think the developer of this Windows FAT32 code mentioned he wrote the code a long long time ago when floppies still existed. This code was re-used till this day causing FAT32 to limit itself to 2GB.

 

[netcat]

Suggest an fs that supports symlinks often required to compile. Ext2 is good and lighterweight. If you need compatibility with a Mac (heaven forbid) use hfs+.

 

[Godmil]

I got it formatted to Ext4 and it seems to be working nicely, and I have an old Fat32 if I want to grab something from Windows. Thanks for the tips.