USB Un-mounting randomly / settings lost

1st Official Post

    I'm not sure where to start with this one so appreciate any help. I've 2 Gigabyte Brix 3000 units booting from USB which are running LEv7.0.2. I'm using the DVBlink PVR & EMBY client add-ons but that's it. Both units are controlled using the Kore android app. I was using Yatse but switch to Kore to rule it out.

    From time to time (could be days between events) I see a message pop up on the screen saying 'removable storage unmounted' followed quickly by 'remove storage mounted' (or word to that effect). The box continues to run as does Kodi itself but the filesytem I'm guessing has gone readonly as settings will no longer toggle, new content isn't added from emby, guide wont update, etc, until I perform a reboot.

    Once I reboot some settings are lost (home screen layout, playback preferences, etc) but everything functions again until the next pop up. I used to run OE on these and didn't have the issue. I've ruled out the USB devices by replacing both and the issue remains. I've also tried reinstalling both boxes from scratch and again it comes back.

    What logs can I provided that may assist? Thanks in advance.

    • Official Post

    The OS boots into RAM if there is >=1GB so it's possible to remove boot media and the system will continue to run, but this will make the persistent /storage area unavailable and when it reappears after unclean dismount the kernel will consider the partition to be dirty and remounts it read-only to prevent data corruption issues. This prevents Emby from making ad-hoc saves, and Kodi (Jarvis) only saves it's settings on shutdown, so when you reboot to solve the issue any changes since previous boot are lost.

    If it was 1/2 boxes I'd guess dodgy USB ports or USB sticks, but if it's 2/2 and you've already swapped the USB sticks it's either something in hardware like a BIOS or PSU issue that results in interrupted power to the USB ports, or it's software. If it's something in software, it's some kind of kernel level bug that probably doesn't leave much trace: "journalctl --no-pager -b -1" will show the previous boot journal including the diconnect/reconnect, but i'd be surprised if anything is revealed; and I'd be surprised if really was a software issue.

    As general advice: I worked for several companies who released products that boot from USB/SD media and a myriad of issues have been miraculously resolved the second they reverted to using old-fashioned spinning rust or SSD's. We don't advocate long-term use of removable media, as while it can be done, the underlying media is not designed for it. I personally consider all USB/SD installations to be temporary. It's never about if things will go wrong, only a matter of when it takes place.

    Thanks for the detailed response. Yes my fear was having to switch to SSDs and was simply reluctant to do so due to cost and the waste aspect (I've nothing locally to store on the SSDs everything is on my server).

    • Official Post

    eBay shows "KingDian" 8GB SSD's for £10 delivered from HK to the UK, so postage to Ireland should be similar. They won't be taxing a brand-name device for ultimate speed or long-term reliability, but LE runs in RAM after boot anyway, and at that price who cares. You can buy three and have one spare..