These are the cheap AndroidTV 6 boxes you can find on eBay, Amazon, Walmart, et al. I'm not concerned with rooting the device, from what I've read that's not possible (at least not if you don't want it permanently tethered to a PC). I am interested in using an external hard drive as external (_NOT_ internal) storage without having to format it FAT32, is that possible?
My issue is, I have a Seagate external hard drive that I would like to use both as a general backup device, and as portable storage for my movie and music collection. My desktop PC runs Ubuntu Linux and I do have files I would like to backup that require (or at least would benefit from) a filesystem that is case-sensitive and preserves Linux permissions. I've tried formatting the drive as ext2, 3 and 4 on my desktop PC and AndroidTV recognizes it, but will not mount it, I only have the options to prepare the drive as "Internal" or "External" storage. If I prepare it as internal storage, I find that it's formatted as FAT32 with a similar directory structure as the SD card in my Android phone. If I prepare it as external storage, I find that there is a single partition that my desktop sees as "unknown" (I'm assuming it's an encrypted ext2, 3 or 4 fs). Partitioning doesn't help, I've tried splitting the drive evenly between FAT32 and ext4 partitions and my AndroidTV box can see and mount the FAT32 partition but cannot safely unmount it (I'm assuming because of the second partition that it can't do anything with).
Is there anything I can do, without rooting the device, to get it to recognize ext2, 3 or 4 (or literally _any_ other Linux compatible, case-sensitive filesystem) as external storage?
I suggest use plex server on Ubuntu and let the hdd always connected to Ubuntu. Access media content from plex app on mi box
I suggest to check out Emby
It is an open source media server which worth a try.
Mi Box different models. consfused please help!!
The Mi Box reviews are available all over the internet.
But it is becoming very difficult for a noob like me to understand what features are there in each model.
I have been looking at MDZ-16AB, 3C, 3S etc. it is very confusing to understand which is predecessor of whom.
One comparison that i see here but is has completely different naming convention to understand
hxxp://attach.en.miui.com/forum/201412/03/225910cbuzbykhqtaqx7a7.png.thumb.jpg
Then there is one Mi Box which is avialable with SD card option, OTG option, which version is this?
hxxp://bdbazaar24.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/181046tub3kg5xvt8v28vv.jpg
Can someone please tell which version is the best? I plan to use it overseas and buy it in US.
Any other box that I should consider (I wish to have Google Cast functionality in that box)
Please help.
Related
just wondering if any smart devs have any thoughts on this:
When the Atrix (or i suppose any android device) is in usb storage mode it runs as a simple mass storage device.
So is it possible to boot a PC from the atrix like you would boot a portable OS (Ubuntu, WinPE, ect) from a USB flash drive?
The SD card or the Internal storage has the room for it, but i don't know how you'd go about making either a bootable device.
It'd be a good diagnostic tool when fixing PCs, and along with webtop would make it a awesome tool to use as a tech.
cglowstick said:
just wondering if any smart devs have any thoughts on this:
When the Atrix (or i suppose any android device) is in usb storage mode it runs as a simple mass storage device.
So is it possible to boot a PC from the atrix like you would boot a portable OS (Ubuntu, WinPE, ect) from a USB flash drive?
The SD card or the Internal storage has the room for it, but i don't know how you'd go about making either a bootable device.
It'd be a good diagnostic tool when fixing PCs, and along with webtop would make it a awesome tool to use as a tech.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was thinking about this actually.
I think we have to first partion the SD card and install the portable OS on one of those partions.
I don't have an atrix yet but I'm going to try something with my older phone I think I can make this work just give me sometime.
Any luck with this?
I plan on trying GParted (free GUI disk partition editor)... http://gparted.sourceforge.net/
It offers quite an array of filesystem options including, but not limited to:
ext2 / ext3 / ext4
fat16 / fat32
linux-swap
ntfs
ufs
xfs
I'm not sure if my rooted AT&T Atrix will reject my attempts to create an ntfs partition, or if GParted will even recognize it. But it's still worth a try
Bob
I wanted to buy a 32GB Class 10 card for my GS2, so I can watch movies at my friends houses. That is one of the main reasons I bought this phone. Mostly all of my movies are .MKV files around 8-10GB, but I read somewhere that you can only have videos under 4GB. I understand that is true for Fat32, is that how the SD card will function in the GS2? Is their no way to get it to take larger files? If not I'll just get a 16GB and save some money.
Their is no other format or something that can be done so it will take larger movies?
It might be possible to hack it up to support ext4, but then you'll only be able to read/write the SD card from the phone or a Linux box.
Okay I guess I'll just buy a 16gb since the movies can only be under 4gb
Convert it to ext4 and use this on the windows box. http://www.ubuntugeek.com/how-to-read-ext3ext4-linux-partition-from-windows-7.html
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I777 using xda premium
Okay I'm a noob, so I don't fully understand all of this.
ext4, is a newer format that allows large files?
So android phones can read Fat32 and ext4?
The phone can format in ext4 or you have to use windows for that?
is their any problems with ext4, slow speed problems righting too, not to stable?
Also if I format it to ext4, and I hook it up to my PC, can windows read that? or every PC i'm gonna need some special software to view the SD?
dfxda said:
Okay I'm a noob, so I don't fully understand all of this.
ext4, is a newer format that allows large files?
So android phones can read Fat32 and ext4?
The phone can format in ext4 or you have to use windows for that?
is their any problems with ext4, slow speed problems righting too, not to stable?
Also if I format it to ext4, and I hook it up to my PC, can windows read that? or every PC i'm gonna need some special software to view the SD?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Ext4 is a filesystem that allows large files, just like NTFS on Windows. Ext4 is the standard filesystem on newer Linux distributions. (Just like its predecessors ext2 and ext3 were). Even ext2 supports large files.
Unfortunately, the situation is that NTFS support on Linux is so-so, and ext4 support on Windows is even poorer. I'm not sure if the solution in the link above will allow write access to ext4 safely - I know as of 2-3 years ago it could read ext3 but not write, it could only write ext2.
Ext4 is vastly superior to FAT - that's why our phone uses it for all of its "non-USB-mountable" filesystems, and why Honeycomb devices use it for "unified" storage. To avoid the issue of ext4 support in Windows, they use MTP instead of USB Mass Storage mode, as MTP is file-oriented (hides the underlying filesystem from the host machine), while USB Mass Storage is block-oriented (the host machine must understand the filesystem format).
I think our phones support MTP, but I'm not sure how well this would play with an "ext4" hack since that wasn't designed into our phone.
Anyway - We have an 800x480 screen, anything above 1GB/hour is going to just be a waste of storage. (Unless you're using an MHL adapter to connect to an HDMI TV.)
My main goal was to be able to copy my 1080p .KMV movies to the SD and play them out at peoples houses using MHL adapter to TV.
So then I can't use NTFS? that's what I use on all my other drives. Is android not able to read that?
dfxda said:
My main goal was to be able to copy my 1080p .KMV movies to the SD and play them out at peoples houses using MHL adapter to TV.
So then I can't use NTFS? that's what I use on all my other drives. Is android not able to read that?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Not directly. It's possible to compile it into the kernel but I'm not sure how well it'll work.
There's also FUSE and ntfs-3g, but again - not sure how well those will work on an Android device, I've only used ntfs-3g on desktop machines.
Both would require kernel tweaks and probably also initramfs tweaks unless you want to do a lot of manual mounting, I'll try to look at it when I have the time.
Hey thanks for all the help.
I guess then I'll just get the 16gb, and use the fat32 that's made for the phone.
kinda stinks though
Hi there.
I think that all android devices support fat32 filesystem, the problems its the storage limitation of 4gb max per file in the sdcard.
I been trying to avoid the limitation of 4gb in all my android devices with this results, giving using different filesystems on my sdcard (ext2, ext3, exfat, ntfs...).
Galaxy s3: supports fat32 and exfat
Chinese tablet aoson m7: Suppots fat32 and ntfs
Chinese phone Lenono A760: Suppots only fat32.
Andoid its based on linux, but none of my devices recognice the sdcard with ext2 or ext3 formats.
Also I don't understand why only the chinese tablet supports NTFS. It's because they paid to microsoft so they can use that filesystem?
How it's possible that any device supports a free filesystem like ext3???
I think that I will get rid of the lenovo a760...I need to use files larger than 4gb.
thank you
Looks like you could root it and enable USB OTG support for a little pen drive or something of that sort. How often are you really going to need that many files bigger than 4 GB on your phone?
http://android-sensor.com/Lenovo_A760/programs/system_software/78-usb-otg-helper-root.html (use Google Translate if you can't read Czech - I know I can't lol)
that link leads to:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.shajul.usbotg
To mount ext partitions automatically, I think you also have to be rooted and run an auto-mount script (or manually via terminal commands). This is not for your phone, but provided as an example and info:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2076327
es0tericcha0s said:
Looks like you could root it and enable USB OTG support for a little pen drive or something of that sort. How often are you really going to need that many files bigger than 4 GB on your phone?
http://android-sensor.com/Lenovo_A760/programs/system_software/78-usb-otg-helper-root.html (use Google Translate if you can't read Czech - I know I can't lol)
that link leads to:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.shajul.usbotg
To mount ext partitions automatically, I think you also have to be rooted and run an auto-mount script (or manually via terminal commands). This is not for your phone, but provided as an example and info:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2076327
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks, I want to use my phone as bittorrent client, that why i need to use big files often. I'm root.
I don't have a USB OTG cable...
I have the sd card with ext4 format as primary partition and it's not working.
I think that it's not an easy way to use files biger that 4 gb in this chinese phone.
I also tried to NTFS format and this tool https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.paragon.mounter&hl=es and the phone freezes often...it's not a solution at all.
It's frustating that a chinese tablet supports perfectly ntfs and the s3 exfat, but with this phone, ther¡s no way...i been trying all day long! I gave up.
thank you anyway.
I posted this on the Nexus7 pages, but I wonder if it might be better in a general android page .
I have a nexus 7 that i'm utilising in a car build.
It's running CM10.1 which I believe is based on 4.2.2, and Timurs custom Kernel.
I have a 175gb SSD dive, hooked up to a USB hub and OTG cable.
The SSD is recognised and mounts correctly on the Nexus via the kernel.
I'm looking to speed up the mount process.
When I connect the SSD, the led activity light on the SSD will start to blink rapidly, any media on the drive is inaccessible until the drive activity has ceased.
This process takes around 30 seconds or more.
The drive is formatted using exFat, with a single partition.
I've placed a number of .nomedia files inside the USBDISK folder, SDCARD folder, and in the root of the USB drive itself, but still mounting takes time.
Is there a way to speed up the mounting process.
Maybe moving the media folders inside a single folder, or some sort of file (like .nomedia) inside the folder structure to tell Android to not perform a file check and just mount it regardless.
Maybe a cache system.
The kernel is configured to have the drive in read only mode, so unless I manually add any files, then I have no need to scan for any file changes.
The drive could be in the car for months before I add any new media to it.
I noticed last night, when I connect the HDD to my Windows 7 PC, no such disk activity takes place.
The drive is mounted, and ready to access within seconds.
Thinking that the drive activity could be folder related, I created a new folder in the root named .files, and then moved all my data in to it.
However, the tablet is still performing some sort of laborious disk activity when the drive is connected.
This now has me thinking...
When a disk is mounted in Android, is it a real mount of a virtual one.
If it's a virtual one, then I guess the system needs to build the directory listing and populate this in a virtual folder ??
I guess no one else has experienced this, or I posted in the wrong forum, but i think i figured it out.
Just incase someone else has the same problem in the future, and in the vain hope that they stumble across this thread, I think it's only fair that I post my findings.
My SSD drive is formatted exFat for compatibilty between my PC, Tablet and S7 phone which is on Marshmallow.
I have 2 hard drives, I have a 2.5" SSD and a standard 2.5" Sata drive.
So something to experiment with.
I have 2 hard drives, I have a 2.5" SSD and a standard 2.5" Sata drive.
So something to experiment with.
Formatting the standard hard drive as NTFS and then copying a small number of my files on to it, i noticed that the mount time was instant, with hardly any drive activity.
All files are accessable.
It makes little sense, considering a standard mechanical drive is supposedly slower than SSD.
I then formatted it exFat, and copied roughly the same number of files, but now the mount time was about 5 seconds, with the drive light activity issue.
I reformatted my SSD as NTFS, copied my files back on to it, and the mount time is still almost instantaneous.
So it looks like whatever is causing the extended mount time is asscociated with exFat.
I've no idea why, so if anyone can explain, i'll be happy to learn.
somehow exfat formatted disk is checked for errors on android every time it mounts.
i cant find unmount or eject anywhere on my pixel 6 in settings to safely remove a usb stick.
the pixel 6 formatted my usb stick to fat 32, it will not read exfat. is there a way to get support on the factory rom for exfat? or do i have to run a custom rom
ok the eject is in the notificaton
OTG technology doesn't need to be unmounted just pull it once the transfer is complete.
I format it with the phone to avoid issues in the future.
Never use only flash drives for backup. Hdds should be used as the primary backup. Hdds are more robust and data can be recovered even if the interface gets fried or corrupted... not easily though. Hdds have much better memory retention than does flash memory.
only way I have seen to mount other formats is to use "exFAT/NTFS by Paragon Software" on the playstore.
There's a plan to merge exFAT into Linux kernel 5 same way NTFS was merged last year. But this doesn't mean Google is interested in adopting it for Android. AFAIK, Samsung is the only Android OEM who ever offered native exFAT support with a kernel module.
Works on both P6/P6P. I can confirm as I have it on both my devices.
[MOD][MAGISK][ANDROID 12] - vold-exFAT OTG Support for Pixel 6 Pro
What's this? A simple Magisk Module that will give you access to mount USB OTG devices formatted as exFAT. I created this module for my personal use due to the limitation of stock OS and the limitation of FAT32 formatted devices. How to use...
forum.xda-developers.com