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ext4 for internal and external storage?

C

cornandro

Lurker
Hello everybody,

My first post here :)
Also quite new to Android. I've been using Linux exclusively both at work and at home for the past 6 years. I own a Samsung Galaxy SII with the original Gingerbread 2.3.3 OS version.
I formatted the internal storage (12GB) with ext4 and SGS refuses to recognize it. This sucks because ext4 is way better than fat32 and any Android phone should be able to see ext4. I also bought a 32GB microSD card that I want to format with ext4.
So my question is: is there a way to make my SGS see ext4 internal or external storage?
If not, are there custom ROMs that support ext4 for internal and external storage?
I am not concerned with the fact that my ext4 storage will not mount on Windows because I don't use Windows and probably never will.

Thank you in advance,

Corneliu
 
I know because Android uses the Linux kernel and ext4 has been the default file system in Linux for quite a while. Support for the file system is implemented in the kernel. My SGS uses Linux kernel 2.6.35.7 for example. I also read that starting with 2.3 Android uses ext4 as the default file system (but it seems only for the system partition).
 
You'd think that being a Linux Filesystem and Android being based off a Linux kernel, it would make sense, but Chanchan is correct I believe. It has to be Fat32 for it to be recognised.

When you partition the SD an SD Card for apps2sd, you use EXT2/3, so you might want to try that? (It's a long shot though).
 
@cornandro .I dont think you can auto mount SD card to ext4 .

you will need to compile a kernel and use ext4 as mount point as against default vfat IMHO .
btw did you try mounting it manually with mount command on /sdcard .

I think you will just complicate things but it's worth a shot anyway .
nothing is impossible :D
 
ok I verified on my spare SD .
Good news .
You can actually use as ext4 as a file system
Bad news
You need to mount it in /system/abc(or whatever folder) and you are restricted to terminal/shell and root explorers like Filexpert,root explorer and ES File Explorer for navigation and everything .
Navigation is a bit hitchy .You cant listen to music/video/stuff without a file explorer .
Like El Presidente said it will work like a second Sd card partition . :D

But it works ;)
 
Thank you all for your replies.
I read that on phones running Android 2.3 or later, the root partition (or whatever its name is in Android) is ext4 so the phone must be able to see an ext4 partition. I can live without graphical file browser but I actually wanted to put a ton of music on the phone so not being able to listen to music is definitely a show stopper. Now that ICS source code has been unleashed I hope we will soon get ROMs that will be able to mount ext4 partitions.
We have been using fat for so long we actually came to believe it's OK to use fat. It's not. It sucks. It is slow and takes a lot of space for its own stuff (journaling and whatnot). We can have better speed and more storage room on our microSD cards by using a good file system.
 
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