How to Install I/O Bottleneck Fix for Asus Transformer Prime [GUIDE]
Veteran modder discovers how to increase read/write speeds on Asus tablet. Asus

Thanks to XDA forum member TweakerL, a potential I/O bottleneck concerning the internal storage of Transformer Prime tablet has been uncovered. The veteran modder has hit on a way of tweaking the hardware settings to get superior read/write speeds.

High-end hardware components are often vulnerable to I/O bottlenecks owing to one or more weak links in the system configuration. A bottleneck may arise when one of the hardware components does not meet or match the speed of other connected components.

For instance, insufficient memory could stall the processing requirements of a system. A quad core or dual core processor will require more memory than single core counterparts and given that the least upgraded devices on computers are often system memory and internal storage, these often become bottlenecks to a power-packed system.

Software concerns can be addressed by tweaking systems to optimise performance. From a hardware perspective though, an upgrade seems the only viable option.

However, there may well be an alternative, even for hardware problems. With desktops it is the internal storage of the device which tends to slow down over time, before eventually becoming a performance bottleneck. This can be addressed by substituting that piece with an external storage device.

A member of the XDA forum, TweakerL, may have addressed a potential I/O bottleneck concerning the internal storage of the Transformer Prime tablet. The veteran modder with the help of his teammates has successfully tweaked the hardware settings to get superior read/write speeds on the Transformer Prime .

"So, the whole idea here started with me reading an article on how part of the whole I/O problem with the transformer is partially caused by the hardware used as internal storage. I wanted to find out if this had any merit and I figured the best way to do it would be to "replace" the internal storage. I did this by mounting the /data partition to the external SD (which according to my research, my specific SD Card is better at writing speeds - allegedly the main problem with the Transformer's internal storage hardware wise). Then I ran a bunch of benchmarks and have been running it that way for about 24 hours and so far it feels great. Anyone is welcome to give it a try, and hopefully with help, suggestions and feedback from the community, we can all take as much advantage of this idea as possible," explainws TweakerL.

It is believed slow writing speeds to internal storage are causing lag problems. The proposed solution is to move the /data partition to an external SD card. The subsequent step involves moving the /cache partition to enhance performance even further and then check results over daily routines such as Nandroid backups on the device.

System Requirements

  • The device needs to be rooted/unlocked for necessary modifications to take effect.
  • The external SD card must be repartitioned and the kernel image mounted only to the second partition. Ensure the second partition is formatted to ext4. For instance, you may use gparted through virtualbox if you use Windows.
  • Class Six to 10 SD cards are known to have extremely slow random write speeds. A SD card of Class 10 or higher is recommended.
  • It is recommended the AOKP 6.1 kernel is used as base for new kernel with this package. Opting for any kernel is likely to damage the device. Extreme caution is required.

Download Files

Meanwhile, here is a guide to cloning data from internal storage to external storage.

[Courtesy: XDA Developers/TweakerL]

How to Install I/O Bottleneck Fix for Asus Transformer Prime

Step 1: Download attached file (boot-data2SD-AOKP6.1base.zip) and extract to root of internal storage (/sdcard).

Step 2: Open a terminal.

Step 3: Type the following:

Code:

su

dd if=/sdcard/boot.blob of=dev/block/mmcblk0p4 bs=1

Step 4: Wait for process to complete.

Step 5: Reboot.

If you ever want to revert to the original ROM, just repeat the above steps, but use boot-default-AOKP6.1.zip instead.