I should probably be posting this to the Steam forums, but
most of the denizens there are Windows people so I might be
better off letting you Debian gurus have a go at it first.

TL;DR: Copying an existing /home into a fresh Debian installation
causes audio in Steam games to glitch - but all other sound is OK.

Full description:

I have a machine in the living room that stores MP3s and videos
and serves them to other machines on our network as well as playing
them locally on our TV's big screen. I also play a few Steam games
(e.g. Portal) on it. It's a 2007-vintage machine, but it has 8GB
of RAM and enough CPU power to do the job, and runs the latest
version of Bookworm.

Recently I decided to upgrade its storage capacity, and replaced
its 500GB hard drive (which was pretty large at the time I bought
it) with a 4TB drive. I did an install from scratch using a
network install CD, then copied my /home partition (using rsync)
from the old drive. Everything works great with one exception:
when I fire up Portal the sound gets glitches about once a second.
This only happens with Steam games; I can play MP3s and videos
with mpv and the sound is perfect, as it is when watching YouTube
videos. If I swap the old drive back in everything is fine.

Obviously my Steam programs and configuration files are in my
home directory, since the updated system comes up icons and all
without re-installing Steam, and can find everything it needs to
run the games. But perhaps there are a few files somewhere else
(/usr?) containing information critical to audio for Steam.

Any ideas?

(Side question: is this an acceptable way to upgrade a hard drive?)

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | Life is perverse.
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | It can be beautiful -
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | but it won't.
/ \ if you read it the right way. | -- Lily Tomlin

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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On 2024-04-21, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

Obviously my Steam programs and configuration files are in my
home directory, since the updated system comes up icons and all
without re-installing Steam, and can find everything it needs to
run the games. But perhaps there are a few files somewhere else
(/usr?) containing information critical to audio for Steam.

Do you sync /etc ? Configuration is mainly there.

(Side question: is this an acceptable way to upgrade a hard drive?)

There is other ways but yes if you also sync /etc :)

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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On 4/21/24 22:33, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

I should probably be posting this to the Steam forums, but
most of the denizens there are Windows people so I might be
better off letting you Debian gurus have a go at it first.

TL;DR: Copying an existing /home into a fresh Debian installation
causes audio in Steam games to glitch - but all other sound is OK.

Full description:

I have a machine in the living room that stores MP3s and videos
and serves them to other machines on our network as well as playing
them locally on our TV's big screen.  I also play a few Steam games
(e.g. Portal) on it.  It's a 2007-vintage machine, but it has 8GB
of RAM and enough CPU power to do the job, and runs the latest
version of Bookworm.

Recently I decided to upgrade its storage capacity, and replaced
its 500GB hard drive (which was pretty large at the time I bought
it) with a 4TB drive.  I did an install from scratch using a
network install CD, then copied my /home partition (using rsync)
from the old drive.  Everything works great with one exception:
when I fire up Portal the sound gets glitches about once a second.
This only happens with Steam games; I can play MP3s and videos
with mpv and the sound is perfect, as it is when watching YouTube
videos.  If I swap the old drive back in everything is fine.

Obviously my Steam programs and configuration files are in my
home directory, since the updated system comes up icons and all
without re-installing Steam, and can find everything it needs to
run the games.  But perhaps there are a few files somewhere else
(/usr?) containing information critical to audio for Steam.

Any ideas?

(Side question: is this an acceptable way to upgrade a hard drive?)

Copying a home directory from one OS instance to another OS instance
sounds risky, especially as I run various OS's. I have several
instances of Debian 11, and would not consider them to be identical
enough to try it. I only touch the content I create or have learned how
to manage.


I put my OS on a small SSD and the vast majority of my data on HDD RAID
in a file server.


As I am the only user on my Debian daily driver, I leave the /home
directory on the root file system and keep as little as possible in it.


I mount the file server shares under /mnt, and create symlinks in my
home directory that point into the mounted file system.


I use CVS for project working directories. To migrate to a new home
directory, I check in the projects in the old home and check out the
project in the new home.


I use Firefox and its sync feature. To migrate to a new home, I start
Firefox, log in, wait for my settings to sync, and then check all of the settings by hand.


I use Thunderbird. To migrate to a new home, I create a tarball of my Thunderbird profile directory on the old machine, expand the tarball on
the new machine, and configure Thunderbird to use that profile.


I do not attempt to migrate any of the various home directory
configuration directories; I let the installer and/or package manager
create them, and let the desktop, apps, etc., manage them.


David

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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Recently I decided to upgrade its storage capacity, and replaced
its 500GB hard drive (which was pretty large at the time I bought
it) with a 4TB drive. I did an install from scratch using a
network install CD, then copied my /home partition (using rsync)
from the old drive.

[...]

(Side question: is this an acceptable way to upgrade a hard drive?)

It's acceptable enough that we'll keep talking to you. 🙂

Personally, assuming the 500GB drive was basically full, I suspect I'd
have just done a `dd` copy of the 500GB drive to the new drive, followed
by a quick `gparted` run to resize on-the-fly the partitions (in order
to get access to the extra 3.5GB).

Everything works great with one exception:
when I fire up Portal the sound gets glitches about once a second.
This only happens with Steam games; I can play MP3s and videos
with mpv and the sound is perfect, as it is when watching YouTube
videos. If I swap the old drive back in everything is fine.

I suspect the difference is that the Steam games keep your machine very
busy whereas playing a video isn't nearly as demanding, so the machine
ends up too busy to refill the sound buffer before its empty.

As for why this happens with the new disk&install and not with the old disk&install, ...
AFAICT it can be either due to the new install such as a difference in
the configuration and/or installed software (e.g. one using pulseaudio
and the other pipewire), or due to the new hardware, presumably because
some operations are slower.

Can you boot with both disks connected? If so, can you try to boot off
of the 500GB and then use the /home from the 4TB drive (and vice versa)?
I think you should be able to do that by booting to "rescue" where
(after entering the root password) you'd do something like

umount /home
mount /dev/the/other/home/partition /home
exit

I'd tend to think that a modern 4TB drive should be no slower than
a 500GB drive, no matter the operation, but maybe the new drive has
a particularly small cache, or maybe it's shingled and the Steam game
makes a fair amount of writes to the disk which ends up affecting the
reads needed to fetch the next chunk of sound?


Stefan

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On 2024-04-22 16:50, Jeffrey Walton wrote:

What are the old and new hard drive model numbers and specs?

The old drive is a Western Digital WD5000YS (500GB SATA).
The new drive is a Western Digital Red, WF40EFPX (4TB SATA).

If the old hard drive was spinning rust, it is acceptable to replace it
with a solid state drive. I did it several times in the past. But
nowadays a new machine usually (always?) comes with a SSD, so you
usually don't need to upgrade for performance reasons.

Both drives are spinning rust. I'm upgrading for the increased
capacity, i.e. to store more MP3s and videos.

Many thanks to all who have replied. When my schedule permits me to
continue experimenting, I'm going to try copying /etc from the old drive
to the new one. I've already learned how _not_ to do this:

Boot from the new drive
$ su root
# cd /
# mv etc etc.ori
# rsync -av /mnt/backup/etc .

The second line makes the system fall over and makes logins impossible.
It took a boot from the rescue CD to undo the damage, which fortunately
was easy since the deadly step at least succeeded in backing up /etc.

Next time I'll do it while booted from the old drive.

--
/~\ Charlie Gibbs | "Some of you may die,
\ / <cgibbs@kltpzyxm.invalid> | but it's a sacrifice
X I'm really at ac.dekanfrus | I'm willing to make."
/ \ if you read it the right way. | -- Lord Farquaad (Shrek)

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@surfnaked.ca> wrote:

On 2024-04-22 16:50, Jeffrey Walton wrote:

What are the old and new hard drive model numbers and specs?

The old drive is a Western Digital WD5000YS (500GB SATA).
The new drive is a Western Digital Red, WF40EFPX (4TB SATA).

According to my searches, there's no such disk as a WF40EFPX. Are you
sure that's what it is? If by any chance it is a WD40EFRX then that is certainly slower than your old drive, so may cause some problems as
suggested.

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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On 4/23/24 09:02, debian-user@howorth.org.uk wrote:

Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@surfnaked.ca> wrote:

On 2024-04-22 16:50, Jeffrey Walton wrote:

What are the old and new hard drive model numbers and specs?

The old drive is a Western Digital WD5000YS (500GB SATA).
The new drive is a Western Digital Red, WF40EFPX (4TB SATA).

According to my searches, there's no such disk as a WF40EFPX. Are you
sure that's what it is? If by any chance it is a WD40EFRX then that is certainly slower than your old drive, so may cause some problems as suggested.

I doubt the new drive is slower than the old drive:

- https://www.harddrivebenchmark.net/hdd.php?hdd=WDC%20WD5000YS

WDC WD5000YS 425

- https://www.harddrivebenchmark.net/hdd.php?hdd=WDC%20WD40EFRX

WDC WD40EFRX 1,943


David

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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On 4/22/24 21:26, Charlie Gibbs wrote:

On 2024-04-22 16:50, Jeffrey Walton wrote:

What are the old and new hard drive model numbers and specs?

The old drive is a Western Digital WD5000YS (500GB SATA).

https://www.newegg.com/western-digital-re2-wd5000ys-500gb/p/N82E16822136032?Item=N82E16822136032

The new drive is a Western Digital Red, WF40EFPX (4TB SATA).

https://www.westerndigital.com/products/internal-drives/wd-red-plus-sata-3-5-hdd?sku=WD40EFPX

Both drives are spinning rust.  I'm upgrading for the increased
capacity, i.e. to store more MP3s and videos.

Many thanks to all who have replied.  When my schedule permits me to continue experimenting, I'm going to try copying /etc from the old drive
to the new one.   I've already learned how _not_ to do this:

Boot from the new drive
$ su root
# cd /
# mv etc etc.ori
# rsync -av /mnt/backup/etc .

The second line makes the system fall over and makes logins impossible.
It took a boot from the rescue CD to undo the damage, which fortunately
was easy since the deadly step at least succeeded in backing up /etc.

Next time I'll do it while booted from the old drive.

Copying an entire /etc directory from one machine to another requires a
highly controlled environment and lot of engineering. I have always
migrated /etc settings from one OS instance to another OS instance by
hand, one service/ configuration file at a time.


Can you leave the 500 GB HDD operational and use the 4 TB HDD for data?


David

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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I doubt the new drive is slower than the old drive:

Overall, agreed. Tho AFAICT the new drive spins slower (5400rpm vs
7200rpm), so it has a slightly higher rotational latency. This means
that in *some* cases it can be slower.
Now, I have no idea whether that's the cause of the glitches.


Stefan

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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On 2024-04-22, Charlie Gibbs <cgibbs@surfnaked.ca> wrote:

TL;DR: Copying an existing /home into a fresh Debian installation
causes audio in Steam games to glitch - but all other sound is OK.

I have only the most vaporous ideas about Steam, but have you tried
backing up and then recreating (if such a thing is possible) your user profile ~/.steam or ~/.config/steam files?

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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