Linux 7.4 already merged one FAT32 optimization worth up to 265x (we covered it here). Now 7.4-rc2 adds another one, Phoronix reports, with gains of up to 162x.
What changed
Developer Matheus Alves de Almeida’s patch pre-allocates clusters in fat_cont_expand() instead of handing it off to a generic path that did lots of small allocations. A new fat_preallocate() helper is now shared with fallocate. The biggest wins are on small-cluster filesystems mounted sync.
My take
FAT32 is still on every USB stick, SD card and EFI partition out there. Nice to see it getting love, and there’s more queued for 7.5.
God Bless, and Happy hacking!
