Does migrating older Ubuntu desktop ext4 to ZFS make sense?

OpenZFS
1

I’m curious about migrating an Ubuntu desktop machine from ext4 to ZFS now that it is supported at the installer level. Here is documentation and a nice write up from Phoronix - https://www.phoronix.com/news/OpenZFS-Ubuntu-24.04-LTS

Current setup is running Timeshift rsync snapshots to an external disk ext4.

Desktop Machine:
i5 Intel Nuc with 12gb ram and single 512gb SSD running Ubuntu 22.04

Backup server - Hi all, spun up my 1st Truenas Scale with mirrored vdev

The goal would be:

  • Migrate Ubuntu ext4 to ZFS installation
  • Migrate external disk → mirrored vdev
  • Replace Timeshift with ZFS level snapshots

Suggestions and thoughts appreciated.

2

I think that’s a pretty nice option if you’re thoroughly “nested” into one specific desktop PC with a myriad of customizations, apps, and configurations that you built up over a long time with very little documentation and you’re scared of losing it.

Personally I went the other way–I mercilessly pared down my dependency on any configuration I couldn’t easily recreate. Data I care about goes on ZFS. Application stacks that are truly a massive pain in the ass to recreate go into VMs which are stored on ZFS. But even in the era of ZFSBootMenu and direct-install docs at OpenZFS like the one you listed, I still most frequently do an ext4 root, because it’s the absolute least hassle to put in place, and because I can literally replace my desktop environment in 15 minutes maximum.

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