NanoPi NEO and zRAM

[mackowiakp]

I have more then 100 pcs nanoPi NEO already installed and solder inside measuring units, with several sensor connected to each one. Because most of them has only 256 MB RAM, I must to increase amount of memory. I use Linux distro from Friendly Elec. It is not possible to solder something in already existing units or use USB Flash Drive because life-time of such memory. I moved all temporary files to RAM-disk (including measurements) so SD card is practically read-only (except sys upgrade). The only solution for me is zRAM. Does anybody has experiences with such solution on nanoPi with Linux taken from Friendly Elec repo? Is it worth to install it? What about performance? (less important for me). What version of zRAM I have to install? (any link if You be so kind).
Below current (the latest available) version of Linux I use (with all updates available this day):

Linux NanoPi-NEO 4.14.0 #1 SMP Mon Dec 18 11:43:22 CST 2017 armv7l armv7l armv7l GNU/Linux

[igorp]

I have more then 100 pcs nanoPi NEO already installed and solder inside measuring units, with several sensor connected to each one. Because most of them has only 256 MB RAM, I must to increase amount of memory. I use Linux distro from Friendly Elec. It is not possible to solder something in already existing units or use USB Flash Drive because life-time of such memory. I moved all temporary files to RAM-disk (including measurements) so SD card is practically read-only (except sys upgrade). The only solution for me is zRAM. Does anybody has experiences with such solution on nanoPi with Linux taken from Friendly Elec repo? Is it worth to install it? What about performance? (less important for me). What version of zRAM I have to install? (any link if You be so kind).
Below current (the latest available) version of Linux I use (with all updates available this day):

Linux NanoPi-NEO 4.14.0 #1 SMP Mon Dec 18 11:43:22 CST 2017 armv7l armv7l armv7l GNU/Linux

In Armbian, all this comes by default.

[mackowiakp]

OK. But I have no choice. Just 120 measuring units with FriendlyElec Linux distro on it. No way to change to another distro.

[igorp]

OK. But I have no choice. Just 120 measuring units with FriendlyElec Linux distro on it. No way to change to another distro.

Why? You will burn 120 cards faster and you will not need to use any brain power for that operation.

All optimisations are implemented here https://github.com/armbian/build but since this is a huge system you will need some time and focus to figure things out. I was a part of making this, but I forget details around this and can't guide you to get things in place. apt install zram-config will not be enough, you also need to recompile kernel and enable support for this and that ...

And you will still remain on some very old kernel with questionable support ... which will, btw, never receive update. With Armbian it will.

[mackowiakp]

Yep, but my measuring unit are located country wide. I agree that if it would be possible to have 120 cards in the same place - OK. The next problem is possibility to make changes in app software. Nobody knows at this moment what it should be done. The soft is already well tested and works. But I need bigger RAM-disk. Even I don want to travel hundreds kilometers to install USB Flas in all units.