# mount |grep /boot /dev/sda1 on /boot type ext3 (rw,relatime,seclabel,user_xattr,barrier=1,nodelalloc,data=ordered) # mount /dev/sda1 /boot/ -onorelatime,remount # mount |grep /boot /dev/sda1 on /boot type ext3 (rw,relatime,seclabel,user_xattr,barrier=1,nodelalloc,data=ordered) The same happens if I don't use remount. The same happens if I specify norelatime instead of defaults in /etc/fstab. There is no way not to use norelatime.
Did you read mount(8) man page? # findmnt /boot TARGET SOURCE FSTYPE OPTIONS /boot /dev/sda1 ext4 rw,relatime,user_xattr,barrier=1,data=ordered # mount -o remount,strictatime /boot # findmnt /boot TARGET SOURCE FSTYPE OPTIONS /boot /dev/sda1 ext4 rw,user_xattr,barrier=1,data=ordered The 'norealatime' only removes MS_RELATIME from the syscall mount(2) flags, so kernel will follow the default -- the default is realatime :-) You have to use strictatime to overwrite the default and enable full atime updates.
This seems a little counter-intuitive. So when I explicitly state the opposite of a mount option, I don't get it? Should this also fail because rw is default? mount -o remount,ro