Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Gentoo on a Dell XPS 13 Ultrabook

[Alex Schuster <wonko@wonkology.org>]

Grant writes:

> > The performance is only impacted if the sector size is something other
> >  than 512 bytes. The newer 4K sector size used by some higher density
> > drives requires that you start partitions on a sector boundary or they
> > will perform badly. There isn't an actually performance need to
> > actually start on 2048 but the fdisk-type developer folks are doing
> > that to be more compatible with newer Windows installations.
> 
> All my drives says this from fdisk:
> 
> Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
> Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
> I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

Neither fdisk nor hdparm seem to get the correct sector size, at least
not always. That's what I read somewhere (and not only once), and it's
true for my own 2TB drive which I know to have a 4K sector size. I'd say
you have to look up the specs on the vendor's web size to be sure.

> So it doesn't matter where the first partition starts?

If you have 4K sectors (and not a Seagate drive with SmartAlign [*]), it
does.

BTW, here's some benchmarks I just stumbled upon:
http://hothardware.com/Articles/WDs-1TB-Caviar-Green-w-Advanced-Format-Windows-XP-Users-Pay-Attention/?page=2

[*] I don't want to sound like I'm advertising for Seagate here, but at
least it seems that with SmartAlign the performance impact will be
much less, so it might not be worth the trouble of re-partitioning drives
that are already being used.

	Wonko