From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org ([208.92.234.80] helo=lists.gentoo.org) by finch.gentoo.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1NgrTd-0000Ti-9Y for garchives@archives.gentoo.org; Mon, 15 Feb 2010 03:18:25 +0000 Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with SMTP id BDC8AE07C7; Mon, 15 Feb 2010 03:17:22 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mail-pw0-f53.google.com (mail-pw0-f53.google.com [209.85.160.53]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 85085E07C7 for ; Mon, 15 Feb 2010 03:17:22 +0000 (UTC) Received: by pwj5 with SMTP id 5so341589pwj.40 for ; Sun, 14 Feb 2010 19:17:22 -0800 (PST) DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; c=relaxed/relaxed; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=domainkey-signature:mime-version:received:in-reply-to:references :date:message-id:subject:from:to:content-type :content-transfer-encoding; bh=EnhLGM/tHK7DCv8HYvlauHd2mCpfS67tFC3lfBwDtao=; b=DUZt3jyOVVebQ3L2hNB62kSdQzwVZbHFmLOB3JKvf4Rh9ITKmYesCqulCr+LU1amUj k5tT9Gs0RCJfhGJjnJg7t//lt98dCThCmRpugp+4QAzQHCswUEviGgnHsdCJ/wf53Ksh wvVGEdkruK6LAsvYdAMZfI4mVluxfaMQ+T/RM= DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; c=nofws; d=gmail.com; s=gamma; h=mime-version:in-reply-to:references:date:message-id:subject:from:to :content-type:content-transfer-encoding; b=OlMgK1MNMiuYxjTmFPuzbqkRozHplsGBAZyj7tYDPLHs00Z7WPtFfrzL2U8wxAHSI5 V+wpuzZUm3IYx+HYGKzjnhZ3qQIBVyAuFgAfkot0rOpJxP9nps4fa6Lon3WK6ncqrlZ/ l7E9YFsTwiWgmN5iujTeEBV7Jo7htsWbr6OII= Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Linux mail X-BeenThere: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org Reply-to: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org MIME-Version: 1.0 Received: by 10.142.118.5 with SMTP id q5mr3062773wfc.320.1266203842028; Sun, 14 Feb 2010 19:17:22 -0800 (PST) In-Reply-To: <20100215011740.GA27687@math.princeton.edu> References: <5bdc1c8b1002070827i14f59047k39a695900ebe9889@mail.gmail.com> <20100207193947.GB30196@math.princeton.edu> <5bdc1c8b1002071342v6c81cf13gde7bcef72be5017b@mail.gmail.com> <201002150148.05937.Warp_7@gmx.de> <20100215011740.GA27687@math.princeton.edu> Date: Sun, 14 Feb 2010 19:17:21 -0800 Message-ID: <5bdc1c8b1002141917tabba6a6g511e9aa8e68682bc@mail.gmail.com> Subject: Re: [gentoo-user] 1-Terabyte drives - 4K sector sizes? -> bar performance so far From: Mark Knecht To: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable X-Archives-Salt: 504326fa-56d8-46ad-86fd-12cc6613582c X-Archives-Hash: a65940d9490d13c8aa95125e8b8ef6c3 2010/2/14 Willie Wong : > On Mon, Feb 15, 2010 at 01:48:01AM +0100, Frank Steinmetzger wrote: >> >> action =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 SS (1st) =C2=A0 SS (2nd) =C2=A0 SS+2 = =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 SS+4 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 SS+6 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 SS= +8 >> -------------+----------+----------+----------+----------+----------+---= ------- >> untar portage =C2=A03m12.517 =C2=A0 2m55.916 =C2=A0 1m46.663 =C2=A0 1m35= .341 =C2=A0 1m47.829 =C2=A0 1m43.677 >> rm portage =C2=A0 =C2=A0 4m11.109 =C2=A0 3m54.950 =C2=A0 3m18.820 =C2=A0= 3m11.378 =C2=A0 3m21.804 =C2=A0 3m12.433 >> cp 1GB file 0m21.383 0m13.558 0m14.920 0m12.813 0m13.407 0m= 13.681 > > Instead of guessing using this rather imprecise metric, why not just > look up the serial number of your drive and see what the physical > sector size is? If you don't want to open your box, you can usually > get the information from dmesg. hdparm capital eye works very nicely: gandalf ~ # hdparm -I /dev/sda /dev/sda: ATA device, with non-removable media Model Number: WDC WD10EARS-00Y5B1 Serial Number: WD-WCAV55464493 Firmware Revision: 80.00A80 Transport: Serial, SATA 1.0a, SATA II Extensions, SATA Rev 2.5, SATA Rev 2.6 Standards: Supported: 8 7 6 5 Likely used: 8 > > Only caveat: don't trust the harddrive to report accurate geometry. > This whole issue is due to the harddrives lying about their physical > geometry to be compatible with older versions of Windows. So the > physical sector size listed in dmesg may not be the real one. Which is > why you are advised to look up the model number on the vendor's > website yourself to determine the physical sector size. > > W > -- > Willie W. Wong =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 = =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 wwong= @math.princeton.edu Very true... Since this thread started and you help (me at least1) understand what I was dealing with I got in contact with Mark Lord - the developer and maintainer of the hdparm program. I was interested in seeing if we could get hdparm to recognize this aspect of the drive. He was very interested and asked me to send along additional info which he then analyzed and decided that, at least at this time, even drives that we __know__ are 4K sector sizes are not implementing any way of reading it from the drive's firmware which is supported, at least in the newer SATA specs. With that he decided that even for his own new 4K drives he cannot do anything except either assume they are 4K and partition appropriately or look up specs specifically as you suggest. Currently I'm partial to the idea that all my sector starting addresses will end in '000'. It's easy to remember and at most that wastes (I think) 512K bytes between sectors so it's not much in terms of the overall disk space. Just a couple of megabyte on a drive with 4 partitions. =3D Mark