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Alignment Checker for Disk Drives with Large Physical Sectors and 512 Byte Emulation
Partition Offset Information PartitionOffsetInformationisasimple,singlefileWindowsutilityyoucanruntoreadanddisplaythe startingLBAforeverypartition.Thistooldetectsdiskdrivesthatreportthemselvesaslargesector drives,typically4KiBsectors,andanalyzesthestartingsectorofapartitiontoseeifthelogicalfile systemclustersarealignedtothediskdriveornot.ThePartitionOffsetInformationutilitywaswritten in2005whenSeagateTechnologydevelopeddiskdriveswith1KiBsectors.Thesedriveswerenever releasedtostandarddistribution. References Foracompletedescriptionofthecharacteristicsof4KIndustryadoptionofLargeSectorspleasereferto T13/1699DRevision6(ATA8ACS),AnnexE.Additionalinformationisavailableat http://www.bigsector.org. ForinformationaboutFileSystemsandClusters,pleaserefertosomeofthenumerousonlinearticleson thesubject.Searchonfilesystemclustersizeforatypicalselectionofarticles.
QUICK4KFAQ
Whatis4KSector? Largesectordescribesusingasectorsizeof4096bytesinsteadof512bytespersector.Tothehost,the drivestillhas512bytesectorsandnomodificationstotheBIOS/OSareneededatthistimetoaddress thedataontheharddrive. Whydoestheindustryneedtotransitionto4Ksectors? Largercapacitiesperdisk(arealdensity)havecreatedaneedformoreformatefficiency(theratioof datatonondata)ondisks.Using4096bytespersectorallowsformoredataversussectoroverhead (servo,addressmarks,ECC,etc)perbyte,allowingtheHardDrivevendorstoincreasethecapacityofa givendiskby~10% Industrytransitionplans. ByJan2011,allharddiskdrive(HDD)manufacturerswillbesupplying4Kdrives.Allsoftwareand industrymanufacturingfacilitiesmustbecapableofsupporting4KHDDs.SincetheHDDlookslikea 512bytedrivetothehost,theonlyrealramificationistheperformanceimpactofanymisalignedwrites ondatapartitionsthatarenot4Kfriendly. Whytheneedtoalignpartitionsina4Ksectordrive? Thestraightansweristoavoidperformancepenalty.Asmuchaspossiblewewanteverypartitionto startwithLBAoffsetthatisalignedtodrivesphysical4ksectortoreducetheperformanceimpact. Writestothediskthatarenot"aligned"(writtenonmodulo8sectorcounts)willrequiretheHDDto firstreaduptheoriginal4096bytes,thenmergethenewwritedatawiththeexisting4096bytesthat arenotchanged,andthenwritethatwholeblockof4096backtothedisk.Thiscausesanapproximate 1520msexcessoverheadperwritecommandthatisnotalignedproperly.Theonlyimpactseenis duringrandomwritecommands.Thereisnoperformancedegradationwhenperformingreads. WhichOSareaffectedby4Ksector? Eventhoughalloperatingsystemswillbeseeing512bytesectorsthroughtheuseofemulation technologyonthedrivecontrolleronlyWindowsVistaandWindows7are4Ksectoraware,meaning
Partition Offset Information theywillautomaticallyalignthedatapartitionson4Kbytesectorsboundaries,matchingtheharddrive's physicalsectorlayout.LinuxandMacOSarealso4ksectoraware. WindowsXPdoesn'thavethis4Kawareness,andsincetheOScreatesthefirstpartitionatLBAsector number63(commoncase),allfollowingdataclusterswillbemisaligned,causinganoticeable performanceimpact.EachwriteprocesswillnowcauseaReadModifyWritethatintroducesadditional latencyduetotherequiredadditionalrotationoftheharddrive.Driveimaging/cloningsoftwarewill alsobeaffectedbypartitionmisalignmentinsomecasesifthesoftwareitselfisnot4Kaware. Howtocheckifapartitionisaligned? SeagatehascreatedasimpleWindowsutility,PartitionOffsetInformation,toreadanddisplaythe startingLBAforeverypartition.Thistoolcananalyzethestartingsectorofapartitionifitismisaligned ornot. Intheexamplebelow,driveC:isagenericdrive(ST9160823AS)with512bytespersector.DrivesF:,G: andH:arelogicaldrives,allontheST32000540ASwhichhasa4096byte(4KiB)sectorsizeandan Alignmentof0.
Notice the the RED exclamation marks. These marks indicate that the Logical Volumes (drive letters) in this partitioning arrangement are not aligned with the physical sectors on the disk drive. Normal 4K disk drives will ship with Alignment 0. Drives with Alignment 1 and not typical and the example above is shown only for comparison purposes. It is important to understand that the drive operates with the same reliability, but just a little bit slower when WRITING to the drive. It runs the same when READING which accounts for the majority of activity on a disk drive.
12. Contact Information. Any inquiries regarding this Agreement or the Software may be addressed to Licensor at 920 Disc Drive, Scotts Valley, California, USA, 95066, or www.Seagate.com.
Revised 04-06-2007