WD10EARS ?

whiic · Post by **whiic** » Tue May 25, 2010 8:56 am

The issue related to need for aligning is only dependent on the OS used to partition the HDD so you don't even have to worry about whether WDTV supports 4K sectors. WDTV isn't the one doing the partitioning.

There's no reason to believe WDTV has problem dealing with partitions created in WinXP (first partition starting from LBA 63) and Win Vista and newer (first partition starting from LBA 64) because partition table created specifies the starting LBA and the reading system doesn't have to assume anything - it's all explicitly told where it starts so there should be no compatibility issue.

In previous message I said LBA starts from 0 but I guess I was wrong as if it started from 0 instead of 1, LBA 63 would indeed be aligned and LBA 64 misaligned from 4K sector boundary. Since LBA 64 is aligned and 63 is not, the LBA must start from 1 and LBA 0 does not exist. It's more logical of course if LBA 0 does not exist... it's just that computer geeks like to count 0 as well... it makes dealing with binaries easier. But HDDs use decimal prefixes and stuff so I guess those binary world stuff doesn't that much apply to them.

nikunj_cal · Post by **nikunj_cal** » Tue May 25, 2010 6:10 pm

subaqua wrote:ok thanks for that whiic.

I guess i just want to be sure coz you hear so much mixed stuff about these new drives. The guy at a computer store told me it would be best not to get one of these new drives as i might have issues with them on the media drive.

But after reading your post i think im happy now to go out and buy one when i need more storage.

Exactly my point. This information is there in little or no sites at all. All of them have highlighted the fact that 4k sectors may cause premature death of WinXP etc etc . But why did they over look this that the alignment is just a one time thing. You can always align the drive at your friends Win7 based PC and then use it normally on your Winxp. Yes the flexibility of creating partitons as per your convenience from WinXp is lost but I really dont see that as a very big issue here. In fact you are gaining extra space in these drives which can be really helpful at times.