4k and 512B sectors

mediaman · 21 Nov 2010 at 20:48

Just looking into what components I want in my new htpc im lining up for building in the new year and began looking into hard drives, and have seemingly stumbled on loads of people moaning about 4k or 512B sectors and what not with regards to the 2tb drive I was looking at.

My question is what is all this about emulation and problems with sectors etc etc? Are these 2tb hard drives pony with small file sizes or something? What exactly are peoples concerns with large hard drives and what are the draw backs on a day to day basis using large drives for storing all types of files?

Hairybudda · 21 Nov 2010 at 21:20

What drive were you looking at and what filesystem & os were you planning on using?

Stonedofmoo · 22 Nov 2010 at 07:52

I'd like to see drives using true native 4K sectors the whole way through, not this silly emulation to 512 bytes the recent crop of drives seem to be doing.

It basically hinders performance and seems to be introduced as a stepping stone for older PC's running 32bit windows.

mediaman · 22 Nov 2010 at 11:34

Im looking at a 2tb F4 or WD equivalent. OS will be Vista for now and Windows 7 when I upgrade OS. The drive will be for a currently non existent htpc when I get round to building one. Looking at getting the drive and starting on getting all my media onto it ready for the htpc.