[RCmini9]

So, I've read the threads on issues with partition alignment using NTFS on the Runcore drives, but there remains one question specific to those of us with dead STEC drives / forced to do a fresh install of Win XP:

The Runcore Pro IV Light PATA drives for the mini 9 ship with an existing partition. Is this partition properly aligned? I get the impression the older Runcore drives were shipping with the alignment problem on their factory partition, but that this may have been corrected.

I do notice that the BIOS on the mini recognizes the drive as over 32GB (yay!), but the sole partion found by the XP installer lists it as 30530 MB (29.8 GB). I'm used to losing a bit of space when partitioning, but thought 2.2 GB was a bit much to lose on a 32 GB drive. Is this any indication of a partition alignment issue, or completely unrelated trivia?

Thank you.

[reflex]

I dunno what the optimal alignment is on RunCores, but I can tell you where your "missing space" went. Drive manufacturers advertise capacity with metric unit prefixes, Windows XP uses binary unit prefixes. A 32 metric GB drive is 29.8 binary GB.

See here for more info: Binary prefix - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[RCmini9]

I had suspected as such, until I saw the BIOS list it as 32 GB. I just checked it in disk management and see that it does indeed list at 29.8 GB. It's a sinful game they play.

The other question still stands! I suspect Runcore will be little help on questions about partition alignment.

Thanks.

[rrfranczak3]

I dont know what you mean by aligned?....if you mean formatted?, then when you go to load windows just format the drive and load windows...simple as that

[reflex]

Originally Posted by rrfranczak3

I dont know what you mean by aligned?....if you mean formatted?, then when you go to load windows just format the drive and load windows...simple as that

Historically, hard drives use 0.5 KB sectors as the minimum unit. But SSDs and newer hard drives use larger units. 4KB on newer hard drives, and 128KB isn't uncommon for a SSD erase block (the minimum amount that needs to be erased prior to a write). A partition that isn't aligned with the underlying storage will result in extra IO.

Windows XP makes no attempt to align partitions. If you want aligned partitions with XP, you'll need to use a smarter tool (or a dumber tool, that allows manual alignment ).

For what it's worth, on all my drives, I align all my partitions to 512KB "units" and I start the first one offset 1024KB from the beginning of the drive. This seems to work well, but I can't always be sure that I'm actually matching the drive's natural alignment.

[rrfranczak3]

thats reflex for the info......think I will just stick to the old fashioned rotating drives that just need to be formatted.....

[reflex]

Originally Posted by rrfranczak3

thats reflex for the info......think I will just stick to the old fashioned rotating drives that just need to be formatted.....

Partition alignment also applies to hard drives. Half of my hard drives use 4KB sectors. But the tools included with modern OSs should align partitions decently automatically.