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Hardware Forum / Storage / General Topics / June 2010Hard drive evolution could hit Microsoft XP users
BBC News - Hard drive evolution could hit Microsoft XP users "By early 2011 all hard drives will use an "advanced format" that changes how they go about saving the data people store on them. The move to the advanced format will make it easier for hard drive makers to produce bigger drives that use less power and are more reliable. However, it might mean problems for Windows XP users who swap an old drive for one using the changed format. " http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8557144.stm >BBC News - Hard drive evolution could hit Microsoft XP users >"By early 2011 all hard drives will use an "advanced format" that [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] >drive for one using the changed format. " >http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8557144.stm Is there any way to do a low-level format on an older drive so that it now has 4K sectors? Way, way, way back when. Floppy diskette sectors started out at 128B, the moved to 256B. IBM pioneered 512B sectors when they brought out the PC in 1981. Of course, with the right parameters sent to the FD 1765 controller chip, any system could read the 512B sector diskettes. >>BBC News - Hard drive evolution could hit Microsoft XP users >>"By early 2011 all hard drives will use an "advanced format" that [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] >>drive for one using the changed format. " >>http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8557144.stm > Is there any way to do a low-level format on an older drive so that it > now has 4K sectors? Well, you could try that together with a firmware patch for an old MFM drive ;-) Seriously, no. Even while SCSI drives theoretically can do this, in practice they just lump sectors together and emulate the larger ones. > Way, way, way back when. Floppy diskette sectors started out at 128B, > the moved to 256B. IBM pioneered 512B sectors when they brought out > the PC in 1981. Of course, with the right parameters sent to the FD > 1765 controller chip, any system could read the 512B sector diskettes. Floppies have stepper motors, which makes software formatting very easy. Modern HDDs have a linear morto type that has stepless positioning. (The mentioned MFM drives also used stepper motors.) That means AFAIK modern HDDs cannot be formatted by themselves, but this is either done with extra head or with positioning support equipment only attached to the drive in manufacturing. Arno  SignatureArno Wagner, Dr. sc. techn., Dipl. Inform., CISSP -- Email: arno@wagner.name GnuPG: ID: 1E25338F FP: 0C30 5782 9D93 F785 E79C 0296 797F 6B50 1E25 338F ---- Cuddly UI's are the manifestation of wishful thinking. -- Dylan Evans WD has a utility to align for XP. SignatureEd Light Better World News TV Channel: http://realnews.com Iraq Veterans Against the War and Related: http://ivaw.org http://couragetoresist.org http://antiwar.com Send spam to the FTC at spam@uce.gov Thanks, robots. >WD has a utility to align for XP. Yup, and the current version of the utility won't work on an uninitialized drive. I had to connect it to a USB adapter and initialize it on a system running XP before the utility would see the drive. >WD has a utility to align for XP. That will work for the first generation 4KB drives that emulate 512byte sectors, but not once 4KB comes out in native mode. >> WD has a utility to align for XP. > That will work for the first generation 4KB drives that emulate > 512byte sectors, but not once 4KB comes out in native mode. You dont know that they wont be able to appear to have 512 byte sectors but just have those as part of 4K sectors. Its perfectly possible for the drive to look like its got 512 byte sectors but actually has 4K sectors on the platters. >>> WD has a utility to align for XP. > [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] >Its perfectly possible for the drive to look like its got 512 byte >sectors but actually has 4K sectors on the platters. Right -- I just said that, that's the "first generation 4KB drives that emulate 512byte sectors" XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB sectors to the OS. My guess is that we'll start out with drives that work only in emulation mode, then drives that work in either mode based on a jumper (similar to the -150 mode limiter for poorly designed SATA controllers), until finally we get 4KB-only drives. > Rod Speed <rod.speed.aaa@gmail.com> wrote >>> Ed Light <nobody@nobody.there> wrote >>>> WD has a utility to align for XP. >>> That will work for the first generation 4KB drives that emulate >>> 512byte sectors, but not once 4KB comes out in native mode. >> You dont know that they wont be able to appear to have >> 512 byte sectors but just have those as part of 4K sectors. >> Its perfectly possible for the drive to look like its got 512 >> byte sectors but actually has 4K sectors on the platters. > Right -- I just said that, No you didnt. > that's the "first generation 4KB drives that emulate 512byte sectors" No reason why drives cant optionally do that forever. > XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB sectors to the OS. So all thats necessary is drives that can do that emulation optionally and a ute to change that behaviour. > My guess is that we'll start out with drives that work only in emulation > mode, then drives that work in either mode based on a jumper Or do that electronically without using a jumper, like so many do with all sorts of other config stuff like AAM etc etc etc. > (similar to the -150 mode limiter for poorly designed SATA controllers), > until finally we get 4KB-only drives. Why would they remove that capability once its there ? >> Rod Speed<rod.speed.aaa@gmail.com> wrote >>>> Ed Light<nobody@nobody.there> wrote [quoted text clipped - 17 lines] > > No reason why drives cant optionally do that forever. There will come a point when the 512 byte sector emulation will be dropped, but it will be a good while yet. It won't be dropped for the current generation of disk electronics - as you say, why remove it when it's already there? But in future generations (for even bigger and faster drives), I don't think it will stay. >> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB sectors to the OS. > [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > Or do that electronically without using a jumper, like so many > do with all sorts of other config stuff like AAM etc etc etc. I expect this one will be by jumper for a good while to come. There is not, as far as I know, a way for the host/OS/controller and the disk electronics to agree on the best mode automatically - it would need a new ATA command and that means changes to the OS. These things take a long time in the windows world - by the time it gets realistic to have such an automatic selection, it would be easier to drop 512 byte sector mode entirely. What is a more immediate question is what the default jumper setting should be - set to 512 for compatibility with XP and older OS's, or set to 4 KB native for faster speed with Linux and newer OS's ? >> (similar to the -150 mode limiter for poorly designed SATA controllers), > >> until finally we get 4KB-only drives. > > Why would they remove that capability once its there ? > Rod Speed wrote >>> Rod Speed<rod.speed.aaa@gmail.com> wrote >>>>> Ed Light<nobody@nobody.there> wrote >>>>>> WD has a utility to align for XP. >>>>> That will work for the first generation 4KB drives that emulate >>>>> 512byte sectors, but not once 4KB comes out in native mode. >>>> You dont know that they wont be able to appear to have >>>> 512 byte sectors but just have those as part of 4K sectors. >>>> Its perfectly possible for the drive to look like its got 512 >>>> byte sectors but actually has 4K sectors on the platters. >>> Right -- I just said that, >> No you didnt. >>> that's the "first generation 4KB drives that emulate 512byte sectors" >> No reason why drives cant optionally do that forever. > There will come a point when the 512 byte sector emulation will be dropped, I doubt it. It costs them nothing to keep doing it, particularly when there isnt even a physical jumper involved. > but it will be a good while yet. It won't be dropped for the > current generation of disk electronics - as you say, why remove it when it's already there? But in future generations > (for even bigger and faster drives), I don't think it will stay. Why shouldnt they drop that when there isnt even a physical jumper involved ? >>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB >>> sectors to the OS. >> So all thats necessary is drives that can do that emulation >> optionally and a ute to change that behaviour. >>> My guess is that we'll start out with drives that work only in emulation mode, then drives that work in either mode >>> based on a jumper >> Or do that electronically without using a jumper, like so many >> do with all sorts of other config stuff like AAM etc etc etc. > I expect this one will be by jumper for a good while to come. Bet it doesnt. > There is not, as far as I know, a way for the host/OS/controller and the disk electronics to agree on the best mode > automatically Corse there is with the later OSs. > - it would need a new ATA command and that means changes to the OS. Nope, it can be done with a ute, just like AAM is. > These things take a long time in the windows world They didnt with stuff like AAM and the SATA mode. > - by the time it gets realistic to have such an automatic selection, it would be easier to drop 512 byte sector mode > entirely. Doesnt need to be automatic. > What is a more immediate question is what the default jumper setting > should be - set to 512 for compatibility with XP and older OS's, or > set to 4 KB native for faster speed with Linux and newer OS's ? Who cares ? >>> (similar to the -150 mode limiter for poorly designed SATA controllers), >>> until finally we get 4KB-only drives. >> Why would they remove that capability once its there ? > I expect this one will be by jumper for a good while to come. There is > not, as far as I know, a way for the host/OS/controller and the disk [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] > should be - set to 512 for compatibility with XP and older OS's, or set > to 4 KB native for faster speed with Linux and newer OS's ? I doubt that this will be handled through jumpers. I`m pretty sure it`ll be through ATA commands only, and they will likely add a specific new ATA command which will likely return zeros on older drives, but ones on the newer drives that will indicate to a driver that this is 4K capable. You wouldn`t need to update the internal OS structures, since as they say Vista and Seven might already be capable of variable sector sizes, just not XP. So the only thing you`d need on Vista or Seven are slightly updated SATA/ATA drivers. Yousuf Khan > Right -- I just said that, that's the "first generation 4KB drives that > emulate 512byte sectors" [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > the -150 mode limiter for poorly designed SATA controllers), until > finally we get 4KB-only drives. I think the only reason for getting 4KB sectors instead of 512B is the error correction code overhead, not because 512B sectors aren't able to represent the latest sizes of hard drives. Since the error correction code is handled internally within the drive itself, the external interface wouldn't need to be aware of this internal organizational issue. It would be just another level abstraction that the internal electronics of the drive will handle itself. If the OS writes sectors out in 512B units, then the drive electronics will have to take care of combining them in cache to 4KB units. So once the electronics can handle 512-to-4096 transitions, I don't see any reason why they would ever remove it from the electronics. Apart from whether current OS internal structures can handle non-512 sector sizes, you will also need to update the HD drivers to tell the HD`s that they know how to 4KB sectors. Yousuf Khan >XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB >sectors to the OS. I don't see why. All it should need to do is load a hard disk controller driver that reads 4k sectors from the disk and present them to the OS in 512-byte chunks. I had a meg-optical drive once which used 2048-byte sectors. That worked fine once a driver was loaded for it. Signature(\__/) (='.'=) Bunny says Windows 7 is Vi$ta reloaded. (")_(") http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/windows_7.png >> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB >> sectors to the OS. [quoted text clipped - 5 lines] > I had a meg-optical drive once which used 2048-byte sectors. That > worked fine once a driver was loaded for it. Good luck in getting Microsoft to write anymore drivers for XP. Yousuf Khan >Good luck in getting Microsoft to write anymore drivers for XP. Aye, there is that. Signature(\__/) (='.'=) Bunny says Windows 7 is Vi$ta reloaded. (")_(") http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/windows_7.png >>Good luck in getting Microsoft to write anymore drivers for XP. > Aye, there is that. And there you have one of the limitations of closed source software. No long-term perspective, unless the vendor has one. Arno SignatureArno Wagner, Dr. sc. techn., Dipl. Inform., CISSP -- Email: arno@wagner.name GnuPG: ID: 1E25338F FP: 0C30 5782 9D93 F785 E79C 0296 797F 6B50 1E25 338F ---- Cuddly UI's are the manifestation of wishful thinking. -- Dylan Evans >>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB >>> sectors to the OS. [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] > >Good luck in getting Microsoft to write anymore drivers for XP. That doesn't parse. Did you mean >Good luck in getting Microsoft to write anymore, drivers for XP. or >Good luck in getting Microsoft to write any more drivers for XP. ? > Yousuf Khan Barry ===== Home page http://members.iinet.net.au/~barry.og Dont worry about BOG, he got kicked out of the biggest sheltered workshop in the country, and it should be obvious why that happened. >>>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB >>>> sectors to the OS. [quoted text clipped - 20 lines] > Home page > http://members.iinet.net.au/~barry.og > > Dont worry about BOG, he got kicked out of the biggest sheltered > workshop in the country, and it should be obvious why that happened. It's not "obvious" to most of us who live outside of Australia, though. So, Rod...what's the story? SignatureCordially, John Turco <jtur@concentric.net> Marie's Musings <http://fairiesandtails.blogspot.com> > > > >>>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB [quoted text clipped - 21 lines] > > Home page > > http://members.iinet.net.au/~barry.og > Rod Speed wrote >> Dont worry about BOG, he got kicked out of the biggest sheltered >> workshop in the country, and it should be obvious why that happened. > It's not "obvious" to most of us who live outside of Australia, though. > So, Rod...what's the story? He used to 'work' for the biggest sheltered workshop in the entire country, Telstra, the ex monopoly telco. They gave him the bums rush, right out the door, onto his lard arse, for what should be obvious reasons. >>>>>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present >>>>>> 4KB sectors to the OS. [quoted text clipped - 20 lines] >>> Home page >>> http://members.iinet.net.au/~barry.og > > Rod Speed wrote > [quoted text clipped - 10 lines] > They gave him the bums rush, right out the door, onto his lard arse, for > what should be obvious reasons. Okay, I did a bit of Wikipedia research, on the term "sheltered workshop." Now, I just want to know, whether Barry O'Grady got the "bums rush" because: He's handicapped (is he?). He's a member of an "ethnic minority" (Irish). The latter possiblility seems rather implausible -- as in Australia (and in every other English-speaking country), the Irish are a huge "minority" and hardly an underprivileged one, these days. SignatureCordially, John Turco <jtur@concentric.net> Marie's Musings <http://fairiesandtails.blogspot.com> > >>> > >>>>>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present [quoted text clipped - 21 lines] > >>> Home page > >>> http://members.iinet.net.au/~barry.og > Rod Speed wrote >>> Rod Speed wrote >>>> Dont worry about BOG, he got kicked out of the biggest sheltered >>>> workshop in the country, and it should be obvious why that happened. >>> It's not "obvious" to most of us who live outside of Australia, though. >>> So, Rod...what's the story? >> He used to 'work' for the biggest sheltered workshop >> in the entire country, Telstra, the ex monopoly telco. >> They gave him the bums rush, right out the door, >> onto his lard arse, for what should be obvious reasons. > Okay, I did a bit of Wikipedia research, on the term "sheltered workshop." > Now, I just want to know, whether Barry O'Grady got the "bums rush" because: > He's handicapped (is he?). Yes, between the ears, very severly indeed. Have a look at his usenet posts sometime. Stands out like dogs balls. > He's a member of an "ethnic minority" (Irish). Rather likely given his last name. > The latter possiblility seems rather implausible -- as in Australia > (and in every other English-speaking country), the Irish are a > huge "minority" and hardly an underprivileged one, these days. Corse they are underpriviledged, they have all those child raping priests. BOG is the spawn of one of them. >>>>>>>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present >>>>>>>> 4KB sectors to the OS. [quoted text clipped - 20 lines] >>>>> Home page >>>>> http://members.iinet.net.au/~barry.og > > Rod Speed wrote > >>> Rod Speed wrote [quoted text clipped - 20 lines] > > Stands out like dogs balls. Well, I just had a glance at his Web page (which, apparently, hasn't been updated since December 3, 2006); he's a rabid atheist, obviously. > > He's a member of an "ethnic minority" (Irish). > > Rather likely given his last name. I'm thinkin' that there's lots o' Irish (descendents), in Australia, though. They're the USA's second largest ethnic group, behind the Germans (and ahead of the third-place English, surprisingly enough). > > The latter possiblility seems rather implausible -- as in Australia > > (and in every other English-speaking country), the Irish are a > > huge "minority" and hardly an underprivileged one, these days. > > Corse they are underpriviledged, they have all those child raping priests. Hmmm, could such traumatization be the reason Barry O'Grady is so atheistic, as an adult? > BOG is the spawn of one of them. Perhaps, but...I'd bet that Folkert Rienstra is far worse. Do you believe Folksy would be allowed to even >visit< Oz, without his keeper? (Speaking of Usenet nuisances: Where's our crusty Canuck, Eric Gisin?) > >>>>>>>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present > >>>>>>>> 4KB sectors to the OS. [quoted text clipped - 20 lines] > >>>>> Home page > >>>>> http://members.iinet.net.au/~barry.og You see, Rod -- I didn't delete any of the above text, either! SignatureCordially, John Turco <jtur@concentric.net> Marie's Musings <http://fairiesandtails.blogspot.com> > Rod Speed wrote >>> Rod Speed wrote >>>>> Rod Speed wrote >>>>>> Dont worry about BOG, he got kicked out of the biggest sheltered >>>>>> workshop in the country, and it should be obvious why that happened. >>>>> It's not "obvious" to most of us who live outside of Australia, though. >>>>> So, Rod...what's the story? >>>> He used to 'work' for the biggest sheltered workshop >>>> in the entire country, Telstra, the ex monopoly telco. >>>> They gave him the bums rush, right out the door, onto >>>> his lard arse, for what should be obvious reasons. >>> Okay, I did a bit of Wikipedia research, on the term "sheltered >>> workshop." Now, I just want to know, whether Barry O'Grady got the >>> "bums rush" because: >>> He's handicapped (is he?). >> Yes, between the ears, very severly indeed. Have a look at his usenet posts sometime. >> Stands out like dogs balls. > Well, I just had a glance at his Web page (which, apparently, hasn't > been updated since December 3, 2006); he's a rabid atheist, obviously. And barking mad to boot. >>> He's a member of an "ethnic minority" (Irish). >> Rather likely given his last name. > I'm thinkin' that there's lots o' Irish (descendents), in Australia, though. Yeah, hordes of them. One even made it to governor of the Reserve Bank, our equivalent of your Fed. > They're the USA's second largest ethnic group, behind the Germans > (and ahead of the third-place English, surprisingly enough). We werent that stupid outselves. Most of ours were convicts, the result of the english f.cking over ireland very comprehensively indeed. >>> The latter possiblility seems rather implausible -- as in Australia >>> (and in every other English-speaking country), the Irish are a >>> huge "minority" and hardly an underprivileged one, these days. >> Corse they are underpriviledged, they have all those child raping priests. > Hmmm, could such traumatization be the reason Barry O'Grady is so atheistic, as an adult? Its possible, but I'm a heathen myself, and that isnt the reason I am. >> BOG is the spawn of one of them. > Perhaps, but...I'd bet that Folkert Rienstra is far worse. Do you believe > Folksy would be allowed to even >visit< Oz, without his keeper? He wouldnt be allowed to visit even with his keeper. > (Speaking of Usenet nuisances: Where's our crusty Canuck, Eric Gisin?) He's still around, mostly posting about what he claims is the global warming scam. >>>>>>>>>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that >>>>>>>>>> present 4KB sectors to the OS. [quoted text clipped - 22 lines] >>>>>>> Home page >>>>>>> http://members.iinet.net.au/~barry.og > You see, Rod -- I didn't delete any of the above text, either! OK, you can have a gold star on the back of your hand if you keep that up. >>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB >>> sectors to the OS. [quoted text clipped - 9 lines] > > Yousuf Khan If the hard drive manufacturers want to sell their drives to the huge XP user base, then I would think that they would write the drivers themselves. I believe that WD provides a sector "alignment" utility to optimise their 4KB sectored drives for use with XP. - Franc Zabkar SignaturePlease remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email. >>>> XP apparently will not be able to cope with drives that present 4KB >>>> sectors to the OS. [quoted text clipped - 15 lines] > >- Franc Zabkar If there is a good money making base of XP users, you better believe after market guys will fill the need. > >Good luck in getting Microsoft to write anymore drivers for XP. > [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > XP user base, then I would think that they would write the drivers > themselves. Not necessary, the first generation of such drives will have a built- in translator mode. By the time these manufacturers are ready to remove the translator mode (if ever), then XP will be a long-dead operating system. > I believe that WD provides a sector "alignment" utility to optimise > their 4KB sectored drives for use with XP. Do they already exist? Yousuf Khan >> >Good luck in getting Microsoft to write anymore drivers for XP. >> [quoted text clipped - 8 lines] >remove the translator mode (if ever), then XP will be a long-dead >operating system. WD's 4KB sectored drives have a jumper. >> I believe that WD provides a sector "alignment" utility to optimise >> their 4KB sectored drives for use with XP. > >Do they already exist? > > Yousuf Khan Yes. Advanced Format Hard Drive Download Utility: http://www.wdc.com/en/products/advancedformat/ What models utilize Advanced Format technology? "Some models of the WD Caviar Green and WD Scorpio Blue product families are built using Advanced Format technology. Over time more models and capacities will be added. WD drives with Advanced Format technology include special installation information on the drive label so be sure to read the label on your drive before installing it." - Franc Zabkar SignaturePlease remove one 'i' from my address when replying by email. > Is there any way to do a low-level format on an older drive so that it > now has 4K sectors? The days of low-level formatting are long gone. > Way, way, way back when. Floppy diskette sectors started out at 128B, > the moved to 256B. IBM pioneered 512B sectors when they brought out > the PC in 1981. Of course, with the right parameters sent to the FD > 1765 controller chip, any system could read the 512B sector diskettes. That's because the controllers for those devices were basically the system's CPU itself. These days they have their own intelligence, and it's more like a couple of peers talking over a network these days. Yousuf Khan > Yousuf Khan<bbbl67@spammenot.yahoo.com> wrote >> BBC News - Hard drive evolution could hit Microsoft XP users >> "By early 2011 all hard drives will use an "advanced format" that >> changes how they go about saving the data people store on them. >> The move to the advanced format will make it easier for hard drive makers >> to produce bigger drives that use less power and are more reliable. >> However, it might mean problems for Windows XP users >> who swap an old drive for one using the changed format. " >> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8557144.stm No reason why it cant use standard 512 byte LBAs to the system its connected to. > Is there any way to do a low-level format on > an older drive so that it now has 4K sectors? Nope, not with standard ATA and SATA drives. > Way, way, way back when. Floppy diskette sectors started out at 128B, > the moved to 256B. IBM pioneered 512B sectors when they brought out > the PC in 1981. Of course, with the right parameters sent to the FD > 1765 controller chip, any system could read the 512B sector diskettes. There is no separate controller with hard drives, that functionality is on the drive itself. Andrew Hamilton <Ahamilton90900@yahoo.com> kenjka: > Is there any way to do a low-level format on an older drive so that it > now has 4K sectors? Yup... Try SCSITool... But, note that I did this once and it somehow lowered the visible capacity of a drive, I believe it has something to do with counting blocks in Windows because Windows know to work with 512 byte drives only... SignatureRukometas gladi slomljen Djedicao njise ispod mosta popodne. By runf Damir Lukic, calypso@_MAKNIOVO_fly.srk.fer.hr http://inovator.blog.hr http://calypso-innovations.blogspot.com/ |
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