Thank you! This seems almost too simple, so forgive me for trying to make sure I do have it all right...
So all I have to do is pop the 4k sector drive (2TB) into a USB enclosure, attach that to my Win7 box, and perform a Quick Format -- then I'm done, and it can be moved back over to the XP box? (Why wouldn't it just come pre-formatted this way?) Is there any downside to using this sort of 4k drive on XP (assuming I follow the procedure outlined above)? fwiw, I'm leaning toward a Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB -- also thinking about getting a Thermaltake BlacX Duet, which seems like a nifty idea (the didn't exist the last time I did this). On Thu, Mar 22, 2012 at 1:00 PM, Alex Austin <[email protected]> wrote: > The only important point to the drive, performance wise, is that the main > partition begin on a 4k boundary. Windows 7 will make sure that happens, and > format the filesystem with 4K block sizes, leaving it safe for Windows XP to > use. Even if XP addresses the drive in 512-byte sectors, it will still be > doing so in 4K chunks, and the drive will do the translation itself. > > - Alex > -- > Smart is knowing that a tomato is a fruit. Wise is knowing better than to > put one in a fruit salad. > > > On Thu, Mar 22, 2012 at 11:57 AM, Scott Matthews <[email protected]> > wrote: >> >> > You could attach the USB drive to a Windows 7 machine, format >> > (initialize?) it there, then move it for use next to your XP machine. >> >> Out of curiosity, why doesn't it then "just work" (don't they come >> formatted)? ie, is formatting it on Windows 7 somehow changing it from >> 4k to 512 sectors? >> >> So all I have to do is attach a 4k sector drive via a USB enclosure to >> a Win7 box, Quick Format it there, and then it'll be fine back over on >> the XP box? >> _______________________________________________ >> Thinkpad mailing list >> [email protected] >> http://stderr.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/thinkpad > > _______________________________________________ Thinkpad mailing list [email protected] http://stderr.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/thinkpad
