New Hard Drive - Advanced Format Question

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SSri

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Mar 11, 2010
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I know this has been asked before. Sorry for raising it again.

Hi All,

I am buying a couple of HGST 7K6000 3.5" Hard Disks (2 TB or 4TB). These would be internal drives, which I plan to run them in suitable enclosures for backups through USB 3.0.

https://www.senetic.co.uk/hgst/hgst_hdd/capacity/ultrastar_7k6000/

I plan to use with Casper 10 or EaseUS for backups.

These hard disks come in two formats : 512N and 4KN.

I am using Win7 64 bit. But I plan to upgrade to Win10.

I am aware these AFs are at physical sector levels, where 1 4kn physical sector equals 1 logical sector, while it is 8 logical sectors in the case of 512. Since I will be using USB 3.0, it should be down to the USB 3.0 interface to handle this, I suppose. I know the disks > 2TB needs to be GPT formatted.

FYI, I am using a PCIe card for usb 3.0.

My questions are:

Which one of the AF HDD is recommended, considering my backup plans and win7 and win10 please?

The backup software should not matter in the case of AF HDDs, should it please?

Thanks,


 
Solution
photonboy
I'm not sure the Advanced Format has any bearing on usage. Perhaps you mean "4K Native" specifically as a server functionality but regardless my advice is:

1) look at customer feedback/reviews, and
2) get the cheapest drives that make sense

AFAIK you just get those and use NTFS formatting via Disk Management and that's it.

I would consider looking at the WDMYCLOUD as well which attaches to the router via Ethernet but then it can access all computers. You can alternatively us a Gigabit Switch to connect it to a local PC if you have no Ethernet cable running to the router.

When attached to the router you can access it by all Ethernet and wi-fi devices. I use it for my move collection and to backup the laptop since it has no second...
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photonboy

photonboy

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Jun 20, 2006
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I'm not sure the Advanced Format has any bearing on usage. Perhaps you mean "4K Native" specifically as a server functionality but regardless my advice is:

1) look at customer feedback/reviews, and
2) get the cheapest drives that make sense

AFAIK you just get those and use NTFS formatting via Disk Management and that's it.

I would consider looking at the WDMYCLOUD as well which attaches to the router via Ethernet but then it can access all computers. You can alternatively us a Gigabit Switch to connect it to a local PC if you have no Ethernet cable running to the router.

When attached to the router you can access it by all Ethernet and wi-fi devices. I use it for my move collection and to backup the laptop since it has no second drive. (I use ACRONIS TRUE IMAGE which I love but it has a small learning curve... everything on every PC is now done on an AUTOMATED, weekly backup).

To setup Acronis TI to use the WDMYCLOUD I had to put "admin" in twice. Not sure if that was to access the WDMYCLOUD or my Router but once I did that everything stayed automatic with the weekly backups.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/WD-TB-Cloud-Personal-Storage/dp/B00FOKN7D8/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1519299337&sr=8-6&keywords=wdmycloud

They have models with dual hard drives however I found it cheaper to get a second 4TB USB drive (normal USB3 Mybook) and just attach it then setup the auto backup of the WDMYCLOUD. (auto backup doesn't work for me so i just occasionally tell it to backup the WDMYCLOUD to the attached USB drive)

Another issue with LOCAL USB drives is that they will start up any time you do something like access the Recycle Bin. It also may be a GLITCH but one or more of my USB drives starts up and shuts down every hour or so.

 
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Solution
photonboy

photonboy

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Jun 20, 2006
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https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2510009/microsoft-support-policy-for-4k-sector-hard-drives-in-windows

Note that "native 4K" as of this page creation is NOT supported for W7 but "Advanced Format" drives are.

I'm no expert but I believe what you may be looking for is support for "512" such as 512e in addition to 4K such as the 7K6000 spec sheet shows.
https://www.hgst.com/sites/default/files/resources/Ultrastar-7K6000-DS.pdf

Again, I believe 4K Native is for server-specific drives which I don't recommend you buy anyway as that should be overpriced for your purpose.
 
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SSri

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Thank you for the recommendations.

The 4KN, 512E and 512N cost the same. The 512e gets a balance of compatibility and performance. I am aware that TI is very popular but I have had nothing but issues on TI on both versions (XP and win7).

HGST does not have have 512E in 2TB. I reckon I need to take the 4TBs.

I reckon I would go for something else.
 
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