Partition new 1tb HTPC drive?
Last response: in Storage
Hey guys, just trying to get a second point of view on what approach to take here, because I am torn between two ideas of my own.
I just picked up a 1tb WD Caviar Blue drive (10EZEX- single platter 64mb cache) for my HTPC. I know that with a spinning disk, I'd be getting the best performance by NOT partitioning it in general- my first inclination is to just leave it a single large disk, especially since there OS is on a separate SSD.
The other thought I've been having is that I should consider dividing the disk into three sections. The first for large, dense media such as HD movies that read speed would be most important for, the second for all smaller media such as music and photos, and lastly a small third for any random data storage that might be overflow from the SSD.
Maybe I am over-analyzing since the sequential read/write is so high (around 180mb/s). I'm just coming from multiple older drives in the system that averaged around 60mb/s each and actually caused some issues with playback of full HD media.
I just picked up a 1tb WD Caviar Blue drive (10EZEX- single platter 64mb cache) for my HTPC. I know that with a spinning disk, I'd be getting the best performance by NOT partitioning it in general- my first inclination is to just leave it a single large disk, especially since there OS is on a separate SSD.
The other thought I've been having is that I should consider dividing the disk into three sections. The first for large, dense media such as HD movies that read speed would be most important for, the second for all smaller media such as music and photos, and lastly a small third for any random data storage that might be overflow from the SSD.
Maybe I am over-analyzing since the sequential read/write is so high (around 180mb/s). I'm just coming from multiple older drives in the system that averaged around 60mb/s each and actually caused some issues with playback of full HD media.
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rwpritchett said:
Just one partition.To illustrate, the read on the hard drive is about 100 MB/s. High definition video like blu-ray has a maximum bitrate of 54 Mbit/s. There are 8 bits to 1 byte. Even older hard drives won't have any problems playing high definition video.
Thanks for the feedback. I know the bit/byte conversion, but wasn't certain what speed HD video was read at, so that's quite helpful. Logically, I would assume that if the source media maxed out at 54 mbits, encoded containers such as .avi or .mp4 would play at even lower bitrates? If so, I really don't have anything to sweat it would seem.
I am curious how I ended up having issues on occasion with video playback off the older disks that I had been using. Could it be that the issue was caused by attempting to play existing data on the same disk that was simultaneously the source/destination for torrent transfers? *disclosure- not into pirating; I only download recent episodes of certain programs to suffice until the season is available on DVD/BluRay*
Heck, maybe the drive was just getting glitchy from old age, considering it was a hand-me-down from another rig that had been using it for years.
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