How to make sure 2TB Western Digital is good for Windows XP + pick the best one

[c627627]

After multiple EDITS:


Friendly advice, unless you want to get a headache - maybe skip reading posts 2-98

Draft 3​

Western Digital Advanced Format technology hard drives use sectors with 4,096 bytes of user data. They are not optimized to be formatted under Windows XP or earlier operating systems. If possible, partition and/or format WD Advanced Format drives under Windows 7/Vista before using them under Windows XP. (Remember not to partition or format them under Windows XP after that.)

If you cannot partition/format them under Windows 7/Vista before using them under Windows XP:

• For a single partition: you have the option of placing a jumper on pins 7-8 which then allow these drives to be optimally used by Windows XP. [Once again, this is unnecessary if the drive was previously partitioned/formatted under Windows 7/Vista.]

• For multiple partitions under Windows XP: use WD Advanced Format Hard Drive Utility http://www.wdc.com/global/products/features/?id=7&language=1 [Once again, this is unnecessary if the drive was previously partitioned/formatted under Windows 7/Vista.]


Drives made by other manufacturers using Advanced Format technology (such as Seagate SmartAlign drives) do not use pins or software. If possible, they should also be partitioned and/or formatted under Windows 7/Vista for later use on Windows XP.


For single partition Advanced Format WD drives under Windows XP, if you place a jumper on pins 7-8 and boot into Windows XP > Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Computer Management > Storage > Disk Management >

A Wizard will pop-up in Windows XP to initialize the disk. CHECK the disk to be initialized but UNCHECK the disk when asked to convert it to a dynamic disk. Then right click on the Disk > New Partition... > Next > Next > Next > Next > UNCHECK: Perform a quick format > Next > Finish


Make sure they do not fail the Western Digital Extended Test using Data Lifeguard Diagnostic for Windows:
http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=608&sid=3&lang=en

So if you get a drive that appears to be working, make sure it doesn't fail the extended test like this:




Other manufacturers have their own utilities which also have extended tests. They usually need to run overnight since they take many hours to complete.


If you have no access to Windows 7/Vista for partitioning/formatting, unfortunately, even modern partition software installed under Windows XP may not be able to correctly partition/format Advanced Format Drives.

However, GParted can. Go to http://sourceforge.net/projects/gparted/
and get the GParted iso. Use it to create a boot CD. Try to only have the Advanced Format Drive connected to the system when you boot with it.

- a drive that came back from the manufacturer could possibly have a file system on it already

- if so delete that partition ... highlight partition ... partition > delete > edit > apply

- if it is new or has no partitions then you will need to create a partition table

- device > create partition table (choose msdos) > edit > apply


- CRPTN - select the unallocated portion of the disk (all of it)

- CRPTN - partition > new ... a dialog box appears

- CRPTN - create your partition(s) as NTFS... assign the partition name

- CRPTN - if you create only 1 partition the above will be the only 2 modifications you would need to make

- CRPTN - notice that "align to" is set to MiB ... there's your alignment

- CRPTN - click the add button > edit > apply


- FMT - highlight the partition you just created

- FMT - partition > format to > NTFS > edit > apply


- CHK - to check that all is well from within GParted ...

- CHK - highlight the partition you created ... right click and choose information

- CHK - If you see that "first sector" is 2048 (or any number divisible by 8), then the partition is aligned.

- CHK - If the first sector is not divisible by 8 then something has gone wrong and such unaligned partitions on Advanced Format drives will perform at reduced speeds.


[Note: If you used a jumper for pins 7-8 on the Western Digital drive, then a subsequent examination of the partition by GParted would show the first sector of the partition as 63. But actually the first sector would be 64 (because of the jumper) and would be aligned.]



* * *



Useful Western Digital links:

• Advanced Format Technology pdf:
http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/?id=216&type=87

• Advanced Format Hard Drive Download Utility:
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.aspx?id=120#tab10

• Advanced Format Software
http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=805

• WD Align Chart:


• How to install a WD Advanced Format Drive on a non-Windows Operating System:
http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/5655



Thank you mrpete of AnandTech for clear GParted instructions above.

mrpete also suggests:

If you want to test the disk then ...

Unaligned partitions on advanced format disks will only perform at ~50% speed on random 4 KB writes when the total amount of random write exceeds 4 times the amount of cache on the disk drive and no 4 KB write is to the same location. If you can implement such a test yourself then you are pretty good. Maybe one of the disk test suites could do this?

If you want to do a really useful test then here's a suggestion. Gather advanced format disks from WD, Seagate, Samsung and Hitachi. Format them in the default way by XP. Do NOT jumper the WD disk. You now have 4 advanced format disks that have unaligned partitions (all start at LBA 63). The firmware on all the disks can handle this situation to a greater or lesser extent. Seagate claims that their firmware handles this situation by far the best and indeed that the performance of their advanced format disks in this situation will be quite close to that of a properly aligned partition. Test the performance of the group of disks while writing 25 KB (tiny Word doc) and 100 MB files.

The writing/rewriting of the 25 KB files should be done in such a way as to ensure that (1) each subsequently rewritten file is in a different track from the previously rewritten file and (2) the disk cache will be overflowed before the rewriting starts. The 25 KB test could be done in a butterfly fashion ... write files 1 - 5000 ... then rewrite 1, then 2000, then 2, then 1999, then 3, then 1998 ... etc. The time to watch is the rewrite time for files 1 through 2000. The cache will have been effectively voided by writing files 2001 through 5000 and you'll also get the effect of jumping from track to track. The controller might take the track jump as a signal to write out the cache.

All the unaligned partition disks should be able to handle the 100 MB file writes reasonably well by simply caching the disk writes and mostly avoiding the read/modify/write penalty of writing to an unaligned partition. If any of the disks give 50% speed performance on that test then that would be HUGE news. A comparison of the speed between the different disks would be interesting and will indicate the skill of the folks producing the firmware.

The random 25 KB file rewrites are a much more difficult test for the unaligned partition disks. On a percentage basis the firmware will not be able use caching nearly as much. Seagate is so confident their disks will perform well that they do not even offer an alignment tool.

Of course, in order to compare the results of the above tests you need to also repartition the above disks in a properly aligned way and then rerun the tests.

properly aligned = start LBA is evenly divisible by 8 [if WD has a jumper then (start LBA+1)/8]




Once again - it took a lot to get to this Edit ↑, so skip posts 2 through 98 or else you'll find yourself big time.

 

[Moto7451]

Are these the advanced format drives or is this just a regular formatting question? I've set them the formatting options to auto in XP, Vista, Win 7, OS X, etc and all seems to work well backwards and forwards.

 

[Psykoikonov]

I am getting two identical 2TB Western Digital drives. I understand to be able to use them under Windows XP, I should make sure that offset is 1024 KB or any number that can be multiplied with a whole number to get 4096, is that correct? And the way to check that is in DOS:

diskpart
list disk
select disk #
list partition

I figure simply formatting them in Windows 7 would take care of them for use under Windows XP, since I have a dual boot. By the way how do you format them with the correct offset in Windows XP?


Also, I understand that only "prolonged scans" may detect errors on them initially. Since these large drives are more unreliable than old smaller ones, I'd like to make sure all is well, from what can be done initially.

Which scans exactly should be used, and how can you tell that the drive is 100% good to go? What exactly do you look at to to tell which one of the two is better?

1. Run elevated CMD.
2. type diskpart in cmd window <hit enter
3. at diskpart prompt type list disk <hit enter
4. find the number corresponding to the drive
5. type select disk # where # is the drive given from above <hit enter
6. type clean <hit enter
7. type create partition primary align=1024 <hit enter
8. type select partition 1 <hit enter
9. type active <hit enter
10. type format fs=ntfs <hit enter (go to bed )
11. Optional: type assign <hit enter (gives partition a drive letter)

Not that I think offset matters on mechanical drives (the above would give an offset of 1024kb=1MB, only heard of offset being used on SSDs) but anyway that's how you do it. Regarding checks I would run WD Lifeguard Diagnostic Tool (either in Windows 7 or in Dos) and run a full scan on them and call them good to go. If you want to be sure run the scan 5 times or something but make my guess is each scan will take ~12 hours.

 

[c627627]

Not that I think offset matters on mechanical drives.

It matters because of this WD paper:
http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/WhitePapers/ENG/2579-771430.pdf

which specifically says:

Advanced Format technology is designed to work with the most current operating systems, such as Windows® Vista, Windows® 7 and Mac® operating systems. Like many new technologies, Advanced Format is not optimized for outdated operating systems such as Windows XP. For users who are still using Windows XP, WD offers WD Align software, a simple utility that allows Advanced Format drives operating under Windows XP to run at full performance. The WD Align software is available for download from WD's web site at http://www.wdc.com/advformat

 

[c627627]

Your method should be used under Windows XP but if the system is a multi boot so that it has Windows 7 and Windows XP - would simply formatting the drive under Windows 7 make the drive ready for Windows XP as well? And the way to check is as listed in post#1?


As for the other thing - what exactly would WD Lifeguard Full Scan display, what specific thing should be look for when that scan finishes? I guess I don't know what information it displays so I'm asking if someone already did this?

 

[Psykoikonov]

It matters because of this WD paper:
http://www.wdc.com/wdproducts/library/WhitePapers/ENG/2579-771430.pdf

which specifically says:

Advanced Format technology is designed to work with the most current operating systems, such as Windows® Vista, Windows® 7 and Mac® operating systems. Like many new technologies, Advanced Format is not optimized for outdated operating systems such as Windows XP. For users who are still using Windows XP, WD offers WD Align software, a simple utility that allows Advanced Format drives operating under Windows XP to run at full performance. The WD Align software is available for download from WD's web site at http://www.wdc.com/advformat

This tool provided by WD and alignment are two TOTALLY different things. If your going to use the drive using XP run WDs tool, end of story. I misunderstood, apologies.

The storage industry is improving this legacy architecture by changing the size of the sectors on the media to store 4,096 bytes of data rather than 512 bytes of data.

The alignment I'm referring to offsets the beginning of the drive (used for SSds only) by the amount specified and has nothing to do with the sector sizes themselves.

Your method should be used under Windows XP but if the system is a multi boot so that it has Windows 7 and Windows XP - would simply formatting the drive under Windows 7 make the drive ready for Windows XP as well? And the way to check is as listed in post#1?


As for the other thing - what exactly would WD Lifeguard Full Scan display, what specific thing should be look for when that scan finishes? I guess I don't know what information it displays so I'm asking if someone already did this?

The scan will check the disc for bad sectors, all of them.

 

[c627627]

I was not aware that formatting offset has nothing to do with WD Advanced Format and that the *only* way to deal with this issue is to use the WDs tool http://www.wdc.com/advformat The link says that if we only use one partition on WinXP then the Jumper PIN 7-8 should be used but I've heard conflicting info on that, should the pin be used on 1 partition or not for WinXP?


Also I'm more concerned about the head parking issue which apparently can be resolved using http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=609&sid=113

Supposedly the drive parks itself every 8 seconds and this could reduce its life span. Some people say disable this feature no matter what - other says leave it.

What are your opinions?

 

[Psykoikonov]

I was not aware that formatting offset has nothing to do with WD Advanced Format and that the *only* way to deal with this issue is to use the WDs tool http://www.wdc.com/advformat The link says that if we only use one partition on WinXP then the Jumper PIN 7-8 should be used but I've heard conflicting info on that, should the pin be used on 1 partition or not for WinXP?


Also I'm more concerned about the head parking issue which apparently can be resolved using http://support.wdc.com/product/download.asp?groupid=609&sid=113

Supposedly the drive parks itself every 8 seconds and this could reduce its life span. Some people say disable this feature no matter what - other says leave it.

What are your opinions?

To be honest I've never used one of these drives (I have older 750GBs) so I can't base any opinion on those features.

In regards to Advanced Format there is some information here and here which may provide some insight.

 

[Xaotic]

The advanced format is 512b sector emulation. This would be similar to dynamic drive overlay many years back. It will reduce performance in a dual boot, from the same drive, situation. Different disks would be much better, if possible.

On a storage only drive for large files or streaming media, I would likely not use the parking modification. Otherwise I would probably disable it.

 

[madhatter256]

Your method should be used under Windows XP but if the system is a multi boot so that it has Windows 7 and Windows XP - would simply formatting the drive under Windows 7 make the drive ready for Windows XP as well? And the way to check is as listed in post#1?


As for the other thing - what exactly would WD Lifeguard Full Scan display, what specific thing should be look for when that scan finishes? I guess I don't know what information it displays so I'm asking if someone already did this?

Before you format it or plug it in. Put a jumper on pin 7-8. this makes the hdd format its sectors into 512b size, then you can use it in XP no sweat, but not recommended as an OS drive just a storage drive. Says so on the HDD itself.....

The parking 'issue' (not really an issue) is only problematic if you're using the drive as an OS drive (constantly being read/write). Also, that fix only applies to their first generation green drives and you're getting a 3rd gen drive with 2tb capacity. It's main purpose is to be used as a storage drive.

 

[c627627]

Yes for file backup purposes only - not OS.

The jumper is apparently only if there is one partition, should Advanced Format Hard Drive Utility be used for one partition? Plus I think jumper should not be used for more than 1 partition.

 

[madhatter256]

Applying the jumper affects the whole drive, regardless of how many partitions. SO it will all be formatted as 512b in any number of partitions.

I don't know about the other manufacturers.

 

[c627627]

Why does WD say to apply jumper for 1 partition only:
http://www.wdc.com/global/products/features/?id=7&language=1

 

[madhatter256]

I guess I was partially wrong on the jumper making any partition you created 512b sectors....

For a clean install of Windows XP using multiple partitions, DO NOT install the jumper; simply run the WD Align utility.

Looks like you will have to use the software to do this and not install the jumper.

 

[c627627]

Yes, however note that mentioning the installation of operating systems is a great source of confusion since most of us will be using these 2TB drives for backing up files - not for installing Windows7/XP on.


So for the majority of us - for backing up files on Win7-WinXP dual boot systems - let me repeat the questions I posted elsewhere, if one of the already installed OS is Windows XP:

• Why use pin for one partition and not on more than one partition?
• Why/why not use Advanced Format Utility on top of the pin for one partition?
• What is the situation with Seagate, Samsung, Hitachi and Advanced Format? Do they use pins or software or anything?

 

[madhatter256]

The WD paper you posted explains all of that. The last question can be solved by looking at each individual manufacturer site. A lot of them make specific models with the advance format, and they still make basic 512b sector models.

 

[- bill]

Why does WD say to apply jumper for 1 partition only:
http://www.wdc.com/global/products/features/?id=7&language=1

Because the jumper is simply a quick and dirty fix for a disk which will contain only a single, primary partition positioned at the start of the disk. Any other partitions on the disk won't be optimally aligned save by chance.

Older partitioning software can create optimal partition alignment on the new drives, but you have to tweak it manually to make the partitions start on appropriate boundaries. For NTFS using 4 KB or larger clusters (I think they'll always be at least 4 KB unless you converted from a FAT partition, when they may be 512 B and hence poorly suited to a 4 KB disk) just making the partition start on a 4 KB disk boundary should work fine - e.g., you can define a dummy primary partition of about 62 MB at the disk's start to make the NEXT primary partition start at such a boundary, then delete the dummy.

Unlike NTFS, FAT file systems don't normally align their data clusters internally at a 4 KB multiple from the partition start (rather, it depends upon the size of the FATs themselves), so you need to decide what size you want the partition to be, create a test partition of that size, and then use a partition manager like EASEUS Partition Master (free version available) which provides the location of the first data sector to see what location you need to make the partition start at in order to make the first data sector land on a 4 KB disk boundary. Again, you need a FAT cluster size of at least 4 KB to make all this work optimally.

Logical partitions have the added complication that they don't actually start on 'logical cylinder' boundaries but instead one logical track later (since the 'extended partition boot record' - like the MBR at the start of the disk -occupies the first logical track of - normally - 63 512-byte sectors of that cylinder) and this actual start of the partition is what you need to align appropriately.

So it should be possible, using traditional partitioning software, to partition the new drives such that both third-party partitioning utilities and WinXP/2K/9x systems using at least a 4 KB cluster size will work (and perform) just fine (and my impression is that Linux is a good citizen in that it looks at whatever partitioning layout already exists and honors it - though I'd check first before risking my data on that assumption). The advantage of doing so as I described above is that it uses bog-standard techniques (e.g., it's possible to fiddle with the offset of the first data sector from the partition start location, and with the size of the MBR 'track' as well, but any such theoretically legitimate but unusual tweaking runs some risk of confusing one of the many different pieces of software which might be less than thorough in honoring such corner cases - and I do not know whether the WD 'align' utility does such things or not).

But what if you want to share a disk between such older systems (and utilities) and Win7/Vista? Partitioning the disk in the traditional manner as described will certainly create partitions into which Win7 and Vista can be installed appropriately, but even Microsoft has admitted that in some cases using Win7/Vista to MODIFY the partition structure of such a traditionally-partitioned drive, or using traditional partitioning utilities (including Windows Disk Management) to modify the partition structure of a drive partitioned using Win7/Vista defaults, can result in lost partitions. They even provided a patch for XP to make it use the new layouts to avoid some such problems, but that doesn't cover traditional third-party tools (or Win2K).

That leaves a couple of safe options:

1. Use ONLY Vista/Win7/updated third-party tools (or the patched XP described above) to affect the partition layout on the disk.

2. Use ONLY traditional tools to affect the partition layout on the disk (you can adjust Win7 and Vista registries to honor the old layout style if you want to be able to use them as well).

For additional discussion of such issues http://www.multibooters.co.uk used to have a good discussion of the perils of mixing new-style with traditional partition management.

 

[c627627]

Welcome to the forums. Thanks for the info.

When you refer to a jumper being a quick and 'dirty fix', does that mean you recommend using WD Advanced Format utility even for one partition? When the utility is used for one partition, is the jumper necessary?

 

[- bill]

Welcome to the forums. Thanks for the info.

When you refer to a jumper being a quick and 'dirty fix', does that mean you recommend using WD Advanced Format utility even for one partition? When the utility is used for one partition, is the jumper necessary?

Since I have no idea what the WD utility may be doing to achieve its alignment goals I can't recommend it (because, as I noted above, some potentially legitimate but unusual solutions might confuse other partitioning software). What the jumper is doing is clearer (though optimal only for a single-partitioned disk), but you wouldn't want to use it on a disk which you were going to use Win7/Vista partitioning tools on since they would take the adjusted start location at face value and create uniformly pessimal partitions on it.

 

[c627627]

All right, I feel we're really getting somewhere now.

So for a dual Win7/WinXP system using Advanced Format drive for backing up files (not OS) onto a single partition, you would recommend:

1. Place jumper on pins 7-8
2. Boot into Windows XP (not Win7) and format


Correct?