Final Word on the Samsung HD204UI

[bcbgboy13]

FYI - Linux on 4kB-sector disks:

ReiserFS is the worst of the Linix-based FS in regard to write performance on misaligned sectors:

http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-4kb-sector-disks/

[pike]

The F4 series has already replaced F3 here in Sweden

[pike]

FYI - Linux on 4kB-sector disks:

ReiserFS is the worst of the Linix-based FS in regard to write performance on misaligned sectors:

http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-4kb-sector-disks/

at the middle/end of that article he talks about ways to ALIGN the hdd using software tools. Does this work with unraid ?

[Joe L.]

FYI - Linux on 4kB-sector disks:

ReiserFS is the worst of the Linix-based FS in regard to write performance on misaligned sectors:

http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-4kb-sector-disks/

at the middle/end of that article he talks about ways to ALIGN the hdd using software tools. Does this work with unraid ?

No.  unRAID, at this time, starts its partition on sector 63.   Hopefully, at some future time, that will change.   

[mbryanr]

Which looking at Samsung's history, they usually fix this type of thing through firmware..... 

Maybe if more people contact their support department, it might speed up getting a firmware patch.

I received a response from @Samsungservice re: using this drive (or jumper setting) with a OS that starts the partition at sector 63.

According to our techs it is not possible. Hope this helps. Thanks! ^Jess

Didn't really "help".   Asked a follow up if this would be possible to correct in a firmware upgrade.  Will post when I receive a response.

[SomeWhatLost]

so, just noticed this thread....
I already have 3 HD204UI's about to be delivered from newegg...

so what do I do?

use them anyway? its just for DVD's... will there be any long term issues?

return them? hopefully no restocking fee? (plus then I need to wait that much longer to bring my unRAID online...)

should I just run and hide and pretend this never happened?

whats the best option?

[Rajahal]

so, just noticed this thread....
I already have 3 HD204UI's about to be delivered from newegg...

so what do I do?

use them anyway? its just for DVD's... will there be any long term issues?

return them? hopefully no restocking fee? (plus then I need to wait that much longer to bring my unRAID online...)

should I just run and hide and pretend this never happened?

whats the best option?

Newegg is very good about returns, they really care about keeping their customers happy.  Just yesterday they gave me $20 back because they were unable to provide me the invoice I needed for a rebate.  Stellar customer service in my opinion.

Therefore, I would suggest this: get on their live chat and explain to them that you just found out that the drives you ordered are incompatible for the server application in which you intend to use them (or you could just say you want to use them with WinXP if you want to keep it simpler).  Ask them if they will let you cancel the order or return them without a restocking fee.  They may offer you store credit, which would be fine since you could just use it to get drives that will work with unRAID, such as WD EARS w/ jumpers.

[Kaygee]

So when WD finlly announced this new format, the only benefit I remember being touted is more space (upto 11%?). So far all I can see is slower performance... another great idea badly implemented by commitee (actually they bottled it and left it to the HDD makers) and it only took ten years to cock it up this badly.

Has anyone tried a 4096 byte sector drive on a supported OS to see if you do actually get any extra space as touted by WD? I suspect not.
 

[Rajahal]

As I understand it, the 'extra space' is invisible to the user.  Basically, advanced format drives are able to cram more data into the same physical platter surface area (4x as much, if I understand it correctly).  This means that they can start manufacturing drives with much higher capacities without increasing the number of platters.  This is good for power savings, weight, heat, etc.  A 2 TB advanced format HDD will still appear as a 2 TB hard drive to the user even when used in a supporting OS, such as Win7.  There's no hidden space to be unlocked, or anything like that.

I agree that this whole issue is quite annoying, and it makes choosing a 2 TB drive rather daunting...they all seem to have some problems (at least all the green ones do).  Still, pretty much every time a new technology is introduced there will be an awkward transitional phase.  As consumers we just get to whine a lot and ultimately tough it out.  And won't it be fun when all our non-advanced format drives (which I'm sure they'll soon start calling 'legacy drives' or similar) will be incompatible with new systems!  Not for any good reason, of course, just because they want us to upgrade to the latest and greatest.  Kind of like how Windows XP is now claimed by Microsoft to be 'incompatible with the internet' because it still ships with IE6.

[SomeWhatLost]

well, it seems I have another option...

use the Samsungs in one of my NV+... seems infrant is up to date on their file systems... at least with their latest firmware release...


um... why is a hardware device (NV+) more up to date than a software device (unRAID) shouldn't it be the other way around?
although, I guess, just going by the date of the 5.0 beta posting, it may be that limetech is following the Duke Nukem Forever release schedule? hopefully that works out better for Limetect than it did for 3drealms btw, slightly off topic... anyone know when DNF will be released... I was a huge fan of DN3 back in the day....

[prostuff1]

well, it seems I have another option...

use the Samsungs in one of my NV+... seems infrant is up to date on their file systems... at least with their latest firmware release...


um... why is a hardware device (NV+) more up to date than a software device (unRAID) shouldn't it be the other way around?
although, I guess, just going by the date of the 5.0 beta posting, it may be that limetech is following the Duke Nukem Forever release schedule? hopefully that works out better for Limetect than it did for 3drealms btw, slightly off topic... anyone know when DNF will be released... I was a huge fan of DN3 back in the day....

Unraid starts the partitions at 63 which is not aligned with the 4k sector drives.  There is work that needs to be done so that sector 63 can still be used in unraid but when new 4k discs are put in they are formatted and the partition starts at 64.  There is a lot of hoop jumping and checking that needs to be done for this to be implemented and not require the user to change a lot of stuff.

[SomeWhatLost]

There is a lot of hoop jumping and checking that needs to be done for this to be implemented and not require the user to change a lot of stuff.

thats ok, I am starting fresh... so as long as it gets done now, it wont really effect me

[prostuff1]

There is a lot of hoop jumping and checking that needs to be done for this to be implemented and not require the user to change a lot of stuff.

thats ok, I am starting fresh... so as long as it gets done now, it wont really effect me

Fair enough, but Lime-Tech has to make it work for everyone.  There has not been a lot of communication from Lime-Tech lately.

This change will hopefully make it into 5.0 (as we are seeing more and more drives with the 4K sector setup) but I am not sure if it will make it into a 4.5.x release.  My gut says it probably will but will probably be the last change to the 4.5.x series.  Every change after that will only be done to the 5.x releases.

[jtown]

FWIW, an F4 can work "well enough" depending on how you use the drive.  I didn't think to check the forum until after I'd picked mine up and decided to give it a shot anyway.  As long as the access is sequential, I don't see a performance hit.  And everything I do on most of my unRAID drives involves one-time writes of huge files and occasional reads.  (Storing and playing back HD video.)  I get 32-34megs/sec when writing large files to the drive which is the same I get with similar writes to any other drive.  If I try to read while writing, it bogs down but I can live with it.  Once I'm done filling up the drive, I won't be writing to it again.  I haven't run a parity check yet but I'm not too concerned with the speed of parity checks as long as it still finishes overnight.

So whether it will be adequate depends on how you use it.  I'm disappointed in this trend, tho.  unRAID will need to start detecting and handling these drives in software soon if everyone starts designing their new drives this way.  The F3 was my favorite 2tb drive because it just plain worked and didn't have any issues.  I'm tempted to track down some F3s and buy them while I can. 

[madpoet]

I'm also using 4 of them.  The introduction of a cache drive in my system has made it even better, since it's not writing files to the drives in big chunks   Honestly they perform fine for me so far.