[SOLVED] NTFS 2048kb vs 64kb cluster size performance benefits for HDD

[vietanh.ngdinh]

Hi I was wondering if i'm thinking a 2048kb cluster size would help my hdd compared to 64kb cluster size. Is it true?

 

[RealBeast]

Hi I was wondering if i'm thinking a 2048kb cluster size would help my hdd compared to 64kb cluster size. Is it true?

It depends on what type of files you are primarily working with -- 64KB is good for very large files (like multimedia or big databases) on a storage drive. If you mostly deal with text documents that are smaller you are better off with a smaller cluster size to avoid wasting a lot of space.

As for your OS drive 4KB or 8KB probably makes more sense since the files are smaller and will not result in as much wasted space. And if you want OS drive performance you should be looking at SSDs.

It is also important to consider the size of your total storage array -- probably something that will not be an issue for you, but large partitions require larger cluster size since the number of clusters is limited to 2^32 and a cluster size too small will limit the maximum partition size. 4KB can only give you a 16TB partition, while 64KB will allow partitions up to 256TB (not something that the average user has to worry about).

 

[vietanh.ngdinh]

Hi I was wondering if i'm thinking a 2048kb cluster size would help my hdd compared to 64kb cluster size. Is it true?

It depends on what type of files you are primarily working with -- 64KB is good for very large files (like multimedia or big databases) on a storage drive. If you mostly deal with text documents that are smaller you are better off with a smaller cluster size to avoid wasting a lot of space.

As for your OS drive 4KB or 8KB probably makes more sense since the files are smaller and will not result in as much wasted space. And if you want OS drive performance you should be looking at SSDs.

It is also important to consider the size of your total storage array -- probably something that will not be an issue for you, but large partitions require larger cluster size since the number of clusters is limited to 2^32 and a cluster size too small will limit the maximum partition size. 4KB can only give you a 16TB partition, while 64KB will allow partitions up to 256TB (not something that the average user has to worry about).

So I use hd tune random access benchmark and it gives me this. i'm really confused, why does bigger cluster size give better speed but take more access time??

 

[RealBeast]

You're overthinking it. You will get a result for the best cluster size depending on the data file size. Don't spend too much time running benchmarks, as they only indicate what you should expect depending on the parameters of the particular benchmark.

You get faster transfers with a larger cluster size that makes a difference with large files. The larger file when using bigger cluster size requires fewer accesses to get the data. But you will not see this for smaller files and you waste a lot of space -- files that are a lot smaller than the cluster size result in a lot of unused space.

If this is your OS drive, use a smaller cluster size, usually the default NTFS value for the drive size is fine. If it is for a movie storage drive, then use a larger cluster size. You won't really see a difference in the real world at that level though because video playback isn't limited by transfer speed but by the playback frame rate that is a standard value.