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FanIn80 · 10-23-2010, 11:13 AM

OK, so I did a bit of reading on partition alignment. It turns out that Windows 7 automatically aligns partitions on an SSD drive if you let it partition the drive for you.

My partition starting offset is 1,048,576 bytes.
1048576 / 4096 = 256

I'm still not 100% down with the benefits of doing this, but it appears I got lucky (or that Windows does a pretty good job of handling SSDs).

Edit: OK, now I get it. So if the partition's not aligned, the OS has to write a page twice (once for each half) which winds up doubling the number of writes you need. Well not really doubling, since it doesn't happen on every page, but enough that it makes a difference.

10-23-2010, 11:13 AM	#49
FanIn80 GOAT! Join Date: Jun 2006 Exp:	OK, so I did a bit of reading on partition alignment. It turns out that Windows 7 automatically aligns partitions on an SSD drive if you let it partition the drive for you. My partition starting offset is 1,048,576 bytes. 1048576 / 4096 = 256 I'm still not 100% down with the benefits of doing this, but it appears I got lucky (or that Windows does a pretty good job of handling SSDs). Edit: OK, now I get it. So if the partition's not aligned, the OS has to write a page twice (once for each half) which winds up doubling the number of writes you need. Well not really doubling, since it doesn't happen on every page, but enough that it makes a difference. Last edited by FanIn80; 10-23-2010 at 11:37 AM.