If this becomes a problem in the future, I'm sure someone skillful enough will be able to build a kind of SATA-to-SATA adapter that reimplements the 512e layer.

Horun wrote on 2025-02-24, 03:04:

Are you sure about not using MBR on all <2TB HD's ? Will check my 3TB on the one XP box, it has a >32GB fat32 512 primary with rest split into a few NTFS parts. Never checked to see if that first part was bootable.
If it is will post it's make and model. Need to dig it out this week.

The MBR has limit of 2TB allocated by it,most of workarounds r manufacturer-specific,like Seagete's 2nd MBR for partitions behind 2TB limit,possible universal workaround may be Superfloppy format.Unfortunately for testing this a new >2TB drive is needed,as I only know,Rufus is capable to do this,but not lossless,like partition managers,so data will be lost,who has a new >2TB drive,may test to format it by Rufus as Superfloppy & report,do Windows XP c it.For now I do not have >2TB drive for performing the test.When I will have,I will try this & report,but this will not be soon,I have a family,cannot spent whole my income for my hobbies...
Thanx for any1's tests results data.
>32GB FAT32 is quite another thing,32GB it not the limit of FAT32,only the limit of Windows NT 5.1+ for formatting a volume to FAT32.
The real limit of FAT32 is 2TB,Windows 5.1+ has its artificial limit for formatting,but using partition managers like Partition Wizard or Partition Guru or older Windows(4.9 aka ME or NT 5.0 aka 2000),or FreeDOS,or Rufus,U can format a partition up to 2TB as FAT32,then also Windows 5.1/6/7/8/8.1 will c & be able to use such partition,they only cannot create it due to internal artificial limit placed to Windows format wizard,I do not use Windows for creating or modifying partitions,I use Partition Wizard & Partition Guru,or on old systems Partition Magic,Windows NT 5.1 aka XP can even be installed to a FAT32 partition larger than 32GB,it will refuse to create it,but it will install to such a partition prepared in advance.But such a partition has always 32KB clusters,thus inefficient for small files,with 16KB clusters U can go up to 1TB,with 8KB clusters up to 512GB,I create large FAT32 partitions often due to universality or sometimes on SD cards to install FreeDOS on them or to be able to access it from FreeDOS.
But 2TB limit for MBR is a real limit.
Not just bootability,but in case of Windows XP also data accessibility is in question.Depends of what kind of workaround is in place,most for this purpose r non-standardized & proprietary.Good luck with digging.

jmarsh wrote on 2025-02-24, 07:07:

You can put an MBR partition table on any 512b sector disk, it just limits the partitions to being within the first 2TB. But typically what is done is one of the MBR partitions points to a GPT that has all the "proper" partitions.

I mentioned that,normally U will then not able to use the rest of the drive behind 2TB.
& using the layout,U describe,Legacy OSs will c whole drive,or only the 1st 2TB & the rest will only be visible to newer OSs able to read GPT?
& can a partition wizard do this,or this is 1 of the manufacturer-specific solution?

Jo22 wrote on 2025-02-24, 07:21:

I could be wrong, but I think that modern SATA HDDs behave similar to SSDs. That means that they support both the 4k and 512 Byt […]
Show full quote

I could be wrong, but I think that modern SATA HDDs behave similar to SSDs.
That means that they support both the 4k and 512 Bytes "protocol" for communications to the computer (to SATA controller/OS).

Internally, the HDDs and SSDs likely do use 4KB blocks.
So it makes sense to align NTFS to match this.

Since Windows XP Setup starts at sector 63, the alignment will be off by default.
Using GParted to fix it or using Windows 7 Setup to create a fresh NTFS partition might be recommended (uses 2MB boundary).

In the past, some new HDDs (Seagate?) had a jumper to fix (hack) the sector 63 misalignment by adding one sector if jumper was set.

Edit: Some HDDs also have a maintenance software that allows capping the storage capacity.
That might be useful for Windows XP, not sure.

When I am initiating a new disk,I am starting with booting by a flash drive with FreeDOS & Partition Guru for DOS,in which I prepare all partitions & ensuring alignment,then I install the OSs from the oldest to newest into already prepared partitions,thus Windows XP installer does not create any partition & it obey to install into prepared aligned partition.

Azarien wrote on 2025-02-24, 14:24:

If this becomes a problem in the future, I'm sure someone skillful enough will be able to build a kind of SATA-to-SATA adapter that reimplements the 512e layer.

I was just now thinking to ask precisely about this kind of solution & U was just faster with the answer than i with the question.
This would be great,but could it be universal for any drive?
As I know,the translation between 4KB physical sectors & 512B virtual sectors presented to the host is done within the drive's controller by a proprietary method,thus can a universal 512B sectors HW emulator,U proposed,be done?

Sabina_16bit. wrote on 2025-02-24, 16:01:

I was just now thinking to ask precisely about this kind of solution & U was just faster with the answer than i with the questio […]
Show full quote

Azarien wrote on 2025-02-24, 14:24:

If this becomes a problem in the future, I'm sure someone skillful enough will be able to build a kind of SATA-to-SATA adapter that reimplements the 512e layer.

I was just now thinking to ask precisely about this kind of solution & U was just faster with the answer than i with the question.
This would be great,but could it be universal for any drive?
As I know,the translation between 4KB physical sectors & 512B virtual sectors presented to the host is done within the drive's controller by a proprietary method,thus can a universal 512B sectors HW emulator,U proposed,be done?

While that is interesting and will potentially be useful if 512e support is dropped before SATA itself eventually gets phased out. But there are other considerations when looking at the future

AFAIU,

a) Until proven otherwise, SATA AF drives are all still 512e capable
b) We don't know when/if 512e support stops being a thing
c) SATA itself might eventually (likely will) go away
d) Platter based drives might eventually get phased out of the consumer sector
e) SAS and platter based drives may live on in the enterprise segment or get replaced
f) NVME is new enough to last a while and will likely get updated while preserving some degree of backward compatibility

What I am getting at is that we don't know which issue we will hit first. We may need an NVME to SATA adapter, for example, if SATA goes away. We may want an easier way to boot legacy machines from an NVME drive. A higher performance SD card (or other flash format) backed SATA emulator might be desirable (current FC1307 based SD to IDE options adapted to SATA are a slow, unreliable kludge with limited capacity).

My dream solution for local storage/booting would be a hardware SATA emulator (possibly FPGA based) that accepts MicroSD cards (and/or CFAST) , handles discard/TRIM,is scalable, supports wear levelling/balancing, supports striping and mirroring.

While I understand and agree that planning ahead is good, we don't know how the future will turn out, so we can't really guess what we will actually need.

darry wrote on 2025-02-25, 06:51:

While that is interesting and will potentially be useful if 512e support is dropped before SATA itself eventually gets phased ou […]
Show full quote

While that is interesting and will potentially be useful if 512e support is dropped before SATA itself eventually gets phased out. But there are other considerations when looking at the future

AFAIU,

a) Until proven otherwise, SATA AF drives are all still 512e capable
b) We don't know when/if 512e support stops being a thing
c) SATA itself might eventually (likely will) go away
d) Platter based drives might eventually get phased out of the consumer sector
e) SAS and platter based drives may live on in the enterprise segment or get replaced
f) NVME is new enough to last a while and will likely get updated while preserving some degree of backward compatibility

What I am getting at is that we don't know which issue we will hit first. We may need an NVME to SATA adapter, for example, if SATA goes away. We may want an easier way to boot legacy machines from an NVME drive. A higher performance SD card (or other flash format) backed SATA emulator might be desirable (current FC1307 based SD to IDE options adapted to SATA are a slow, unreliable kludge with limited capacity).

My dream solution for local storage/booting would be a hardware SATA emulator (possibly FPGA based) that accepts MicroSD cards (and/or CFAST) , handles discard/TRIM,is scalable, supports wear levelling/balancing, supports striping and mirroring.

While I understand and agree that planning ahead is good, we don't know how the future will turn out, so we can't really guess what we will actually need.

U elaborated it very well.Thanx 4 pointing to other treats to our Legacy lives.
I just wish to add,that I based the topic as to point to backwards compatible new hard drives or to point to non-compatible 1s to avoid them,but I did not stated "HDDs only",nor "SATA only",thus all hard drives can be listed,not only hard disk drives,so 512e/n SSDs r also welcomed,NVME drives too,if they r 512e/n,they may be usable too.
I also have 1 SSD on way(2TB WD Green SATA) & when it arrives,I will report,if I will be able to format it as MBR,the manufacturer(Sandisk!) replied,that it is 512e,but I will confirm it here just after successfull formatting as MBR,I will use it as a data drive for my compact desktop for movies,which will have multiboot of 4 OSs(Windows NT 5.1+6.0+7.0+8.1) on the WD20SPZX HDD(alredy installed the HDD & 1st 3 OSs),when I will add the SSD,I will report accessibility from Windows XP.But probably there will be no OS on it,as SSDs has limited writes & OSs does a lot of writes...
U r right,I did not thought,SATA may become obsolete,I am quite surprised by this new,for me,it is a very new interface,it loox crazy for me to discontinue an interface so soon,I feel the trend of change the interface every few years as a deliberate sabotage of backwards compatibility by manufacturers.It prevents upgrading & forces replacing whole machines & I am from the eranwhere interfaces lasted for decades & drives improved in capacity & machines was easy to upgrade thanx to maintaining the same interface,I miss this logical approach,I always preferred upgrading & maintaining same machine over dumping it & buying a new 1,I love having a continuity.& I also dislike the incredible load to the ecosystem by too short lives of our machines,which causes too much dumping & too much wasting of resources for new 1s...
So a plan for discontinuing SATA makes me angry to red like a SATA cable itself...It is too young to be discontinued,did it lived even half a time of how long IDE was here?
So this was up to c).
d)This is another thing,which bothers me a lot,it is obvious,manufacturers r about discontinuing HDDs,which is quite crazy,as SSDs r not a direct replacements for HDDs for their limited rewriting ability.If U care well for the HDD,it may live longer than U,but if U use SSD as a system drive,it is sentenced to death & unlike HDDs,which warns U by BBs or bad sounds,SSDs die @ 1ce & without warning,so they may be replacements for data drives,but not for system drives.Of course manufacturers cheats to convince customers to buy SSDs by sabotaging new HDDs to limit their lives,otherwise SSDs could not win over HDDs,U know the miraculous longevity of IDE HDDs,maybe early SATA HDDs r the same,but now it loox,newest HDDs r sabotaged to die sooner than their SSD counterparts,as otherwise customers would still prefer HDDs,ordinary peaple even does not know,SSDs r a pretty short living thing by its nature & they r also useless for long term backup,as the SSD loses data after 5 years without power,while HDDs can hold data 100+ years without power,so really not a replacements for long term archiving & e)enterprise HDDs r too expensive for a normal mortal person,so this is simply a killing of a technology without any proper replacement.
f)So analyzing NVME drives for backwards compatibility makes sense,thus do not hesitate to list NVME drives,which r 512e(or n) & can be MBR.
SD cards r only good for data & for DOS+Win16 systems,Win32 may waste their E/P cycles very soon.
My dream solution would be restoring of Legacy HW to be made...& I would gladly offer space for it in my house(former school building),if someone would wish to establish a plant for manufacturing Legacy HW.
Yes...if just we have a TARDIS or a DeLorean to know the future...then we could also supply Legacy spare parts from the past & hopefully limit the temporal damage to invalidating statistics,how many parts was made in total & some SNs change...

darry wrote on 2025-02-25, 06:51:

b) We don't know when/if 512e support stops being a thing
c) SATA itself might eventually (likely will) go away

Most likely SATA drives will support 512e until the standard will completely die, simply for compatibility purposes. But SATA will die soon enough, my bet it's going to be completely deprecated in the next 5 years.

Also word of warning for modern 2.5 inch high capacity HDDs, they almost exclusively use SMR and horrible as a daily drivers on retrosystem. Last CMR 2.5 inch drives were 1 Tb (2 platters) and I think one Samsung drive with 1.5 Tb (3 platters).

& where will ODDs be connected?
Also to NVME?
Or only to USB?
Or ODDs will die too about the same time & DVDs & BluRays will join floppies in Silicon Haven...or Silicon Hell?
If there will be no more HDDs,nor ODDs,then probably also tower form factor will be discontinued,with only NVME SSDs & USB drives,there will be no reason for any larger form factor,than a small or tiny desktops & laptops,so will tower PCs disappear,or they will be so,so empty?
I mean except servers,they cannot be without HDDs,it would not be very reliable to have SSD-only based servers.
So cool,I have 1 server with SAS too,when there will be no other HDDs,this will come handy...

The Serpent Rider wrote on 2025-02-25, 19:57:

darry wrote on 2025-02-25, 06:51:

b) We don't know when/if 512e support stops being a thing
c) SATA itself might eventually (likely will) go away

Most likely SATA drives will support 512e until the standard will completely die, simply for compatibility purposes. But SATA will die soon enough, my bet it's going to be completely deprecated in the next 5 years. [..]

That's okay. As long as SAS will still continue to exist..
In terms of features SATA is sort of a cut-down version of it, anyway.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_Attached_SCSI

I don't consider SAS to be optimal for majority of scenarios, because they require an additional controller, which makes the whole setup clunky or even impossible (Mini-ITX/Micro-ATX).

In terms of features SATA is sort of a cut-down version of it, anyway.

SATA was released first. SAS is advanced SATA, it's even backwards compatible.

I have done this as well on Pentium and PIII, using large capacity SATA hard drive or SSD using a 3ware with cache PCI-X to SATA controller card. Card plugged in the 32 bit part of PCI works and I can boot DOS and see four 2GB partitions.

Cheers,