Wasted space comparison tool for NTFS cluster size 4096 vs. 2048 vs. 1024 bytes ?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Wolfgang Hercker
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Wolfgang Hercker

When the user formats a NTFS hard disc he can choose wether he wants a cluster size of
4096 (=default) or 2048 or 1024 bytes.

Choosing the wrong cluster size could yield a significant waste of hard disc space.

I have a lot of small files on my hard disc. So I am a candidate to switch to a smaller cluster size
(than the initial 4096). To be sure that I will win hard disc space (and how much ?) I would appreciate
to have a tool which shows me how much space I would win when I switch to 2048 cluste size.

Is there such a tool ?

Wolfgang
 
Wolfgang Hercker said:
When the user formats a NTFS hard disc he can choose wether he wants a
cluster size of
4096 (=default) or 2048 or 1024 bytes.

Choosing the wrong cluster size could yield a significant waste of hard
disc space.

I have a lot of small files on my hard disc. So I am a candidate to switch
to a smaller cluster size
(than the initial 4096). To be sure that I will win hard disc space (and
how much ?) I would appreciate
to have a tool which shows me how much space I would win when I switch to
2048 cluste size.

Is there such a tool ?

Wolfgang
Click to expand...

Making your cluster size smaller also slows down your HDD, as it has read
more clusters. Making the clusters bigger 16 kb for example can speed up
your HDD.

You can select a directory, or group of files, right click, properties. On
the General tab there are two labels. Size, and Size on disk.

Size is how big the files actually are.
Size on Disk is how much space they occupy on the disk.

Size on disk - Size = wasted space, otherwise referred to as "slack"

You could try enabling disk compression, under the properties tab for the
drive. You might need to format the drive and enable this option if it is
not available, (IIRC that is).

You do realise that 4096 is 4 Kb? This is quite small, (anything with about
2 pages of text). It's doubtful you would save much space by making the
clusters smaller.

I just did a check on my system, and over 20 GB of 37,500 odd files there
was less than 1GB of slack, (about 5%). The drive is over 100GB, so in the
scheme of things not substantial.

My C:\ drive, (system drive) actually had a greater Size than Size on disk
:-)
This is because Windows seems to automatically compress windows update
uninstall information. Files with names in blue are compressed/encrypted.

Something for you to think about ...

P.S., you got me curious. I like a small app that tells you lots of
interesting, but generally useless information, so I tracked one down. Seems
accurate enough, and the interface is a bit fiddly.

http://www.glenn.delahoy.com/software/
Disk Usage Analyser
 
Wolfgang said:
When the user formats a NTFS hard disc he can choose wether he wants
a cluster size of 4096 (=default) or 2048 or 1024 bytes.

Choosing the wrong cluster size could yield a significant waste of
hard disc space.

I have a lot of small files on my hard disc. So I am a candidate to
switch to a smaller cluster size (than the initial 4096). To be sure
that I will win hard disc space (and how much ?) I would appreciate
to have a tool which shows me how much space I would win when I
switch to 2048 cluste size.

Is there such a tool ?

Wolfgang
Click to expand...

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314878
http://www.windowsdevcenter.com/pub/a/windows/2005/02/08/NTFS_Hacks.html
 
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