[CentOS] 3TB External USB Drive isn't recognized

Mon Aug 12 18:56:59 UTC 2013
m.roth at 5-cent.us <m.roth at 5-cent.us>

Alexander Dalloz wrote:
> Am 12.08.2013 17:07, schrieb m.roth at 5-cent.us:
>> Mike McCarthy wrote:
>>> Update to CentOS6 or try reformatting them to multiple ext3 (under 2TB)
>>> partitions.
>>>
>>> On 08/12/2013 09:59 AM, james wrote:
>>>> We have a 3TB external USB drive that I am trying to attach to some
>>>> CentOS5 servers. I have tried an older Dell PE1950 and a newer R310
>>>> but neither
>>>> one seems to be able to read the drive. It works no problem on windows
>>>> servers/workstations and I was able to format with NTFS.
>>
>> Oh, right, related: it's almost a complete certainty that the drive's
>> *real* blocksize is 4k, but has internal code to present it as 512bytes.
>> When you format the drive, be 100% sure to align it correctly: for
>> parted, tell it 0.0TB, which will put it at 1M. The alignment really
>> *does* make a difference in access and throughput speed.
>
> Don't know where you take this certainty from, but to remind
>
> https://access.redhat.com/site/documentation/en-US/Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux/5/html/5.6_Technical_Notes/ch03.html
>
> "4 kilobyte physical sectors, 4 kilobyte logical sector harddisks
>
>     4 kilobyte physical sectors, 4 kilobyte logical sector harddisks
> require firmware and software modifications to function. This type of 4
> kilobytes sector disks is currently not supported in Red Hat Enterprise
> Linux 5"
>
> Have an external 3TB Seagate drive myself in the office for which this
> is the case.
>
I'll note right back at'cha that all of the 3TB drives we have appear to
have firmware in them that will present the blocks as 512b.

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