64k cluster question

[footfikinmasta]

I have a HTPC that has been up and running for some time now. I have a 250 gig Sata HD partitioned with 20gigs to the OS and 230gigs to media as a NTFS. I have heard that if the HD is formatted to 64k clusters it runs faster. How do I check what my cluster size is? I don't remember what I did when I was partitioning my HD.

Thanks

[EzyStvy]

You can run CHKDSK to see the cluster size.

You'll see a line like:
4096 bytes in each allocation unit


The Default Cluster Size for the NTFS and FAT File Systems
http://support.microsoft.com/default...b;en-us;314878

"The smaller the cluster size, the more efficiently your disk stores information."

[TwoRails]

64K might load large files unperceivable faster, but just think of all those 1k cookies when you're browsing.... you still have to read a 64k cluster. The benifits of storing more data, as EzyStvy mentions, outweights any factional performance gains: you can save 16 small files in 4K clusters to match just one file in a 64K cluster.

[footfikinmasta]

thanks for the replies guys, I think I'll just keep it teh way it is then.