Partition alignment

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Partition alignment is the proper alignment of partitions to the boundaries available in a data storage device.

Examples include the following:

  • 4 KB sector alignment
    with hard disk drives supporting Advanced Format (AF)
  • Track partition alignment
    , partitions starting on track boundaries on hard disk drives
  • Cylinder partition alignment
    , partitions starting on logical or physical cylinder boundaries on hard disk drives
  • SSD partition alignment
    , partitions starting on NVM boundaries (with typically 4 KB to 1 MB in LBAs size) on SSDs and other flash-based memory devices
  • RAID stripe alignment
    , partition alignment based on stripe boundaries

See also