All about Linux: Boost your hard drive performance in Linux using hdparm

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All about Linux: Boost your hard drive performance in Linux using hdparm: "The hdparm program provides two performance testing features that are crucial in letting you know whether or not you are improving performance or not as you tweak along.

# hdparm -Tt /dev/hda1

will show results such as the following before enhancing the performance.

/dev/hda1:
Timing buffer-cache reads: 340 MB in 2.01 seconds = 169.43 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 30 MB in 3.08 seconds = 9.73 MB/sec

and the results like these after enhancing the performance.

/dev/hda1:
Timing buffer-cache reads: 340 MB in 0.91 seconds = 200.00 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 30 MB in 1.05 seconds = 19.73 MB/sec

The goal is to see the time in seconds decrease and the MB/sec to increase in the above output.You can do that by using a variety of parameters, invoked one at a time, then rerunning the performance tests to see if things are improving or not.

For example: Begin by setting the operating mode of the interface between the system and the disk drive using one of the following parameters:

* -c0 - Sets operating mode to 16-bits
* -c1 - Sets operating mode to 32-bits
* -c3 - Sets operating mode to 32-bits synchronized

Mode -c1 is usually used for best performance. Mode -c3 is required only for certain chipsets.

# hdparm -c1 /dev"