Larger drive 512n 512e and 4kn, does any of this matter in a synology?

[Phone Guy]

I want to start with, I dont fully understand everything about hdd... I have basic knowledge...

Looking at some of todays larger drives 18tb 20tb maybe even some of the 16tb? a lot of what I have seen (amazon) shows 512n 512e 4kn. Now from what I understand this is all related to sector size. so 512n=512 bytes per sector, 512e=4k bytes on disk reported back as 512 so I guess the e is emulation, and 4kn=4k bytes per sector so I assume n=natural/actual reporting in this case?
I don't know if I am right, this is why I am asking.

Can anyone explain the differences here? do these sector sizes affect a raid or shr array in a synology... I know the smr writing method meant rebuilding/resilvering an array would either take 30 days or fail, something like that..... and for raid arrays stick with cmr drives.
I also believe the user can change the sector size on these new hdd and format them either one of the 3 available sector options. is one better than the other? Seems like 4k would probably be fastest, but as I recall from way way back doesnt that large sector size actually reduce available space? especially with lots of small files? I'd guess with huge chunks of data it would be ok like 4k video or 108mp images, things like that.... the one that has me baffled is 512e, so if the drive reports 512 bytes, but is writing 4k bytes, that seems like if a rebuild or resilver happened, you'd get hosed!?

 

[EAZ1964]

Imo: do not bother, the minor speed differences are not worth the hassle. Just pick disk from the compatibility list.

 

[Phone Guy]

Imo: do not bother, the minor speed differences are not worth the hassle. Just pick disk from the compatibility list.

I just saw something on synology that said not to incorporate 4kn drives into an array, and leave it separate.....so I guess you are right!

 

[blogthis]

For best performance use 4k sector drives only if the NAS has very large files you're dealing with. If you have mostly small files say for example from copying a bunch of little files from your Windows or Linux primary storage to the NAS as a form of backup, then I'd stuck with the 512n.
512n = Sectors are 512 byte-Native.
512e = Sectors are 4k sectors but Emulated 512 bytes, I do not personally like these drives although ALL SSD's do this secretly internally and then report a fake 512n for compatibility with all systems.
Many systems are not compatible with 512e.
As for the Synology article you mention, it simply says you cannot and do not mix 512n with 4k drives those will not work together because when you try to RAID parity them it is not possible due to the mis-matched sector sizes so they cannot align and even if you tried to somehow force it then performance and reliability would be horrible.
Summary.
Use 512n from compatibility list for average files in the storage pool.
Use 4k from compatibility list only for huge files in the storage pool.
This will maximize your performance depending on your specific usage case.