From: adam@address.invalid   
      
   Bobbie Sellers wrote:   
   > On 06/16/2012 11:46 AM, Adam wrote:   
   >> Does physical position on the HD affect performance much? For example,   
   >> if / is toward the start (outside) of the disk, how much difference   
   >> would it make whether /accounts is adjacent to it, or all the way at the   
   >> end (inside) of the disk? I come from an era when minimizing seek time   
   >> and saving bytes mattered. :-)   
   >   
   >      It did in the days of SCSI on Amiga but probably not so   
   > much in modern FOSS/Linux times.   
      
   Remember "the good old days" when hackers would do almost anything for a   
   negligible speed increase?  On my TRS-80 I remember using OR instead of   
   bit test instructions because they took one clock cycle less.  I also   
   remember manually optimizing placement of files on the HD.   
      
   >> BTW thanks for the "get your non-UEFI hardware now" FYI and thread!   
   >> That's what spurred me to get a new system now, instead of later in the   
   >> year as I'd been thinking. It made a difference to at least one user.   
   >   
   >      I hope I can wait until FOSS/Linux can deal with UEFI as   
   > easily as with BIOS to get a new machine (aside from a tablet).   
      
   I'm sure that'll happen, I just have no idea when.  Someone reported   
   here that MS now requires a "disable secure boot" setting (it had been   
   an OEM option).  I don't see any option resembling that in my new   
   computer's BIOS or whatever it is.  Also I don't see any option to boot   
   from USB, but then the new box is an HP and my 2007 Compaq didn't have   
   that option either.  I could boot from my external HD if it was   
   connected as eSATA but not if USB.  BTW for months I'd been planning to   
   get a new computer anyway, "sometime soon," and the "non-UEFI" thread   
   was the thing that made me realize it had better be sooner rather than   
   later.   
      
   Adam   
   --   
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