PS2 *IF* a 4TB FAT32 hard drive is possible, will it work on PS2?

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kiddcabbage

Forum Noob
I'm hacking my first PS2 now, and trying to pick a hard drive for it.

Hear me out on this - I know that conventional wisdom is "2TB is the max it can handle, that is the max that MBR and FAT32 can support", however that last part is not entirely true. You actually get 2^32 sectors on a drive, which for a standard 512-byte sector size is 2TB. But if you have a drive whose firmware allows you to bump the sector size up above 512 bytes, then you can then increase the limit of MBR and FAT32. (I have a 5TB FAT32 drive on my Wii right now)

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(for the skeptical)

However, I have not seen anyone talk about if this is possible for a PS2 internal hard drive. From what I understand, the drive has to be formatted in HDL or WinHIIP before use (and WinHIIP seems to have its own limitations?). Is there any way that one might be able to take advantage of a drive with 4k sector sizes to actually have an internal drive which is >2TB? Or will the methods of formatting the drive limit the drive in ways beyond MBR and FAT32?
 
The internal drive isn't formatted as FAT32 (it's something Sony came up with), and the sector size is set at 512 bytes. This is why it must be formatted with a specific app (BTW, using uLe/wLe is better than using WinHIIP).
 
@kiddcabbage You misleading internal HDD with external HDD.

For internal HDD, there is a lot to say. In short, it uses APA partition linking which in fs space can have PFS, EXT2, RFSv1 or raw partitions (raw contains disc images written as partitions, this is how and where HDL etc. apps dumping PS2 games).
https://www.psx-place.com/threads/apa-patitionology.30912/#post-256808

You can format it by uLE/wLE/HDDChecker on PS2 side or by PFS Shell on PC side (Windows/Linux; command "initialize yes"). Do not use WinHIIP because it is outdated and have problems with large drives (1TiB and larger).

In theory size limit is LBA48 limit but peoples says it is 2,2TB (2TiB).

For external HDD, Depend of application, must be used MBR partition table, and can be used FAT32 partitions or in one special case, EXT2. If real sector size is i.e 4KiB instead to 512B, then in theory it is possible to be read i.e by OPL. But probably o one test it yet.
 
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Oh, good to know. Thanks!

I was under the (incorrect) impression that internal drives needed to be MBR like a lot of other consoles from this era. If PFS Shell allows disk initialization, I can go ahead and try it on the 4TB and see if that will work. LBA48 itself should support much, much larger, but maybe there is some other limitation keeping it down to 2TB?
 
A lot? Every or almost every console using custom structure for internal HDD. ;) Let's list them:
  • PS2 (APA>>PFS+EXT2+RFS+raw) / PS2DVR (the same but encrypted)
  • PS3 (PS3PT*>>FAT16+FAT32+UFS2+raw but all encrypted)
  • PS4 (GPT>>UFS2+raw, but all encrypted)
  • PSP (?)
  • PSV/PSTV (PSVPT* >> TexFAT+raw, all encrypted)
  • XC/X360 (PBR>>FATX),
  • XBO probably using custom GPT (like for external) and standard NTFS inside it but it is not hacked yet so we don't really know for sure
  • Wii/WiiU (no partition table?>>WBFS)
  • Switch (?)
@pinky

*custom partition table, this is how I name it ;p

For external is different story. Most indeed, using MBR>>FAT32 (newer also MBR/GPT>>exFAT).
 
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Berion said:
A lot? Every console using custom structure for internal HDD. ;) Let's list them:
  • PS2 (APA>>PFS+EXT2+RFS+raw)
  • PS3 (custom partition table>>FAT16+FAT32+UFS2+raw but all encrypted
  • PSP (I don't remember)
  • PSV/PSTV (custom partition table >> TexFAT+raw, all encrypted)
  • XC/X360 (PBR>>FATX),
  • Maybe only XBO using custom GPT (like for external) and standard NTFS inside it but it is not hacked yet.
  • Wii/WiiU (WBFS)
Click to expand...
Sorry, I didn't mean stock. I know my Wii is reading off FAT32 which is required for GC loading, and PS3 reads the same. Can't remember about the original Xbox now...

Anyway, I managed to get the 4TB initialized fine, but it's only got the stock 5 partitions at the moment. Gotta figure out usage with my backup collection enough to test if this drive is usable beyond the reported 2TiB and I'll report back.
 
They read it but only as external mass storage device, not internal storage. It doesn't matter if it is hacked or not. On hacked for external, sometimes appearing addition fs support (like i.e NTFS for PS3 homebrew).

As I remember OPL will not see nothing past first partition in table. Could be wrong but this is true for v0.7 (last time when I checking this). ;p
 
Since the sector-size is over 512Bytes, it might work. It might work with some apps, but not others and so on!

The 2TiB-Limit comes from the sector-count/addressing you have already mentioned and WinHIIP only uses 31 of the 32Bits for addressing and the MSB ("most significant Bit") overflows after 1TiB, because it/WinHIIP uses a signed integer instead of an unsigned one.
 
Really? That is sounding promising. So how does the LBA48 partitioning system work together with that number, since using HDLDump creates a new partition for every backup put on the drive? I'm used the the 2TB limit being applied to partitions with FAT32, and drives with MBR. Does the APA partition linking have this limitation across the drive? The way this was presented made it sound as if the sector size would cease to be of importance to me.
 
I am not entirely sure about the limits of APA.
SP193 wrote some good posts regarding it, but I can't search for it right now.
 
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