title: dd: How to calculate optimal blocksize?
body: <p>How do you calculate the optimal blocksize when running a <code>dd</code>? I've researched it a bit and I've not found anything suggesting how this would be accomplished.</p>
  
  <p>I am under the impression that a larger blocksize would result in a quicker <code>dd</code>... is this true?</p>
  
  <p>I'm about to <code>dd</code> two identical 500gb Hitachi HDDs that run at 7200rpm on a box running an Intel Core i3 with 4GB DDR3 1333mhz RAM, so I'm trying to figure out what blocksize to use. (I'm going to be booting Ubuntu 10.10 x86 from a flash drive, and running it from that.)</p>