In setting up a new server I had read that aligning the partitons would provide a performance benefit. I'm wondering in which situations this should be done. On local disks (DAS), or on SAN only? If I had seaparate volumes for databases and logs does it matter if I use this on the logs? Below are the instructions that mention it should only be used if the drive is translated as 64 sectors per track. How can I tell if this is the case? http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa995867.aspx

Do it always.It is always better to have aligned sector then not having them You have to check with the hardware vendor for recomendations on alignment.