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    Good 7200rpm HDD?

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by Meaker@Sager, Jul 11, 2009.

  1. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    I was looking into getting a good HDD in the 250GB-320GB range. I notice the 250GB momentus is lighter than the 320 or 500 models so I assume its single platter?

    The website lists the platter density the same on the 320GB and 500GB models, is the 320GB drive a shortened 500GB drive? Does it show the same performance profile just cut off at 320GB?

    How do the WD 320GB black drives compare?

    Are there other makes I should be considering like hitachi?
     
    Meaker@Sager, Jul 11, 2009
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  2. Christoph.krn

    Christoph.krn Notebook Evangelist

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    The biggest platters you can get at the moment (and you likely won't be able to get bigger platters in the near future, but I'm not sure about that now) for 2.5" drives are 250GB. So 250 GB drives should be single platter, where as everything above that would be multi platter.
    • So, seems like the 250GB Momentus is single platter whereas the others are multi platter.
    • 320 GB drives likely consist of 2*160 GB platters, whereas the 500 GB drives should consist of 2*250GB platters. But the 500 GB drive would be faster because of higher data density. So in terms of performance: 250 GB > 500 GB > 320 GB.
    • While I can't compare it to any other drives (because I don't have any other fast 2.5" drives), I can say that the WD Black I previously had in my laptop (see signature) is a very fast one. When using it in my laptop, performance-wise I found it to be somewhere in the middle between most other laptops with average HDDs and my laptop when using the SSD.
    Hope that helped. :)
     
    Christoph.krn, Jul 11, 2009
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  3. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    However both drives tech specs (from seagate.com) state 394 Gbits/inch2.

    So either the 320gb drive uses smaller than 2.5" platters or it uses 250gb platters with 90Gb disabled on each platter.
     
    Meaker@Sager, Jul 11, 2009
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  4. Phil

    Phil Retired

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    Seagate 7200.4 should theoretically be the fastest drive, in real life it's not. It suffers from slow I/O performance. When duplicating a file for example, a 5400rpm drive can outperform the 7200.4.

    [​IMG]
    Source

    WD Scorpio Black is still the fastest traditional hard drive. Detailed real world benchmarks can be found on Techreport.com
     
    Phil, Jul 11, 2009
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  5. Christoph.krn

    Christoph.krn Notebook Evangelist

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    Hm, that is weird. One more reason I can think of is that the information on the website is wrong, this has happened before to other companies. If they really limited the amount of storage by firmware, the 320 GB drives could actually be faster because the heads don't have to move that much...
     
    Christoph.krn, Jul 11, 2009
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  6. Meaker@Sager

    Meaker@Sager Company Representative

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    Well looking at the above review, yeah the scorpio black does well in real world tests, likely due to that amazing seek time. Will shoot for that one.

    I am turning into a WD boy (I have two 320GB RE3 drives in raid 0 in my desktop).
     
    Meaker@Sager, Jul 11, 2009
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  7. Phil

    Phil Retired

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    Seek time and amazing I/O performance. WD is the leader at the moment and I'm looking forward to the 500GB Scorpio Black.
     
    Phil, Jul 12, 2009
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  8. villageman

    villageman Notebook Evangelist

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    WD 2.5 disks seem to have very consistent performance and very good acoustics. For single user setups they are among the best. If yo run virtual machines etc I would go for a Hitachi Travelstar.
     
    villageman, Jul 12, 2009
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  9. davidkneiber

    davidkneiber Notebook Consultant

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    so is a single platter faster or slower than a dual platter?
     
    davidkneiber, Jul 15, 2009
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  10. sgogeta4

    sgogeta4 Notebook Nobel Laureate

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    Usually faster since the head doesn't have to as far.
     
    sgogeta4, Jul 15, 2009
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  11. Phil

    Phil Retired

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    Acces times are usually lower.
     
    Phil, Jul 15, 2009
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  12. saebasan

    saebasan Notebook Guru

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    saebasan, Jul 17, 2009
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