Scorpio Blue 5400 RPM vs. Scorpio Black 7200 RPM

Hi friends,

I'm keen on upgrading my laptop HDD...

But i cant make up my mind between....

750GB Scorpio Blue 5400 RPM vs. 500 GB Scorpio Black 7200 RPM.....!!!

I had a few doubts...

1. How much faster is a Black than a Blue...???

2. In my regular computing usage will i be able to see a noticable difference in speed...??

3. If yes... then where and in which aspects will be the Black faster than a Blue...?? Would anyone be able to list the scenarios....??

4. Also is the speed of a Black over a Blue really noticable to someone who is using the laptop to play itunes, surf net, watch movies etc....?? I mean does the speed of a Black over the Blue matter...??

5. What kind of a user will get a Black over a Blue...???

6. How much % wise will the battery life be reduced...??

7. How much noiseir/hotter is Black over Blue ?

Thanks... ;-)

 

This review gives a pretty good idea about black vs. blue. While the drives in the review are not exactly the same drives, the performance difference will be comparable.

 

+1 for 7200rpm. From what I've read, they don't take more power and as you can see from the review Phil posted, its a good bit faster.

 

Hi phil...

thanks for the link.... I went through it... but i just could not understand it from a technical point of view... and i'm still not clear and hazzy in my head...

Could you be kind enough to put in a few words in layman terms which would really benefit me and also others here who are not technically gifted or apt in understanding graph & figures.... I would like to repeat the following questions ...

Thanks in Anticipation to a reply from you...

1. How much faster is a Black than a Blue...???

2. In my regular computing usage will i be able to see a noticable difference in speed...??

3. If yes... then where and in which aspects will be the Black faster than a Blue...?? Would anyone be able to list the scenarios....??

4. Also is the speed of a Black over a Blue really noticable to someone who is using the laptop to play itunes, surf net, watch movies etc....?? I mean does the speed of a Black over the Blue matter...??

5. How much % wise will the battery life be reduced...??

6. How much noiseir/hotter is Black over Blue ?

Most importantly...

5. What kind of a user will get a Black & what kind of user will get a Blue...???

Thanks a Ton...!!!

 

The review contains more than 10 charts where you can exactly see the differences. What is it exactly you don't understand?

What's not in the review: Seagate Momentus XT is a lot faster than WD Scorpio Black.

 

The few things i cant decipher are...

1. How much will a user will feel in real life day to day operations between blue & black ?

2. Does the Black suit a particular user profile more than a Blue ? I mean what kind of user will buy a blue and what kind of user will buy a black ?

I'm kind of can't make up my mind between the 500GB Black vs. 640/750 MB Blue ?

I just can decide which to get ?

(Note: although you did also reply to me in another thread that the XT is faster than Black i stay away fro it coz it's basically a 7200.4 with Flash and i read a lot of people having problems with the 7200.4 )

Thanks again for your patience.

 

1) Nobody can answer this for you, because what you "feel" is so dependent on the individual person's tolerance for delay, and what programs they run.

I think the question you are really trying to ask is "Is it worth it for me to upgrade to the Black?" If you value performance, then yes. However, the difference will be nowhere near as significant as if you went with a Seagate Momentus XT or an SSD.

2) Black = people who sort-of-want-performance. Those that really want performance get a Seagate Momentus XT or an SSD. Blue = people who don't care about performance, and just want affordable storage.

3) Neither the black or the blue will even come close to the performance of a Seagate Momentus XT. And the XT and the Seagate Momentus 7200.4 are completely different products, despite the fact that they share a lot of the same internal components. To say that the XT sucks because the 7200.4 has problems would be like saying that a Dodge Viper sucks because it uses the same air filter as a Dodge Neon.

 

Look, the Black will be faster, so if you don't need the extra space of the 750gb, then get the Black.

I don't know about these particular drives, but the difference in noise and power consumption between 5400 and 7200 rpm is generally pretty minimal. The manufacturers sometimes post power usage on their specs sheets on their website... you can look there if you like.

If money is not a big concern, then there are even faster options, as Phil suggests.

 

With the Black booting your system, starting itunes and starting your web browser will be a bit quicker. We can't decide for you if that's worth it.

WD 750GB and 640GB are pretty mediocre performers, even for 5400rpm drives.

The Seagate 7200.4 and XT are different hard drives, even the mechanical part performs completely different.

 

I've used the Black and Blue in otherwise identical machines side-side. There's simply no comparison. It feels like waiting an eternity for stuff to get done with the Blue. Having said that, the difference is probably even larger between the Black and Momentus XT if you use certain applications frequently.

 

hey guys... thanks for the explanations... cheers

I think m pretty much set for the 500 GB Black.... ;-)

Amazon shows it for $75. The XT is about $130. I don't suppose it isn't that much better for $55 more...

 

it actually is.. u get loading times close to an SSD's so its worth the investment especially if you are going to use the laptop for a few more years.

 

But what about the "BIG Reliability Issues" of the XT...??

 

The Seagate Momentus XT is absolutely worth every penny.

There is absolutely no reason to buy any other 500GB hard drive if you can afford the Momentus XT.

 

Where did you hear that?

 

Yes the XT is quite a bit faster but only for your most used tasks.

For example: if the Blue 5400rpm drive launches iTunes in 20 seconds, the Black might do it in 10 seconds, the Momentus XT might do it in 5. A fast SSD might do it in 3 to 4 seconds. (theses are all estimates and not exact figures)

 

There are actual benchmark numbers for the Seagate Momentus XT.


This benchmark says it all: Anandtech Seagate Momentus XT Review - Real World Tests

 

Yes there are. Unfortunately they don't include Scorpio Black and Blue, that's why I gave some estimates.

Well Techreport has one but it doesn't cover application launching.

 

Old thread, I know, but...

I would have considered the Seagate Momentus XT myself, it was the front-running choice, and I'd definitely have paid the extra cash for it.

Then, I started doing more research. There's a lot of unhappy people with the XT drive. It has spin-up/spin-down problems that are affecting performance. There is a firmware update, but my understanding is it pretty much turns off power management for the drive, increasing its energy usage. Seagate's own forum has several long, angry threads regarding this.

I've also heard a number of reports that people's Momentus XT drives have just up and died spontaneously. While I can't confirm it, the problems people have encountered made it a no-brainer for me, and I ordered a WD Scorpio Black 500GB to replace my 500GB Scorpio Blue (good drive, I just want faster performance). The Momentus XT did great in a lot of reviews, but it seems production units may not be ready for prime-time. No matter how much I want the extra performance, reliability comes first.

 

Almost every HDD and SSD has had a few drives with issues like this and from what I've seen and read, these cases are few and far in between.

 

It could be. However, as Seagate has had issues with several drive lines regarding firmware (several models in their 7200.11 line), and had a false start or two in getting those lines back on track (firmware that bricked drives in the case of the 7200.11 line, or some Momentus XT drives that won't update with the updated firmware), it makes me a cautious person.

Firmware update - Momentus XT - Seagate Community Forums

Currently, Seagate Momentus XT drives are also causing crashes with some Lenovo ThinkPad utility software, and my laptop of choice is my ThinkPad T400. I still own Seagate drives, and I will probably purchase from them again. Currently though, I'm going with Western Digital. I feel Seagate needs to look a little at its QA processes, and when they have, I'll consider looking again.

 

I can say from experience that turning off power management for a HDD saves very little power.
My T410 came with a WD Scorpio Blue, and I'm extremely unhappy with it. It completely ignores the OS, and parks its heads every 4 seconds of being idle. No matter what settings I have, and it's a "feature" that WD calls "intellipark".
Upon checking the SMART attributes I noticed an abnormally high start/stop count. It really affects performance, while gaming, it causes stuttering as I have to wait for the HDD to spin back up to load something. While watching movies, the HDD goes into idle mode which some times causes stuttering because for whatever reason the HDD needs to be accessed at times.
There's no way to disable it, I tried wdidle3 which is not supported for this drive, and every setting I tried had no effect.
Consequently in linux my HDD never powers down, and so I don't have this issue. Go figure.
My next HDD purchase will most likely be a Sammy or Fujitsu, but there's no way I'll go with Western Digital.

 

So, LoneWolf15,

if you don't try the current Seagates for yourself (even if a few others have had problems), how will you know that Seagate has looked into it's QA process and you'd be 'safe' to try them again?

Every single item fails for somebody, somewhere. What you should concentrate on is that it is working for you. You may be immune to the Seagate failures by your current stance, but you're also missing out on the benefits they offer too.

 

My home server has one 1TB Seagate, and four 1.5TB Seagates. I have plenty of them, and fortunately, my 1.5TB models are a revision or two later than the 1.5TB models with the firmware issues. I'm also not running them in RAID; I've heard of a number of people having issues with them in that environment.

My previous 500GB Seagates were great (I ran three in RAID-5), though my 1TB was one that needed the firmware updates to prevent it from bricking --and I didn't update mine until they released one that didn't brick existing drives. So I've had my fair share of experiences with them, as I do Western Digital, and I've owned hard drives as far back as the early 90's, some from manufacturers most people today haven't heard of.

Roger, I can only say that my WD Scorpio Blue 500GB has been just fine in my T400. My Fujitsu drives have been fine, but unremarkable in performance. I can't say anything about Samsungs.

 

I tried the Momentus XT. Ran the firmware update, took about one minute.

Performance was excellent, noticeably faster than the WD5000bekt in every area, even tasks that weren't cached.

This is the battery life I got:


Keep in mind that a lot of people who complain about issues may not even be aware of a firmware update or how to apply it.

 

does this momentus XT firmware update format ur drive making u loose all data?

 

No, it does not as long as you follow the instructions.

 

Hi There

I think it depends on your laptop which you are using to get a momentus xt or not... but on macbook? well on a macbook it's risky i guess...

a lot of people encountering major beachballin problems and stuff with the drive -> Myself included

i got a momentus xt about 1 month ago for my macbook (late 2008).
My Momentus XT already had Firmware SD23 ( still the newest from seagate ).

Can't get it to work like it should... beachballin all the time in osx... tried everything hdapm, fixing permissions in osx and so on.... no success at all...

so i ordered a wd scorpio black this week as i can't work on my macbook with the seagate drive... it's impossible... can't even play movies anymore in itunes or quicktime...

if you look at the seagate forums not only a few people have issues... there are quiet a lot... mostly macbook users.... so i guess the drive works well with other hardware parts... but for macbooks you're lucky if it turns out to work like it should...

you can also have a look at the last few pages from seagate forums... oh my seagate... oh my....

so i guess i will be fine with the scorpio black in terms of battery life and performance.... the future will be ssd driven i guess and i'm looking forward to Intel's G3 Solid State Drives which will come in 320 and 600gb regarding intels roadmap...

seagate thread:
Firmware update - Momentus XT - Page 16 - Seagate Community Forums