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    which is faster?

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by hbk, Sep 22, 2006.

  1. hbk

    hbk Notebook Enthusiast

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    120G internal SATA HDD 5400rpm
    or
    120G external USB2.0 HDD 7200rpm from desktop HDD
     
    hbk, Sep 22, 2006
    #1
  2. usapatriot

    usapatriot Notebook Nobel Laureate

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    I dont know if USB can bottleneck a 7,200rpm HDD...
    But if it doesnt, the 7,200rpm should be faster.
     
    usapatriot, Sep 22, 2006
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  3. yamla

    yamla Notebook Consultant

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    Peak theoretical transfer rate in USB 2 is 55 MB/s for a single device. You often see transfers much slower than that, however. Additionally, USB requires the CPU get involved. Overall, I'd go with an internal 5400 RPM hard drive over an external 7200 RPM hard drive for regular storage. External drives make great backup or transfer storage, though.
     
    yamla, Sep 22, 2006
    #3
  4. hbk

    hbk Notebook Enthusiast

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    I'm just thinking where I should install my game for a better speed...
     
    hbk, Sep 22, 2006
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  5. yamla

    yamla Notebook Consultant

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    As the internal drive doesn't use any significant amount of CPU, and given that USB2 may well restrict the benefit you get from the 7200 rpm drive, I'd definitely go with the internal 5400 RPM drive.

    I may not be right but it would surprise me if you found the 7200 RPM drive better in this situation.
     
    yamla, Sep 22, 2006
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  6. Lil Mayz

    Lil Mayz Notebook Deity

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    The Internal 5400RPM will be much faster. USB is a huge bottleneck compared to SATA. SATA drives offer data transfer speeds around 1.5Gb/s, but USB 2 offer only speeds up to 480Mbps.
     
    Lil Mayz, Sep 23, 2006
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  7. yamla

    yamla Notebook Consultant

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    No hard drive comes even remotely close to 1.5 Gb/sec transfer rates. Very few hard drives exceed 480 Mbps.
     
    yamla, Sep 23, 2006
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  8. ez2remember

    ez2remember Notebook Evangelist

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    Internal would be faster. USB2 can theorectically transfer up to 480Mb/s (MegaBits Per Second) = 60 MB/s (60 MegaBytes per second) but in reality its a lot less than 60 so in some circumstances it would hinder the hard drive performance. A desktop 7200rpm drives can transfer over 60 MegaBytes a second. Not to mention the cpu hog...
     
    ez2remember, Sep 23, 2006
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  9. Jalf

    Jalf Comrade Santa

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    True on the first part, wrong on the latter. A 7200RPM drive can certainly exceed 480Mbps. They tend to have peak transfer rates in the 70-80MB/s range, which is up to 30% above what USB2 can *theoretically* deliver. In practice, USB2 doesn't come near those 480Mbit/s. And yes, the CPU thing is going to be very noticeable too.
     
    Jalf, Sep 23, 2006
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  10. yamla

    yamla Notebook Consultant

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    Peak, yes. Average read transfer rates are generally below (though close to) 60 MB/sec, except for the Raptors which are about 74 MB/sec, and a couple of others that scrape in a little above 60. You'd probably expect a modern 7200 RPM drive to have a peak performance for reads in the 60 - 70 MB/sec range, some coming in above 70 (and the raptor well above 80, wow).

    In any case, we aren't really arguing. USB2 can do 480 Mbps which is 60 MB/sec and that's theoretical. In reality, you won't see even that much, plus with the CPU overhead, it means an internal 5400 RPM drive is really the way to go. Of course, if the internal drive is a 2.5" drive, that'll be even slower as the 2.5" drives tend to lag behind the 3.5" drives. But still.
     
    yamla, Sep 23, 2006
    #10