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    only getting 25MB/s via USB on my portable HDD

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by sublime313, May 15, 2009.

  1. sublime313

    sublime313 Notebook Evangelist

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    I just bought a Seagate Free Agent GO from some guy off craigslist. 320gb model for $40. Well, I just connected to my laptop and trying to transfer 85GB worth of media and only getting speeds of around 25MB/s right now. It's supposed to be 480MB/s, no?
     
    sublime313, May 15, 2009
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  2. sublime313

    sublime313 Notebook Evangelist

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    hmm is this one of those bits/Bytes situations? lol. ok im an idiot. proved it again.
     
    sublime313, May 15, 2009
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  3. Greg

    Greg Notebook Nobel Laureate

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    Top speed you can possibly expect is 40-60MBps, though it will almost always be closer to 40MBps.

    However, the controller in the device might not be capable of processing that much throughput and it wouldn't surprise me to see that external topping out at 25MBps.
     
    Greg, May 15, 2009
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  4. John Ratsey

    John Ratsey Moderately inquisitive Super Moderator

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    Yes. USB2 is nominally 480 Mb/s and your 25MB/s is typical of actual performance. The best I've seen reported is around 30MB/s.

    eSATA is the way forward for external HDDs.

    John
     
    John Ratsey, May 15, 2009
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  5. sublime313

    sublime313 Notebook Evangelist

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    I figure for $40 I'd pass on the eSATA and go usb 2.0. got this from a dude off craigslist. seemed fishy. he also offered to sell me sunglasses or copies of vista. said he gets it straight from china lol. he says they're "oem new".. so i know thru all that crock of bs i was taking a chance buying this thing but it didnt look like a knockoff and i gambled. seems to be working just fine for me right now.
     
    sublime313, May 15, 2009
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  6. jackluo923

    jackluo923 Notebook Virtuoso

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    There are times when transferring through USB can achieve more than 60MB/s or 480Mb/s throughtput. Sometimes USB transfers are cached and speed in Vista/Windows 7's transfer window might go way to in the 200MB range.

    I tested my flashdrive with ATTO (there's probably a glitch somewhere), I got over 900MB or 7.2Gbps read throughput.
     
    jackluo923, May 15, 2009
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  7. Greg

    Greg Notebook Nobel Laureate

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    The HARD limit for data transfer rate is 60MB/s, if you are seeing that kind of throughput it is because the cache is flushing out or your program is wrong. That has nothing to do with the physical limits of the interface.
     
    Greg, May 15, 2009
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  8. jackluo923

    jackluo923 Notebook Virtuoso

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    That's exactly what've said but in different words. :rolleyes:
    "Sometimes USB transfers are cached and speed in Vista/Windows 7's transfer window might go way to in the 200MB range. "
     
    jackluo923, May 15, 2009
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  9. Jaguar

    Jaguar Notebook Consultant

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    My few year old western digital mybook 500gb gives steady 30mb/s on hdtune.
     
    Jaguar, May 15, 2009
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  10. Manic Penguins

    Manic Penguins [+[ ]=]

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    That is a pretty average speed :)
     
    Manic Penguins, May 15, 2009
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  11. Tinderbox (UK)

    Tinderbox (UK) BAKED BEAN KING

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    I get 28mb/s on my WD 500gb external, but i get 38mb/s read on my buffalo 1tb , using it`s turbo usb feature , all tests done using hdtune on my INTEL PM45 chipset.

    But on an AMD Puma chipset , i was only getting a max of 15mb/s on both the drives above for some reason.
     
    Tinderbox (UK), May 15, 2009
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