X-bit labs

Mega Roundup: 20 Hard Disk Drives with 80GB Storage Capacity (page 11)

Category: Storage

by Alexey Volkov , Nikita Nikolaichev

[ 04/15/2004 | 01:43 PM ]

Performance in WinBench 99

We use the WinBench test to check out the hard disk drives in the “desktop PC” mode. We format the disk into the NTFS file system by means of the system tools (the default cluster size is 4GB) and into FAT32 using Paragon Partition Manager (the cluster size is 32KB). We also perform our tests on the 32GB storage space in NTFS and FAT32 file systems (partitioning the drives be standard Windows 2000 Disk Manager).

The table with benchmark results was very huge, so we split it into logical groups and linked to them:

FAT32:

• IBM-Hitachi;
• Maxtor;
• Samsung;
• Seagate;
• Western Digital.

FAT32-32GB:

• IBM-Hitachi;
• Maxtor;
• Samsung;
• Seagate;
• Western Digital.

NTFS:

• IBM-Hitachi;
• Maxtor;
• Samsung;
• Seagate;
• Western Digital.

NTFS-32GB:

• IBM-Hitachi;
• Maxtor;
• Samsung;
• Seagate;
• Western Digital.

It was very hard to combine the huge masses of numbers into diagrams, but we did it and are now ready to discuss the test results for FAT32.

WinBench 99: Disk Transfer Rate

The results of this test don’t depend on the disk storage capacity or file system, so let’s discuss them before the results for the FAT32 system.

As you see, there is no rival among 7200rpm HDDs to the Raptor drive in terms of linear reading speed. What’s characteristic, WD800LB drive was the second: Western Digital implemented 80GB platters into its devices later than the competitors, but the implementation seems perfect.

Going down the results table, we see 80GB-platter drives and devices with fast 60GB platters. All old HDDs and 5400rpm devices quite deservedly occupy the bottom of the table.

You can view the linear read graphs for each of the drives by clicking on the following links:

• Hitachi HDS722580VLAT20
• Hitachi HDS722580VLSA80
• IBM IC35L080AVV207-0
• IBM DTLA 307075
• Maxtor 6L080L4
• Maxtor 6Y080L0
• Maxtor 6Y080M0
• Maxtor 6Y080P0
• Samsung SP0802N
• Samsung SP8004H
• Samsung SV0802N
• Samsung SV8004H
• Seagate ST380011A
• Seagate ST380013AS
• Seagate ST380023A
• Seagate ST380023AS
• WD 800BB
• WD 800JB
• WD 800LB
• WD 740GD

For example, the shape of the Maxtor 6Y080L0 graph explains why a drive with a true 80GB platter is so slow at linear reading in the beginning of the disk. We are just unlucky to have a bad specimen…:(

Let’s now compare the drives according to their average access time:

Again, WD740GD is nearly twice as fast as ST380011A (the junior drive from the Barracuda 7200.7 series). By the way, this drive showed higher access time than the Samsung drives with lower spindle rotation speed! In our Barracuda 7200.7 HDD Family Review we supposed that Seagate uses a special noiseless seek mode for its ATA drives. This reduces the noise from the device, but also trims down its performance.

Note also that SATA drives all took top positions in the results table. Well, fast seek has always been important for servers, even entry-level ones.