Let’s see if our using the NTFS file system will have any effect on the performance of the drives.

The file creation (writing) speed of the Seagate depends but little on the employed interface, although FireWire still allows achieving a higher performance. The Maxtor is everywhere faster than its opponent, in every pattern and with any interface. The Maxtor is even ahead of the Seagate when they are connected via USB 2.0 and FireWire, respectively.

The Maxtor is faster than the Seagate drive at reading the file-sets, too, when they use the same interface. This time, however, the FireWire-connected Seagate is a little faster than the USB-connected Maxtor.

The Maxtor OneTouch III is the better of the two drives at copying files within the same partition. Even connected via the less efficient USB 2.0 interface, it is faster than the FireWire-attached Seagate.

The last diagram shows the speed of copying from one partition to another. There’s nothing particularly new here – the Maxtor wins every subtest and the FireWire interface proves its higher efficiency once again.