Notebook Hard Drive Roundup 122
Sivar writes "With the increasing popularity of notebooks and their growing use in gaming and workstation-like tasks, it is important to consider the performance of more than just the CPU and video. Storagereview.com has a roundup of notebook hard drives which includes their new gaming and office tests, server performance graphs for those so inclined, and finally power usage and noise numbers which are particularly important for laptop hardware."
Laptops really for gaming? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:4, Interesting)
In addition, with console game systems becoming a more credible place to play first person shooters (see nintendo revolution's controller, eh?) I may not have any reason to play any non-strategy PC games. Those games [generally] need CPU more than graphics, so that should be fine.
Mostly, I don't have time to play PC games any more. Console games are usually broken up into smaller, more convenient pieces. Granted, you can usually save anywhere in a PC game, but it can be disorienting coming back in the middle of a mission. I believe the move towards laptops can also be seen as a move away from sitting on your ass in front of a big heavy display for long periods of time - people making that move probably aren't playing many PC games anyway.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
With Windows, I saw improvement by turning off ClearType for flatpanels, and other
XP display options. Running benchmarks with the AC power connected helps as well.
The worst part with new laptops is you can't drop to full screen 800x600 to run faster.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
This isn't really true.
I use a Dell D810 for gaming. This is configured with an ATI X600. This certainly isn't the fastest card around, but it's perfectly playable with current games.
The native screen resolution is 1920x1200, which is a little high for some games. However, the ATI graphics chip has configuration options for how to scale the image. It's perfectly fine running games full screen at a lower resolution than the panel's native resolution. The filtered scaling by the graphics card is far better than used to be the case with the built in scaling of LCD monitors.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:3, Informative)
I tried out Farcry on it. It played FINE (granted, not on the highest detail settings). I sat in the passenger seat of a car and played with a trackball.
Later, I tried City of Villains on it. It played fine.
This thing isn't even a "gaming" laptop. An X600 is modest, not exceptional, graphics hardware, but it's good enough for something as modern as Farcry. I'd say mobile gaming is at least a possibility on new hardware.
The other thing is... most laptops (including my 3-day-old Gateway) still ship with 4200rpm drives. And, amazingly, the bit-density of large drives (80GB or 100GB or 120GB) is still good enough to keep up with the faster-spinning power-hungry 5400 and 7200rpm models; drives with high density platters read data in larger chunks regardless. When I look at the trade-off in battery life for going to a faster drive, I'd have to say I'm a little put off. Mostly I'm going to load Firefox and/or a word processor on that thing, and that's about it. Even with a 7200rpm drive, I'm not going to get a huge subjective improvement in performance.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
www.sagernotebook.com
Do you like Far Cry?
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
Did you buy this option?
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
I've never quite been able to trust their products, truth be told.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
I myself use a Sager NP9860 as my main workstation. It's simply the highest quality laptop I've ever used. Well worth the absurdly high price for the performance it gives. It's heavy as hell for a laptop, not meant to be portable, but I carry it around school and work all day as is. When the day's done, having a laptop that can play the latest games maxed out at 1680x1050 is fairly nice.
I eagerly await the release of the NP9750, which is an AMD-powered equivalent to the NP9890.
If you want to learn about notebooks, the best place to discuss them is going to be at NotebookForums [notebookforums.com] . It has a large, active, friendly (providing you don't make fun of certain user's favorite retailers.) community willing to discuss just about anything about laptops.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
The 7200rpm drive is significantly faster on boot. Last I timed, I think it was close to 20 seconds faster than the 4.2k. Applications jump up when launched, and gnome panel menus draw almost instantly when first opened as opposed to looking like they will open "when they get around to it". OpenOffice launches much more quickly as well. I timed the boot and the application performance a while back. I don't have the numbers handy on the machine I am at but it was a substantial difference. Moving large chunks of data like multimedia files is night and day. 27MB/sec sustained transfer rates on the 7.2k vs. what was it, 14MB/sec iirc, on the 4.2k? It's quite perceivable.
Battery life is practically identical; the 7.2k drive draws three watts active as opposed to 2.7 on the 4200, whereas they both idle at around
I would not have changed drives just for the performance increase. However, I needed more space and the performance boost was a nice side benefit with no downsides except the capital outlay.
Best regards,
Michael
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
My other notebook, a 1GB 1.6GHz Pentium M Thinkpad T40 with an 80GB, 7200rpm Hitachi drive in it, actually starts Server 2003 Web edition about 12 seconds slower.
Yes, some apps start faster on the Thinkpad. Others, there's no perceptible difference, and the latter outweigh the former.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
It made one hell of a difference.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:3, Interesting)
For a lot of college kids these days, the laptop is their only computer. If a game doesn't run on a laptop, they don't play it. They are more likely to own a handheld console than a desktop PC.
As far as I can tell, Quake III and City of Heroes were made strictly for the VH-1 demographic (and their children.) Young adults are mostly giving the PC game scene a pass.
The one exception seems to be World of Warcraft, which actually plays pretty well on low-end laptops. (I've played it on an iBook myself, and found that it worked quite well.)
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2, Interesting)
The desktop has been relegated to filesharing and being used by the wife.
Yes, it's becoming more popular.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
I'm waiting on the intel procesors on macs to get her one!
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2, Insightful)
For me, though, the laptop isn't a gaming platform. It'll run Unreal Tournament II decently, but Enemy Territory runs at maybe 20fps max (10fps average). Yeah, it's not high-powered...it's also not too upgradeable. Definitely not as tweakable as a good ol' desktop. If by "gaming" you mean an occasional bout of Frozen Bubble, then sure, why not? Anything needing more oomph, probably not.
Maybe there's a market for it out there, like there's a market for high-priced luxury cars. All I know is that I'm not its intended target 'cause I couldn't afford a gaming laptop nor could I justify preferring one over a desktop for gaming.
You'd want to plug it into a bigger monitor anyway. You'd need a power outlet for extended gameplay. You'll need a table to set it on 'cause it'll be really WARM from all that processing/spinning. You'll most likely plug in a USB optical mouse with one of those gaming mousepads. Did I mention you'll have a hard time upgrading the graphics card? In the end, you might as well have a desktop.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2, Informative)
Power consumption isn't much of a factor...when you're doing anything that requires special attention (ie work or gaming), you'll likely be stationed somewhere and plugged in. Some of the 12lb monsters that Sager puts out pretty much assume you'll be using the thing at a desk. As for monitors, there are models with 17-inch screens available and 19-inchers are coming soon. If you need something bigger, just output to a TV.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
Hmmm. Really, the same Enemy Territory that I can play fine on my Matrox G550 (which has very little 3d acceleration to speak of...)?
Admittedly I'm playing with almost all details set to "low" (which has some advantages btw, for example I can sometimes see enemy players shine through walls
The performance with these settings is good enough for a fluid game (~40fps or so?) and I don't miss the high textures / effects all that much. After all gameplay is what counts and that's what ET delivers par excellence.
Since most modern laptops ship with graphics chipsets that have better 3D acceleration than my old matrox
I'd be really surprised if they weren't good enough for ET - probably even at higher detail settings than I am using.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
Admittedly there is one map (the one with the rain, don't recall the name) that cause noticable lag. But it's only that one map and it's still playable. I assume that on in that map it would go down to around 20fps in certain situations but most of the time it's still fast enough to hand out precise headshots...
Maybe the G550 is actually better than it's reputation but no 3d-game except counterstrike and ET would run
at an acceptable framerate.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:3, Interesting)
It depends on what you consider serious. I use my laptop to play stuff like EQ2, Civ 4 and Evil Genius but when it comes to FPSs I'm still a desktop devotee; for one reason it's cheaper and another is that I normally don't use my laptop on a desk, so in the matter of keyboard/mouse play the desktop is more natural to me.
Could I use my laptop to play HL2? Sure, but my performance would suffer simply because of layout over computing power.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
I have personally just hit the threshold where I'm prepared to give up my desktop gaming for the convenience of a laptop - I just purchased a Dell XPS M170 [cnet.com] which includes a GeForce 7800 Go. It benchmarks at 87fps on Doom 3, high quality, 1024x768, 4xAA, which is on par with higher end desktops.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
To me it makes a bit more sense. It's easier to snap a gameboy out at an airport or on a plane, the batteries last longer and frankly nothing beats a good match of some mid-90s GB game with ridiculous plotlines and often hard to decipher graphics [that said I'm a FF2 addict
Tom
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:3, Insightful)
I used my laptop (Eurocom D500P, basically a branded Clevo) for gaming for quite a while. It had a mobile ATI 9600 Pro, 1 GB of RAM, 60 GB HD, and was a very reasonable gaming machine. Still is, but it can't handle some of what I play, notably Everquest, and that is mostly due to the game's horrible graphics engine.
Games like q3 arena, BF1942, Steam and all of its bits, and even Battlefield 2, Doom 3, Quake 4 run pretty decently with appropriate settings levels. This would probably go for any laptop that is similarly outfitted, including the Compaq/HP nc8000 that I use at work (which also has a Mobility Radeon in it). I haven't played around with any geForce Go laptops, so no idea how they fare.
Now, keep in mind that this machine, like most that can be used for high end gaming, are laptops of the "portable but plugged in" variety. They'd likely run out of battery life in minutes rather than hours if left unplugged.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
So, your standard, middle of the road laptop runs most modern games just fine these days. You don't have to blow $3k on a "Gaming" laptop, as long as you don't mind playing at less-than-max settings, with moderate frame rates.
I don't really understand the guys who opt for 100 FPS at max res anyway. I can frag your ass just fine at 1024x768 at 30 FPS -- and spend the $1500+ I saved on shit that matters.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
My Sharp RD-10 is about 2 years old (at the time it was high-end) and still plays everything I throw at it. I don't do really "serious" gaming on any platform, but when I see a new FPS or strategy game that I'd like to give a spin, I haven't really ever run into a problem. It's got a P4, 2.8 GHz desktop CPU, a GeForce 420 Go, 512 MB ram and on-board mini-pci wireless so really still not too bad by modern specs. While the battery life isn't anything to brag about, it has no problem doing what I need it to do on the gaming front.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
Yes. I believe that Notebook sales already have surpassed desktops PC's in many countries. In a not so distant future, notebook computers will constitute the wast majority of computers in peoples home.
Besides, even desktop PC's will soon use 2.5" "notebook" hard discs, instead of 3.5" discs. Of course there will be a transition period, but PC hardware will continue to shrink in size. (full height 5.25" SCSI drives, oh what sound they made when starting.)
--
Regards
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
They should have tested the 100GB version of the Hitachi Travelstar 5K100 instead of the 80GB. I paid under $150 for it in September (after my original 4200 rpm 60GB HDD died) and it is a little faster than the 80GB version that a friend has in his laptop.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
I don't see them either, but that's probably due to natural selection, for those who try probably their laptop gets nicked before long.
(Those who don't try get a better chance of maintaining ownership)
MSI-1036 17" Turion 256MB X700 laptop (Score:2)
Throw in an AMD Turion MT40 (2.2GHz, 25W) CPU (see ewiz.com), 2GB RAM (Crucial PC3200, ~$240), that Hitachi 100GB 7200RPM HD (see zipzoomfly.com), along with the stock 17" widescreen and 256MB Radeon X700 GPU and you'll have a seriously nice gaming notebook.
If you want something really outrageous, the Clevo D900K [amdboard.com] notebooks take Athlon 64 X2 dualcore CPUs and GeForce 7800 Go GPUs. Heavy though.
There are some nice 15.4" Turion notebooks with X700 GPUs too from Acer and MSI [xmeld.com].
Hopefully we'll see some really neat stuff next year when nVidia's new notebook chipset comes out.
My notebook has a lowly GeForce 440 Go though because apparently nobody at HP is into gaming. Nice machine otherwise though.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
As for people riding the bus playing a game, that's obviously BS. Most games are torture to play without a mouse--the trackpad doesn't cut it. My old laptop was great for working on reports while I was on the train in the morning, or surfing the web at the student center. But gaming? No way.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
Of course I'd rather have a desktop, just to be more upgradable but having a laptop that can do most of what I want is the best of both worlds.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:3, Informative)
My other 'desktop' computers are used as servers or for work-only (aka workstations).
There are quite a few valid reasons for using a laptop for gaming. For one, I like to be able to sit on my bed or sofa and play Battlefield 2 without any lag via 802.11g and a logitech wireless mouse. I like to be able to bring my laptop easily to my friends' houses or to LAN partys without having to worry about alot of cables or weight (though my laptop is pretty heavy). I like to be able to do some horrible mundane task in WoW while watching an utterly crappy SciFi movie on TV in comfort. The main difference of a laptop over a desktop is portability at the cost of more $$ for equal performance. Otherwise there is nothing stopping even affordable (read ~$1000) laptops from being decent to great (~$2000) gaming machines.
No, given power constraints, I don't do ANY real gaming on battery only. My laptop would only last 40 minutes or so with that scenario and that's what, one round of BF2?
My current laptop is an Alienware and before that I had a Dell that I used just as much (and was alot cheaper), and with a little lag was also perfectly fine for all my FPS needs (played doom 3 fine and that was like a radeon 9600 mobile w/ 64MB of ram or something? maybe 128).
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
There's some guy in my government class that always brings his obviously-for-gaming laptop to class to take notes on. This thing has got to be over 12 pounds, and the fan gets so loud that I can't concentrate on the lecture. I want to shove that laptop up his urethra.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:1)
I use mine (Score:2)
For games such as Half Life 2 and BattleField (1942, I don't own BF2 yet) it ran just fine. Today's laptops really aren't like the laptops of old... there are definately some that more qualify as mobile desktops.
Re:Laptops really for gaming? (Score:2)
I use my laptop for gaming because it has a faster processor and video card than my desktop system. I hook the lappy up to my CRT monitor, use a fullsize keyboard, and mouse. Now, I'm not a hardcore gamer by any means, but this way I can bring my laptop over to my friends place so we can play games wirelessly. It's a lot easier to grab my laptop to go play a few games than it is to haul my PC/CRT. I'm also a sysadmin, so I need my laptop with me almost all the time anyway - might as well play some games when its not being used for "work."
Toshiba missing (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Toshiba missing (Score:2)
Re:Toshiba missing (Score:1)
Re:Toshiba missing (Score:2)
Hard Drive Speed? (Score:1)
It's too bad... (Score:4, Interesting)
And what really sucks is... (Score:2)
The solution: (Score:1)
Along with a knoppix CD, it's also most handy when some relatives' computer dies for some mysterious reason.
Re:And what really sucks is... (Score:2)
I don't think I'll ever use a 3.5" drive in my desktop again, those are good for the "home-server" in the other room where noise doesn't matter.
Re:It's too bad... (Score:2)
I know that Apple isn't "most of the time" but if you're buying an Apple it's "all the time"
Re:It's too bad... (Score:2)
Check Toshiba, Sony, Eurocom, Dell, etc.
The best notebook harddrive? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:The best notebook harddrive? (Score:2)
It really makes me question the use of a laptop drive (and a slow one at that) in the cheapest Macintosh, but oh well.
Re:The best notebook harddrive? (Score:1)
-Sarkoon
My 7k60 screams (Score:5, Insightful)
It's hard to express in words how much faster my machine "felt" in everyday use. Startup time alone went from so slow where I always put the thing to sleep -- to my shutting down quite often now because it doesn't seem to take an eternity to boot.
Number and words do not do justice to the speed improvements possible by upgrading a slow 4200RPM drive for a 7K(whatever) drive. If you can afford it, I highly suggest you consider upgrading your slow laptop drive to a 7200rpm drive even if your factory drive is not dead (and out of warranty), which was the case for me.
-Pete
Re:My 7k60 screams (Score:1)
Re:My 7k60 screams (Score:2)
Re:My 7k60 screams (Score:3, Interesting)
I have a Seagate 4200RPM drive in my laptop and while initial startup may be a bit slower than my desktop (by a matter of seconds) application performance is just fine.
Oh did I mention I have 768MB of ram in it and I'm not running Windows?
That's why when I look at buying a new laptop [to replace this thing when it eventually dies] I always look at the max ram. My next one will likely have 768 or 1GB initially [I originally upgraded this laptop from 256M to 768M].
Ram is cheaper on the power than a "really fast hard drive" and in practice is faster too. I start many shells for instance, each time it loads "xterm" [and the shared libraries] they're in cache [or the
Not saying a 7200RPM wouldn't be nice but if I had to make a choice between spending money on memory or a fast HD I'd rather the memory.
Tom
Re:My 7k60 screams (Score:2)
I love being able to copy files and start applications and do a variety of other disk I/O bound tasks faster on my 1 grand iBook than my brother can do on his 2.5 grand PowerBook.
Re:My 7k60 screams (Score:2)
I suppose you are right though. Getting both a decent HD and amount of ram doesn't hurt and makes sense. Specially if you're a mac user, you have money to spend
Tom
Re:My 7k60 screams (Score:1)
Re:My 7k60 screams (Score:1)
Re:My 7k60 screams (Score:1)
Even the Momentus 5400.2 is a nice drive (Score:2)
That old drive was a major bottleneck, even though I have 256 MB RAM on this system. I ended up putting the old drive into a cheap USB enclosure.
Flash hybrid drive (Score:3, Interesting)
Samsung is planning on releasing a hybrid flash/disk drive in the second half of 2006, which is around the same time as Vista. The hybrid drive is said to use 10% less power by reducing spin up times and also reducing hd failure caused by dropping. When the flash memory is full the data is then written to disk.
What will they think of next?
Re:Flash hybrid drive (Score:2)
Hugely useful, especially for Mac users (Score:2, Insightful)
With more and more people doing video editing and compression (Final Cut, iMovie) and audio stuff (Logic, GarageBand)... it's very valuable to do this stuff on the go. It's not just gaming that sucks up resources.
So kudos to SR for putting this together, and it would be nice for Apple to provide speedier config options for its customers.
Notebook hard disk sizes haven't grown (Score:3, Interesting)
The hard disks being compared here have an 80gb or 100gb size; the biggest notebook hard disks I have seen are 120gb hard disks. We broke the 80gig barrier about a year ago; if disks were growing the way they were in the 1990s, we would have 160gb notebook hard disks by now. I get the feeling that it is going to take a few years to break the 200gb barrier.
I get the sense that the technology is maturing and that people aren't interested in getting really big hard disks any more. So we're not seeing the growth factors we used to have.
Re:Notebook hard disk sizes haven't grown (Score:3, Informative)
After Seagate announced their next-generation 100 GB 7200 RPM drives (Momentus 7200.1), I waited over a year, checking every few months for availability. They never came and I gave up. Now I see they've finally been released, but sheesh, on the desktop, 100 GB drives are getting pretty rare because they're just too small to bother with.
Re:Notebook hard disk sizes haven't grown (Score:1)
Re:Notebook hard disk sizes haven't grown (Score:1)
I want an upgrade (Score:3, Informative)
Problem is this laptop has a SATA->IDE bridge chip (apparantly made by Intel). So you can use an IDE drive.
Problem this gives is that most drives (with rare exception) generate a BIOS error on startup, that IBM/Lenovo has so far failed to fix.
I'm really hoping they get it fixed. With that drive, this would be the top performing laptop on the market. It really is a nice laptop. It does have a little thermal problem, causing the fan to stay somewhat loud, even when thermals cool, but I suspect that's a BIOS upgrade at some point in the future. Sounds like the settings are a little to harsh. IMHO not a big deal.
I'm really hoping this doesn't become a trend for Laptop HD's. I really want to upgrade. This thing is a real great example of what makes IBM/Lenovo laptops so good. Sturdy, fast, reliable. Just need that HD upgrade now
What good is a hard drive that is not reliable. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:What good is a hard drive that is not reliable. (Score:1)
It wasn't even on as much as the laptop; I had never bothered opening up the laptop to swap the drive in, so it just lived in the external aluminum enclosure that I originally planned to put the laptop's old drive in.
If the drive is stone-cold, I get about an hour or two runtime out of it. Any longer and it stops working. And the bearings sound really, really bad.
I guess it would take a lot longer for them to test longevity, though. Hate to wait 3 years to find out what would have been a good choice....
IBM laptop (Score:1)
Re:IBM laptop (Score:3, Informative)
Make sure you've got 512 meg memory in the system though, not much point in replacing the hard drive if it's still going to swap to disk constantly.
Re:IBM laptop (Score:3, Informative)
To help improve matters (assuming, of course, that you have copious amounts of RAM installed) you can 'tune' Windows to reduce its use of the Paging File, thereby speeding things up. This requires modifying the Registry. The usual caveats about Registry editing being potentially dangerous, etc., apply...
For Windows 2000 and XP; "HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management\DisablePagingExecutive"; Set to '1' decimal.
There are other memory tweaks that involve changing Disk I/O buffering and System Cache. You may want to do your own research. :)
Enjoy!
A question. (Score:2)
Another missing.... (Score:2)
For those interested another review is at Tom's hardware [tomshardware.com].
At any rate, as well as missing the Toshiba drives, I noticed they were using the Samsung Spinpoint M40 80GB for review. I'd discounted that previously because of it's lacklustre performance (also highlighted in the Tom's Hardware review).
But (you knew there would be one!) there's the newer M60 series that was released recently. The HM100JC [samsung.com] looks interesting. Better transfer rate as well as lower power consumption, which is always handy for the laptop users.
Anyways, if anyone has one of these baby's pls post your impressions.
Not Just For Notebooks (Score:2)
Nice to see 5 minutes AFTER my powerbook order... (Score:2)
From TFA: Those in the market for an upgraded notebook hard drive seek more capacity and/or speed. At a rather steep price ($230 at the time of this writing), Hitachi's Travelstar 7K100 offers gobs of both. Though it overall remains a far cry from that of the typical desktop unit, the 7K100 nonetheless delivers the best performance around when it comes both to office/productivity applications and games.
Hopefully it will be a step up from the 4200rpm 40GB drive in my current 12" Powerbook!
Server performance of 2.5" drives - look out! (Score:3, Informative)
Oh, and want killer IOPS with microsecond seek times? Try the Adtron SATA flash drive [adtron.com]. 40GB will only set you back $18,000.
Re:Server performance of 2.5" drives - look out! (Score:1)
Re:Server performance of 2.5" drives - look out! (Score:2)
IBM/Hitachi is my top pick (Score:1)
Best drive for USB enclosure? (Score:3, Informative)
A USB enclosure for a 2.5" HD is cheap, small, and convenient, but which of these drives would be best for this?
Obviously speed doesn't matter.
Probably the most important factor is power consumption since these enclosures run off the USB power which is barely enough for these drives. The WD drive is strange in that it gets very good numbers for operating power dissapation and noise, but then is 2nd worst for startup power dissapation. I guess that puts it out of the running.
Here's the relevant page:
http://storagereview.com/articles/200511/notebook
Regarding the hard drive (Score:1)
Ruggedness (Score:1)
The review, however, did not do any ruggedness testing!! At the very least they should have dropped each drive, one at a time, onto a carpet, then wooden, then concrete floor. What good is a notebook drive if a minor bumps sees the heads or platters destroyed?
I think the review is/was largely a waste of space.
Why not the truly important test? (Score:2)
steve
Re:Fuck'em (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't worry, yours doesn't sound like a fanboy post or anything.
Good point, because it is such a pain in the ass clicking on Performance Database [storagereview.com] at the top and then choosing to sort by NOISE or POWER DISSIPATION.
Seriously I don't know how anyone can be expected to figure that out.
Re:Fuck'em (Score:2)
Storagereview completely ignored noise until recently, and their test criteria are more then questionable.
They dont meassure access noise at all, and their idle nosie meassurements are usually in "xx mm" distance, with xx being a low number... Which doesnt mean shit, as this will only meassure noise emitted right there (whatever surface they put the sensor above), but not the "real" noise profile you get in normal (50cm or so) working distance.
Performance-wise, otoh, their testbed is very balanced and sensible.
Re:Fuck'em (Score:2)
SR has never focused on noise and heat production factors until very recently. Their criterias are sub-par, as well as the documentation of their testing benches (check SPCR, they explain everything about their testing methodologies and update them as soon as they find a flaw).
SPRC has been focusing nearly exclusively on silence and heat issues (notice that it's what I was talking about?) for years, and go up to the pain of providing comparative audio records of the products they review in order for the reader to truely have the best informations they can provide (because, and that's something very few other than SPCR accept to tell you, dB is only a subset of the noise/silence experience, and the type/quality of the sound is almost as important)
Durability (Score:2)
Then it measures only Office DriveMark 2006, High-End DriveMark 2006, FarCry, The Sims 2, World of Warcraft, IOMeter File Server Tests, Average Read Access Time, Average Write Access Time, WB99 Disk/Read Transfer Rate, WB99 Disk/Read Transfer Rate, Idle Noise, Idle Power Dissipation, Active Power Dissipation, 12V Maximum Power Dissipation, and 5V Maximum Power Dissipation.
Where's the Mean Baggage Checks to Failure?
Where is Height Droppable Without Crashing?
Where is Hours Baked at 75C without Melting Something?
Where is Minimum Functional Temperature?
Where is Number of Times Hit on Head with Frying Pan?
Where is Number of Watermelons Smashed with Working Drive?
Re:Durability (Score:2)
Really I don't see the big deal here.
Re:Durability (Score:2)
Fair enough, perhaps our friendly neighborhood review web site would compare and contrast those specs.
Durability was mentioned only to establish how different considerations are when looking into hard drives for laptops vs. hard drives for desktops.
This, of course, is the point. It was a laptop drive review. Assuming (as the article itself asserts) that those buying laptop drives care about durability, some data on durability should have been presented.
Me, I'm just traulling around for an excuse to smash watermelons.
Re:Fuck'em (Score:1)
I've never been able to take SR that seriously since they lost their drive reliability results back in 2002 due to a HD failure
Re:Fuck'em (Score:2)
Like most review websites, it is run on a dedicated server on one of many hosting services. These companies generally have a generic (and cheap) configuration for easy maintenance, and do not allow "suggestions" for the storage infrastructure.
In fact, SR tried to get them to run the server on two Seagate Cheetah's, but the hosting provider did not want to alter the standard hardware for the server, and rightfully so--they wouldn't have replacement parts in case the Cheetahs died.
I am sure it seems cute and fun to say "ha ha, a storage website lost data!", but you really should learn at least a little about what really happened before making a sweeping decision like "therefore they can't be taken seriously."