250 GB Hard Disk Drive Round-Up

**MIG-31** · Jul 30, 2008, 07:13 AM

When buying a hard disk drive most users are only concerned with the drive’s capacity. Should you also care about performance? We compared the performance of nine mainstream 250 GB SATA-300 hard disk drive models from Seagate, Samsung, Western Digital, Maxtor and Hitachi. Is there a big performance difference among them? Is it worthwhile to pay a little bit more and get a drive with a bigger buffer? If so, which is the fastest 250 GB in the market? Check it out!
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Source: Hardware Secrets

Matth · Jul 30, 2008, 10:40 PM

Huge variation in minimum speeds, 55MB/s for the Seagate 7200.10/Maxtor and 32MB/s for the WDs that were as fast or faster in max transfer.

Can't see a mention, but it would appear that the faster minimum transfer rate suggests that those 250GBs are "marketing models" of a 320GB using less than full capacity, so not reaching the slowest part of the platters.

mkk · Jul 31, 2008, 01:33 AM

It would certainly be a nice thing to have such a drive. However they might be looking at a fluke drop in a few cases as the lowest score is so very much lower than ought to be related to regular performance at the end of a platter. The HD Tach graphs would be telling.

Jul 30, 2008, 07:13 AM	#1
MIG-31 HardwareHeaven News Mod Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Nottingham,UK Posts: 56,834 Rep Power: 471 System Specs	250 GB Hard Disk Drive Round-Up When buying a hard disk drive most users are only concerned with the drive’s capacity. Should you also care about performance? We compared the performance of nine mainstream 250 GB SATA-300 hard disk drive models from Seagate, Samsung, Western Digital, Maxtor and Hitachi. Is there a big performance difference among them? Is it worthwhile to pay a little bit more and get a drive with a bigger buffer? If so, which is the fastest 250 GB in the market? Check it out! _____________ Source: Hardware Secrets __________________ Please Post Your News Submissions Here

Jul 30, 2008, 10:40 PM	#2
Matth Flash Banner Hater Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: UK Posts: 3,426 Rep Power: 93 System Specs	Huge variation in minimum speeds, 55MB/s for the Seagate 7200.10/Maxtor and 32MB/s for the WDs that were as fast or faster in max transfer. Can't see a mention, but it would appear that the faster minimum transfer rate suggests that those 250GBs are "marketing models" of a 320GB using less than full capacity, so not reaching the slowest part of the platters. __________________ Mary had a little lamb, Her father shot it dead Now Mary takes her lamb to school, Between two crusts of bread

Jul 31, 2008, 01:33 AM	#3
mkk Cthulhu/Dagon 2012 Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Gefle, Sweden Posts: 4,492 Rep Power: 132 System Specs	It would certainly be a nice thing to have such a drive. However they might be looking at a fluke drop in a few cases as the lowest score is so very much lower than ought to be related to regular performance at the end of a platter. The HD Tach graphs would be telling.