Western Digital’s 640 GB Vs Seagate’s 500 GB 7200.11 Vs Seagate 250 GB Single Platter
Today I am about to compare the 3 hottest selling models of hard disk in the Indian market. Known best for their speed and performance these new generation drives have come very close to even the WD Raptors many aspects.
These are undoubtedly the best selling hard drives in the market. With the hdd prices dropping every day the larger capacity hard drives are becoming more affordable.
[BREAK=The Test Setup]
Test Setup For Comparing the Drives
* CPU - Intel E4300 @ 3 GHZ
* RAM - 4 GB @ 742 Mhz
* GPU - xfx 8500GT
HDD 1 - SEAGATE 250 GB 7200.10 - Single Platter
HDD 2 - SEAGATE 500 GB 7200.11
HDD 3 - Western Digital 640 GB
[BREAK=Everest Benchmarks]
Everest Benchmarks
In these benchmarks we get to see that while the 640 GB dominates in most tests over the 250GB single platter the 500 GB Seagate is very close to it and in fact out performs it for good in the random readtests. Over all looking at the average read access time the WD 640 gb surely looks a great hard disk to own.
[BREAK=PCMARK05 Benchmarks]
The test has left a surprising result were I got to see that the 250 GB single platter overtakes the 500 GB in some of the tests, though otherwise the 640 GB remains at top of the table in all the tests.
What I did not understand was as to why the result came in this way, I ran the test twice just to reconfirm with same results almost.
[BREAK=HD-TUNE PRO Benchmarks]
We can clearly see that the WD is clearly the winner over both the Seagate HDD in this test. The access time of the hard disk looks very good too.
Here we get to see a change in the position looking at the graphs we can make out that the 500GB Seagate looks a more consistent drive in this test and at par in terms of speeds with the WD 640 GB.
[BREAK=HD TACH Benchmarks]
Continuing its dominance we get to see that the WD 640 GB if the best of the lot, though the 500 GB is not far behind.
In the long benchmark the hard disks look consistent and their performance does not drop in fact if we look we can see that the things have improved over all.
[BREAK=Real World Tests]
In my first real world test I found that almost all HDD’s are at par to each other and the time to copy a 4.10 GB file from one HDD to another almost took the same amount of time. The only place were
the WD 640GB got an edge was during the copy of the file to the 250GB drive in which it was ahead of the Seagate 500 by 7 seconds.
Even in this test were I used Winrar to compress and extract a 103 MB file at normal compression and extraction the results for all the 3 drives was the same. Even the extraction of a larger file showed same results and even the extraction of the same file in the same hard disk or another had same results. In real world without a timer that I used there would be no difference to me at all in these small tests.
[BREAK=Conclusion]
The WD640 no doubt is the obvious choice, but if the per gb cost of the 500 GB is a better buy than i would ask one to go for that if the main usage is storage as i think the 500 as well is a very good HDD. I would say any one who can spend today should spend that extra 1 - 1.2 k and get the larger HDD and not really opt of the 250 GB.
Today I am about to compare the 3 hottest selling models of hard disk in the Indian market. Known best for their speed and performance these new generation drives have come very close to even the WD Raptors many aspects.
These are undoubtedly the best selling hard drives in the market. With the hdd prices dropping every day the larger capacity hard drives are becoming more affordable.
[BREAK=The Test Setup]
Test Setup For Comparing the Drives
* CPU - Intel E4300 @ 3 GHZ
* RAM - 4 GB @ 742 Mhz
* GPU - xfx 8500GT
The Hard disks to be compared
HDD 1 - SEAGATE 250 GB 7200.10 - Single Platter
HDD 2 - SEAGATE 500 GB 7200.11
HDD 3 - Western Digital 640 GB
[BREAK=Everest Benchmarks]
Everest Benchmarks
In these benchmarks we get to see that while the 640 GB dominates in most tests over the 250GB single platter the 500 GB Seagate is very close to it and in fact out performs it for good in the random readtests. Over all looking at the average read access time the WD 640 gb surely looks a great hard disk to own.
[BREAK=PCMARK05 Benchmarks]
PCMARK05 Benchmarks
The test has left a surprising result were I got to see that the 250 GB single platter overtakes the 500 GB in some of the tests, though otherwise the 640 GB remains at top of the table in all the tests.
What I did not understand was as to why the result came in this way, I ran the test twice just to reconfirm with same results almost.
[BREAK=HD-TUNE PRO Benchmarks]
HD-TUNE PRO Benchmarks
Read Benchmark
Read Benchmark
We can clearly see that the WD is clearly the winner over both the Seagate HDD in this test. The access time of the hard disk looks very good too.
File Benchmark
Here we get to see a change in the position looking at the graphs we can make out that the 500GB Seagate looks a more consistent drive in this test and at par in terms of speeds with the WD 640 GB.
[BREAK=HD TACH Benchmarks]
HD TACH Benchmarks
Quick Benchmark
Long Benchmark
Quick Benchmark
Long Benchmark
Continuing its dominance we get to see that the WD 640 GB if the best of the lot, though the 500 GB is not far behind.
In the long benchmark the hard disks look consistent and their performance does not drop in fact if we look we can see that the things have improved over all.
[BREAK=Real World Tests]
Real World Tests
File Copy Tests
File Copy Tests
In my first real world test I found that almost all HDD’s are at par to each other and the time to copy a 4.10 GB file from one HDD to another almost took the same amount of time. The only place were
the WD 640GB got an edge was during the copy of the file to the 250GB drive in which it was ahead of the Seagate 500 by 7 seconds.
WINRAR Test
Even in this test were I used Winrar to compress and extract a 103 MB file at normal compression and extraction the results for all the 3 drives was the same. Even the extraction of a larger file showed same results and even the extraction of the same file in the same hard disk or another had same results. In real world without a timer that I used there would be no difference to me at all in these small tests.
[BREAK=Conclusion]
The WD640 no doubt is the obvious choice, but if the per gb cost of the 500 GB is a better buy than i would ask one to go for that if the main usage is storage as i think the 500 as well is a very good HDD. I would say any one who can spend today should spend that extra 1 - 1.2 k and get the larger HDD and not really opt of the 250 GB.
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