Maxtor vs Seagate speeds

Just looking at the properties for the nVidia IDE controller and noticed
that there is a speed test available for hard drives.

I've got two 120gig PATA drives installed so I ran the test to see how they
performed.

Seagate ST3120026A:
Theoretical Limit: 100 mB/sec
Burst Speed: 84.7 mB/sec
Sustained Speed: 58.6 mB/sec

Maxtor:
Theoretical Limit: 133.3 mB/sec
Burst Speed: 106.4mB/sec
Sustained Speed: 46.4 mB/sec

So, with these numbers it looks like the Maxtor is faster for quick
operations but slower when dealing with large transfers.

Right now the Seagate drive has my OS and programs (most data is on a
network store) and I'm using the Maxtor to copy backups to. I'm thinking
that I'm better off with the Maxtor as my system drive and the Seagate as a
backup.

What do y'all think?

> Maxtor:
> Theoretical Limit: 133.3 mB/sec
> Burst Speed: 106.4mB/sec
> Sustained Speed: 46.4 mB/sec

Sorry... the Maxtor is a 4R120L0 drive.

Both drives are 120gig drives, but the Maxtor actually formats a couple gig
larger than the Seagate.

Also, when I ran my tests, both drives contain identical data - The Maxtor
holding a Ghosted image of the Seagate, which was ghosted from the Maxtor
previously.

Noozer wrote:

> Just looking at the properties for the nVidia IDE controller and noticed
> that there is a speed test available for hard drives.
>
> I've got two 120gig PATA drives installed so I ran the test to see how they
> performed.
>
> Seagate ST3120026A:
> Theoretical Limit: 100 mB/sec
> Burst Speed: 84.7 mB/sec
> Sustained Speed: 58.6 mB/sec
>
> Maxtor:
> Theoretical Limit: 133.3 mB/sec
> Burst Speed: 106.4mB/sec
> Sustained Speed: 46.4 mB/sec
>
> So, with these numbers it looks like the Maxtor is faster for quick
> operations but slower when dealing with large transfers.
>
> Right now the Seagate drive has my OS and programs (most data is on a
> network store) and I'm using the Maxtor to copy backups to. I'm thinking
> that I'm better off with the Maxtor as my system drive and the Seagate as a
> backup.
>
> What do y'all think?
>

Here's the address to do your research:

http://www23.tomshardware.com/storage.html

Noozer wrote:
> Just looking at the properties for the nVidia IDE controller and noticed
> that there is a speed test available for hard drives.
>
> I've got two 120gig PATA drives installed so I ran the test to see how they
> performed.
>
> Seagate ST3120026A:
> Theoretical Limit: 100 mB/sec
> Burst Speed: 84.7 mB/sec
> Sustained Speed: 58.6 mB/sec
>
> Maxtor:
> Theoretical Limit: 133.3 mB/sec
> Burst Speed: 106.4mB/sec
> Sustained Speed: 46.4 mB/sec
>
> So, with these numbers it looks like the Maxtor is faster for quick
> operations but slower when dealing with large transfers.
>
> Right now the Seagate drive has my OS and programs (most data is on a
> network store) and I'm using the Maxtor to copy backups to. I'm thinking
> that I'm better off with the Maxtor as my system drive and the Seagate as a
> backup.
>
> What do y'all think?
>
>

That depends on what you would be doing with that system disk.

One parameter not being measured here, is seek time. Which could
be important if the disk is doing random seeks for small bits of
data.

If an executable is stored on the system disk, then the load time
might favor the Seagate. So it might actually depend on what
aspects of normal operation, are using that disk. Different people
set things up differently.

And Tomshardware stopped being a place to get serious information,
after they immersed a PC in cooking oil (just for the advertising
revenue of course, not for any real good reason). And their attempts
to flood the search engine I use (spam farm style), were not
appreciated either.

Paul

I know you've followed at least some of my Maxtor/Seagate shenannigans. That
correspondence also included a completely fruitless discussion with them on
exactly the issue you raise. After asking for the Sustained Transfer Rate
for a particular Maxtor drive four times I got the response "We do not have
the official data about the sustained transfer rate of STM drive. The
sustained transfer rate can be tested by using the benchmark software."


Great - by the drive - then find out it is no good!

So I purchased the drive and did tests. With my true Maxtor ATA133, 120G
drives I got a sustained rate of 48Mbyte/sec - very similar to your result.
Then I tried the same thing on my new Maxgate (or is it Seator?) drive and
got about 70Mbyte/sec. (Making it look - in terms of your full results -
more like a Seagate ATA100)

The relevance of this to your query is: Yes, you are right to use the drives
as you propose, BUT, what works today may not work tomorrow if my experience
of just what Seagate ships - or at least what they think they ship - these
days is anything to go by.

Caveat Emptor!


"Noozer" <dont.spam@me.here> wrote in message
news:2QOzh.942220$5R2.757896@pd7urf3no...
> Just looking at the properties for the nVidia IDE controller and noticed
> that there is a speed test available for hard drives.
>
> I've got two 120gig PATA drives installed so I ran the test to see how
they
> performed.
>
> Seagate ST3120026A:
> Theoretical Limit: 100 mB/sec
> Burst Speed: 84.7 mB/sec
> Sustained Speed: 58.6 mB/sec
>
> Maxtor:
> Theoretical Limit: 133.3 mB/sec
> Burst Speed: 106.4mB/sec
> Sustained Speed: 46.4 mB/sec
>
> So, with these numbers it looks like the Maxtor is faster for quick
> operations but slower when dealing with large transfers.
>
> Right now the Seagate drive has my OS and programs (most data is on a
> network store) and I'm using the Maxtor to copy backups to. I'm thinking
> that I'm better off with the Maxtor as my system drive and the Seagate as
a
> backup.
>
> What do y'all think?
>
>

On Mon, 12 Feb 2007 00:49:02 GMT, "Noozer"
<dont.spam@me.here> wrote:

>Just looking at the properties for the nVidia IDE controller and noticed
>that there is a speed test available for hard drives.
>
>I've got two 120gig PATA drives installed so I ran the test to see how they
>performed.
>
>Seagate ST3120026A:
> Theoretical Limit: 100 mB/sec
> Burst Speed: 84.7 mB/sec
> Sustained Speed: 58.6 mB/sec
>
>Maxtor:
> Theoretical Limit: 133.3 mB/sec
> Burst Speed: 106.4mB/sec
> Sustained Speed: 46.4 mB/sec
>
>So, with these numbers it looks like the Maxtor is faster for quick
>operations but slower when dealing with large transfers.
>
>Right now the Seagate drive has my OS and programs (most data is on a
>network store) and I'm using the Maxtor to copy backups to. I'm thinking
>that I'm better off with the Maxtor as my system drive and the Seagate as a
>backup.
>
>What do y'all think?
>

The test is not thorough enough to draw a conclusion, at
least use something like Sisoft Sandra's filesystem
benchmark to compare them.