Testing (continued):
SiSoft Sandra 2005 (File System Benchmark) - The results shown below are taken from SiSoft Sandra 2005's File System Benchmark. This benchmark provides several results, and a handful were selected to represent the performance of each drive. Lower values are desirable for the average access time, while higher values are better for buffered read, buffered write, and burst speed.
The results from SiSoft Sandra parallel those from HD Tach and show that the 7200.10 performs quite impressively. It provides the highest values I have ever seen, and beats the 7200.9 by about 23% on Drive Index, 10% on Buffered Write, and 3% on Buffered Read.
Real World Data Transfers - The results shown before show the transfer rates achieved by pushing one large file to and from the drives under test. The RAID 0 array was used as the source/destination for all transfers, so you do not see it listed separately, as with the previous tests. The single file used was a 2.05 GB ISO file of the CentOS 4.3 installation DVD.
As you can see, the trend continues, and the 7200.10 bested the 7200.9 by 3% while reading and by about 10% while writing. Not as dominant as in the synthetic benchmarks, but more speed is always welcome! This giant doesn't fit the stereotype of a lumbering oaf, as it is as quick as it is large.
Thermal Testing - Thermal testing consisted of monitoring the idle and load temperatures of the hard drives' outer surface using a Cooler Master Aerogate 3 bay device. The drives were just placed in still, open air (no case / no fans). The idle condition consisted of the system just sitting at the Windows desktop with no extra applications running for a period of at least one hour. The load condition was created by running HD Tach in a looping pattern while also transfering files to and from the drive for a one hour period.
As you can see there wasn't much to set any drive apart thermally. The rather cool ambient temperature may have helped that, but no drive displayed any characteristics of running too hot.
