Seagate's Momentus XT Reviewed, Finally a Good Hybrid HDD
by Anand Lal Shimpi on May 24, 2010 9:31 AM EST- Posted in
- Storage
- SSDs
- Seagate
- Momentus XT
- Hybrid Drive
- SSHDs
SYSMark 2007
Traditionally we use SYSMark in our CPU reviews but I've been slowly accumulating data for use in Bench and decided to debut some of it here today. SYSMark can be very CPU bound and thus we don't see huge differences between storage devices, but any difference here is significant. SYSMark tends to measure response time more than throughput, making it a relatively good indicator of the feel of a drive like the Momentus XT.
Overall performance is much better than the 5400.6 and nipping at the heels of the VelociRaptor. In the tests below you'll see the Momentus XT trade blows with the VelociRaptor. In some cases it's faster, and in others it's a bit slower.
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numberoneoppa - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
As much as I miss my girlfriend who's been on the other side of the world for two weeks... I've missed you more, Anand.Welcome back.
SandmanWN - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
That's just weird...Anand Lal Shimpi - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
HAHA that's awesome. well, not for your girlfriend.Take care,
Anand
weakerthans4 - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
There are some itches a girlfriend just can't scratch... Welcome back Anand!!!!quiksilvr - Wednesday, May 26, 2010 - link
Please stop saying things.falc0ne - Tuesday, July 6, 2010 - link
aaa..lol? :))DoktorSleepless - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
Why wasn't a regular 7200 rpm drive used as another reference point? That would have been nice to have as well.Anand Lal Shimpi - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
I mentioned this on the test page, I simply didn't have a modern 7200RPM 2.5" drive on hand (only older 7200RPM 2.5" drives which were slower than the 5400.6) while I was conducting these tests. As I put together the data for our HDD bench I will add them in though :)Between the 5400.6 and the WDVR you should be able to get a good idea of where this thing falls though.
Take care,
Anand
LoneWolf15 - Monday, May 24, 2010 - link
Yeah, the one thing though is that having, say, a normal Momentus 7200 would allow us to tell if the NAND is really offering us a benefit over a drive without it, and if so, what percentage performance increase can be attributed to it.I understand you didn't have the drive at this time, but if you could update this article in the future, it would be much appreciated.
pcfxer - Tuesday, May 25, 2010 - link
The issue with that line of thinking is that this drive is not just HDD+SSD, the algorithms that the drive uses to read and write data is on a vastly different ball field. This drive is an HDD with SSD capabilities and sometimes benefits.Until everyone understands that, they (consumers) will expect SSD performance at least some of the time, which is a result of poor understanding. Of course, after all the technical articles on SSDs and as a result HDDs, I'm amazed that people would ever expect any SSD performance from a HDD with flash. The flash is just like nitrous in a car; a 100 shot doesn't offer 100hp, but maybe 60hp instead. A good poke, but not the real thing.