A Tale Of Two Thunderbolt Storage Devices: Seagate's GoFlex Desk and Western Digital's Thunderbolt Duo
by Brian Dipert on May 13, 2012 7:52 PM EST- Posted in
- Thunderbolt
- Seagate
- WD
- Western Digital
Now that I know the WD Thunderbolt Duo is software RAID-based, I'm curious to fire it up with Windows 7, running natively on the Mac mini via Boot Camp. I should be able to RAID-configure it using Windows' Computer Management utility (specifically via the Disk Management section of the program).
Speaking of the GoFlex Desk, I'm also curious to tether multiple Seagate drives together via Thunderbolt, RAID them together using the O/S-supplied software, and see how their effective performance compares against that of the more integrated Thunderbolt Duo alternative. Amazon currently lists the 4 TByte Thunderbolt Duo at $550. Both Newegg and Staples, on the other hand, recently had the 2 TByte GoFlex Desk, complete with USB 3 dock, for $110.
At $190 for each Thunderbolt Adapter, a two-drive plus two-adapter Seagate combo currently isn't cost-effective compared to the Thunderbolt Duo, especially considering that the Seagate setup requires a second Thunderbolt cable at $49 from Apple. Should Thunderbolt Adapter prices notably drop, however, or should Seagate begin selling a drive-plus-Thunderbolt Adapter kit, the dual-Seagate drive solution would be more compelling from a pricing standpoint, and its faster-RPM HDD heart might deliver higher performance than the WD alternative to boot.
And of course there's also USB 3. My Mac mini doesn't support it, and there's no place for me to drop a USB 3 expansion module into this particular system. My Mac Pro, on the other hand, has plenty of spare PCI Express expansion slots, but no Thunderbolt capabilities. So in order to test one versus the other on the same platform, I'm clearly going to need some new system hardware. Fortunately, my birthday was a few days ago...and I'm not opposed to buying myself a present, even after-the-fact...
As mentioned on the previous page, I've assembled a ZIP'd archive of directories containing both graph screenshots and text reports of all the AJA System Test iterations I ran, which you can download here. Comments are as always welcomed.
It's liberating to work with an external HDD that isn't performance-hampered versus its internal bus-tethered counterpart. That's what a high-speed interface such as Thunderbolt delivers. And unlike with eSATA, you can use that same port to connect up a high-resolution display, too. Windows-preferring folks who want to tap into Thunderbolt's potential are currently hardware-hampered; pretty your only option (aside from a few Ultrabooks) is to buy a Mac and a copy of Windows, and install the latter using Boot Camp.
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Death666Angel - Wednesday, May 16, 2012 - link
This sentence is a bit misleading:"a specific RPM at any particular time is dependent on both access requirements and sensed operating temperature." - This would suggest that this HDD runs with varying RPMs. This is not true. One HDD runs with one RPM. However, between the various HDDs among one charge there can be different RPM settings. So one Caviar Green "IntelliPower" runs with 5400 while the next runs with 5900. You will not see one 5400 unit suddenly run at 5900 because the temperatures are particularly low.
bdipert - Saturday, May 19, 2012 - link
Dear Death666Angel, I don't think you're correct. WD has told me on many occasions that the IntelliPower algorithm varies a drive's rotational speed over time as a function of performance demand and operating temperature. And past AnandTech writeups make similar statements:http://www.anandtech.com/show/2385/2
for example
wolfgang123usa - Thursday, July 12, 2012 - link
The real advantage of Thunderbolt should be that it carries power, but special this feature is very limited, as the power pin on the connector is very small and shall carry 10Watts, Sata connectors, USB and other have bigger contact surfaces and/or multiple pins to carry power. The display port adapter was designed for a lot less power then 10watts, that's the current issue with Thunderbolt today. Some details can be found here:http://technology.coolodman.com
When a self powered thunderbolt device is used it works fine and uses only about 22% overhead to encapsulate the PCIe bus, so the speed with fast SSD's like Samsung 830 series is really not bad.
marmot_animal - Friday, July 13, 2012 - link
Two months after this article was written, I find Thunderbolt options at the same phase, quite limited. So I bought the Seagate GoFlex Thunderbolt adapter for $$$ from B&H, plus the cable. Although expensive, it seems for the time being the least expensive approach, albeit a DIY approach, to use raw hard drives, of which I have an expanding collection for my video and audio projects.If my research is correct, there are no official generic Tbolt docks, unlike the common USB3 (and earlier interfaces) docks on Tiger Direct. Although LaCie 2big bays appear to physically allow users to swap raw hard drives, LaCie voids the warranty in doing so. Obviously LaCie discourages a DIY approach and of course favors consumers to procure LaCie's aftermarket harddrive-installed bays. This is less of a diehard obstacle as opposed to WD's Caviar requirement. Conversely, I'm not into opening up enclosures to swap drives. It requires tools, is time-consuming, and is semi-permanent. My preference is to swap raw drives on-the-fly.
At least the GoFlex DIY hacker method works, and I secure the drive on the dock via rubber band technology. I report 'so far so good' with raw drives. I don't know precise speed details as long as I'm able to put the Tbolt bus to use, and it appears faster than any other bus I've used with FCPX. Too many companies try to hijack Tbolt by instilling proprietary constraints. Nevertheless, I find the GoFlex design with its generic SATA interface to be an extremely niche approach because most consumers won't want to seat a raw hard drive somewhat precariously in a dock not designed for such use.
spanading - Saturday, October 6, 2012 - link
Honestly peps,Why are people compairing the two. Yes USB is great if you are conneting things like HHD, Mice, Tablets, and the like, but remember you only have 5Gb in a single channel, one way maximum to play with, while thunderbolt has 20Gb when using both channels. True neither USB 3 nor Thunderbolt would be maxed out by a single HDD, but when connecting several data hungry devices at once, (which with thunderbolt can include monitors, and possible legacy port hubs, if they ever arrive) then USB will show the strain a lot quicker than thunderbolt.
Hence why you need a thunderbolt port? Well if all you are doing is plugging in one HHD over it it is probably overkill, BUT, if you like to have one of those new shiny Ultra books to use on the run but then want a fully fledged PC when you get home, Thunderbolt gives you this potential, but only having to connect 1 cable, rather than 3 or 4. Plus with it being compatible with PCi then you can have expansion cards to further enhance performance with out the need for a completely separate PC. Now before you complain ultra books have low spec CPUs, go and play with one that uses a SSD and see how much speed a traditional HDD sucks up while the system waits for data. As an example, my 2011 Mac book air has a 1.7 GHz dual core i5 with integrated graphic and only 4GB of memory, and on day to day tasks, is faster than my 2011 mac min server with a 2.0Ghz Quad core i7 with the same integrated graphics but 16 GB of RAM. In fact my macbook only struggles when the RAM is all used up, which is not very often .
I guess this is exactly what Dan Neely meant. Good on you Dan, I guess the USB people have not quite grasped the fundamental difference yet.
biswa60 - Saturday, October 19, 2019 - link
Each Thunderbolt port handles 40 Gbps of aggregate bandwidth, consisting of two pairs' worth of distinct 10 Gbps transmit and receive laneshttps://theprintcalendar.com/
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