A+ Certification - Re: Hard drive performance question

12-10-2005, 01:55 AM

"Barry Watzman" <> wrote in message
news:SWlmf.157566$ ...
>I have two laptops, a Toshiba 2805-S503 (900MHz P3) and an upgraded
>1415-S173 (2GHz Celeron(P4-based)).
>
> The 2805 has 30gig Hitachi DK23DA-30 hard drive, the 1415 has a 40gig
> Toshiba MK4018GAP. Both drives have substantially identical performance
> specs (4200rpm, 2MB cache, same seek speed, same data transfer rate). Both
> computers are running Windows XP, and both computers report UDMA mode 5 in
> use (ATA-100) for their respective disk drives.
>
> Never one to leave well enough alone (stupid, I know), I ran Passmark
> Performance Test 4.0 (came with Norton Systemworks 2003) on the drives in
> both systems.
>
> The 2805 scored a "90". The 1415 scored a "30".
>
> Does anyone have an explanation for this reported 3:1 performance
> difference? Part of me wants to swap the drives and see if the results
> are consistent, also I want the higher performance drive in the 1415, but
> both drives have multi-operating system, multi-partition configurations
> installed and moving the drives would be a LOT of work.
>
> [I guess the real mistake was running the test, instead of simply being
> blissfully if ignorantly unaware of any differences. Now this is driving
> me nuts.]

Barry, for a guy who knows a lot about computers, you have strange habit of
leaving out the most relevant details when you post a question. In this
case, that detail is: do _you_ __perceive__ any difference in the
performance of the two machines when doing something that involves lots of
transfer to/from the drives?

If you don't, there is none.

All the inexpensive/free diag and benchmark programs I use (norton, sandra
pro, fresh diagnose, aida, bmc diag, ____always____ get some things wrong.

If you _do_ perceive a difference, run msft's perfmon, or as they now call
it system monitor, and see if you can find the bottleneck. It could be
anywhere. E.g, John O's wild guess may be right on the money. Or the
norton prog may simply be misreading lots of things about one of the
computers.

Mike

MF

Thread Tools	Search this Thread
Show Printable Version Email this Page	Search this Thread: Advanced Search

Similar Threads
Thread	Thread Starter	Forum	Replies	Last Post
Another hard drive question...	Dave Hardenbrook	A+ Certification	1	11-06-2007 11:27 PM
Re: Hard drive performance question	John O	A+ Certification	0	12-09-2005 09:31 PM
Re: fat32 converter for windows me	Bum	A+ Certification	0	03-04-2005 11:13 PM
Re: Problem replacing drive	MF	A+ Certification	0	10-15-2004 04:59 PM
hard drive question	-D-	A+ Certification	3	12-10-2003 03:58 AM

12-10-2005, 01:55 AM	#1
	Re: Hard drive performance question "Barry Watzman" <> wrote in message news:SWlmf.157566$ ... >I have two laptops, a Toshiba 2805-S503 (900MHz P3) and an upgraded >1415-S173 (2GHz Celeron(P4-based)). > > The 2805 has 30gig Hitachi DK23DA-30 hard drive, the 1415 has a 40gig > Toshiba MK4018GAP. Both drives have substantially identical performance > specs (4200rpm, 2MB cache, same seek speed, same data transfer rate). Both > computers are running Windows XP, and both computers report UDMA mode 5 in > use (ATA-100) for their respective disk drives. > > Never one to leave well enough alone (stupid, I know), I ran Passmark > Performance Test 4.0 (came with Norton Systemworks 2003) on the drives in > both systems. > > The 2805 scored a "90". The 1415 scored a "30". > > Does anyone have an explanation for this reported 3:1 performance > difference? Part of me wants to swap the drives and see if the results > are consistent, also I want the higher performance drive in the 1415, but > both drives have multi-operating system, multi-partition configurations > installed and moving the drives would be a LOT of work. > > [I guess the real mistake was running the test, instead of simply being > blissfully if ignorantly unaware of any differences. Now this is driving > me nuts.] Barry, for a guy who knows a lot about computers, you have strange habit of leaving out the most relevant details when you post a question. In this case, that detail is: do _you_ __perceive__ any difference in the performance of the two machines when doing something that involves lots of transfer to/from the drives? If you don't, there is none. All the inexpensive/free diag and benchmark programs I use (norton, sandra pro, fresh diagnose, aida, bmc diag, ____always____ get some things wrong. If you _do_ perceive a difference, run msft's perfmon, or as they now call it system monitor, and see if you can find the bottleneck. It could be anywhere. E.g, John O's wild guess may be right on the money. Or the norton prog may simply be misreading lots of things about one of the computers. Mike MF