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Seagate Momentus ST94811A Notebook Hard Drive 

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PCQ Bureau
New Update

This is a 40 GB hard drive for notebooks, with 8 MB cache buffer and 5400 RPM spindle speed. We tested it on an IBM ThinkPad R-51, which had a P M and 256 MB RAM. To see how the higher spindle speed affects performance, we compared it s transfer rates against the default 40 GB, 4200 RPM Hitachi drive that shipped with the notebook. The Seagate drive came out better as far as the raw performance was concerned. It did better than the Hitachi drive in disk access time (15.8 ms against the 17.9 ms of the Hitachi drive). Seagate Momentus also gave better results for disk transfer rate. However, in the Business Disk and High-End Disk Winmarks, the Hitachi drive scored over Momentus. In the Business Disk Winmark benchmark, Hitachi won by a margin of 30%. And in the High-End Disk

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Winmark, Hitachi left Seagate behind by a margin of 7%. These benchmarks test the drive's performance in running business applications. In terms of raw throughputs, we got lower scores than what was mentioned in the drive's specifications. The drive claims a sustained internal transfer rate of 48.25 Mbps and an overall claimed transfer rate of 34.5 Mbps. But, we found that it started with a transfer rate of 34.5 Mbps and ended with 19.3 Mbps (see the graph). 

Bottom Line: Overall, it's a good choice if you're looking for upgrading your notebook's hard drive, especially considering the attractive price tag

Ankit Kawatra

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