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October 3, 2010 by Lawrence Lee
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Product
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Samsung EcoGreen F4 HD204UI
2TB 3.5" HDD
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Seagate Barracuda XT ST32000651AS
2TB 3.5" HDD |
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Sample Supplier
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Seagate |
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Street Price
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US$100~$110 |
US$200 |
The F4 is the newest edition to Samsung's environmentally-friendly EcoGreen
desktop hard drive line. Like Western Digital's popular Caviar Green series,
the EcoGreens employ a rotational speed of only 5400 RPM and large platters
to cut down on cost, noise, vibration, and power consumption. The 2TB F4 has
three massive 667GB disks inside which we hope will give it an acoustic advantage
over its four-platter predecessor. The EcoGreen
F3 was a big disappointment in this regard, with noise levels much higher
than expected.
The Seagate Barracuda XT on the other hand places an emphasis on performance.
An improvement in acoustics and energy efficiency would be welcome over the
previous generation, but these aren't its main selling points. On paper, the
XT seems suspiciously similar to its ancestor, the Barracuda 7200.12. Both have
500GB platters and the exact same specified average seek time and latency. We
suspect nothing has really changed except for the cache doubling from 32MB to
64MB and the incorporation of the new SATA 6Gbps interface. The latter makes
for great marketing but keep in mind that many mechanical drives cannot even
saturate the 1.5Gbps bus of first generation SATA controllers — for a HDD,
this is window dressing more than anything.
There is also a huge price disparity between the two drives. The 2TB EcoGreen
F4 retails for about the same as the 2TB
Caviar Green, as low as US$100, the best capacity-to-price ratio on
the market. The 2TB Barracuda XT is twice as expensive at US$200, $30 more than
WD's fastest consumer 2TB model, the Caviar Black. For that kind of money, it
better deliver a very high level of performance indeed.
EcoGreen F4 on the left, Barracuda XT on the right. Both appear almost
identical to their respective predecessors.
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Specifications:
Samsung EcoGreen F4 2TB vs. Seagate Barracuda XT 2TB
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| Model Number |
HD204UI |
ST32000651AS |
| Capacity |
2 TB |
2TB |
| Cache |
32 MB |
64MB |
| Interface |
Serial ATA 3.0Gbps |
Serial ATA 6.0Gbps |
| Rotational speed |
5400 RPM |
7200 RPM |
| Heads / Disks |
6 / 3 |
8 / 4 |
| Average seek time |
8.9 ms |
8.5 ms read, 9.5 ms write |
| Average latency |
5.52 ms |
4.16 ms |
| Weight |
650 grams |
700 grams |
| Power: Idle / Seek |
5.1 / 5.7 W |
6.39 / 7.3 W |
| Acoustics: Idle / Seek |
2.5~2.6 / 2.8~2.9 bels |
2.8 / 3.2 bels |
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