DiamondMax 10: What does 16 MB Cache and the New Native Command Queuing do? - Disk Bench 2.3 and Conclusion
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Disk Bench 2.3 is a program that creates a file on the hard disk. It measures the time taken to create the file in seconds and the transfer rate in megabytes per second. The beauty of this program is that you can set it up to write two 300mb files simultaneously; this should show off the performance of an NCQ hard disk due to its multi-tasking/threaded simulation.
The results show that the Maxtor drive wins in this test. The NCQ technology shows that it can best a high performance 10k rpm Raptor for this given task. As the Maxtor is spinning at only 7200rpm this is all down to just chipset optimization.
Disk Bench 2.3 results for WD Raptor vs Maxtor Diamond Max 10
Far Cry is a high demanding game. The game takes a substantial time to load on a home pc, so we thought we would see how much difference there is in the two drives. This is a raw HD power test and the Raptor was expected to come out on top.
The results were as expected. The Raptor's faster rotational speed pulls it ahead of the Maxtor; NCQ isn't making much impact on the results due to the games sequential loading nature.
Conclusion
There is no doubt that the Diamond Max10 is the fastest 7200rpm drive out to date. Even with NCQ disabled it is still quicker than any 7200rpm drive due to its 16MB cache. All the other leading manufacturers will follow suite soon enough. Seagate recently brought out a 160GB 8mb cache drive with AHCI support and upgraded firmware to best its predecessor even without NCQ enabled.
Pure performance wise the Raptor still wins hands down with its faster spindle speed and faster access times. If you don't have support for NCQ - or are willing to live with the limited sizes the Raptor comes in - stick with the Raptor. If, however, you do have support for NCQ, and need a hard disk larger than 74 GB there's no better choice than the Maxtor DiamondMax 10. It spins at a lower speed than the Raptor and makes less noise; it also generates less heat and doesn't need active cooling in most machines. What is a clincher is that, as the Maxtor costs not much more than the Raptor, it's cost per GB makes it better value by far - especially as its performance is similar to the Raptor in many tests, and better in some.
To get the full benefit of NCQ, two or more read/writes must be happening to hard disk. This is best achieved in a multi-tasking setup where two or more apps are competing for the drives usage. The performance potential of the Maxtor, when many applications are all being used, is very high.
NCQ is a big step in the right direction and, if the other manufacturers start bringing out NCQ enabled hard disks, AMD will no doubt have no choice but to add an equivalent of AHCI to their boards.
What we would like to see next is a hard disk with 10k rpm, 16MB cache, NCQ enabled and with a good amount of storage. No doubt it's under test even as we speak.
Some useful links:
hard disk basics and choosing hard disks
getting the most out of your hard disk
glossary of RAID and other storage terminologies
More storage articles at Devhead
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Article provided by Poweroid.
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