New USB 3.0 Laptop and Storage—Tested!

[dconnors]

USB 3.0 is here. We see how fast it really is with a new Asus laptop and two external drives from Seagate and Western Digital? Interested? Win all 3!

New USB 3.0 Laptop and Storage—Tested! : Read more

 

[jrocks84]

I'd have to say that the laptop has really good value. I'd love if I could win the contest, but it's too bad it's only eligible for people in the US.

 

[bmgoodman]

Go the extra mile and compare these to eSATA solutions, please! Will USB 3 be an improvement over eSATA?

 

[Guest]

Not too impressive. Considering USB 3.0 is supposed to be x10 compared with USB 2.0, why is it only achieving x2 throughput?

It is definitely not the drive as a bottleneck- I have 2 bog-standard 1 TB Hitachi drives- one as internal sata and 1 as esata (they both have the same contents) when tested by ATTO benchmark the write/read speeds for the eSATA is 100/104 MB/s and the iSATA gives 80/100 MB/S. Im not sure why the isata write speed is slower than the esata, but both greatly exceed the USB3.0 speeds reported here.
BTW: when the disk is connected by USB2.0 it gives speeds of around 25-28 MB/s and the two disks tested by HDTach max at around 110 MB/s with bursts of around 160MB/s

 

[jenesuispasbavard]

[citation][nom]bmgoodman[/nom]Go the extra mile and compare these to eSATA solutions, please! Will USB 3 be an improvement over eSATA?[/citation]
I was wondering the same thing. I use my external hard drive over eSATA and it is not even close to the maximum eSATA throughput of 3.0 Gbps. I don't think this will be a big improvement (or any at all), unless you use SSDs that don't even exist yet.

 

[cadder]

The drive inside of the enclosure is probably running SATA, with an adapter to convert to USB, so the USB 3 probably can't be any faster than SATA.

 

[godwhomismike]

I want that laptop in the worst way. It's $999 on Amazon too.

 

[warezme]

I guess the 5730 is not really all that fast?

It only gets 5,900 something on 3DMark06. My Alienware m15x with 9800GT hits 9800 on 3dMark06 and with a slight OC over 10,000.

 

[wayneepalmer]

Can't wait until SATA 6 drives (especially SSD) get down to where my wife stops threatening to empty the knife drawer at me for mentioning the word "hardware".

 

[Guest]

Wierd, i own this laptop and get ~8000ish in 3dmark 06 as do the other people on newegg and in the asus forums. Also most of us recieved 1333 ram with the laptop instead of 1066.

 

[shiroikaze]

The qualifying questions has some funny answers, I was really tempted to answer all wrong 😛.

 

[bobwya]

Since 500 GB is the largest size available inside notebooks today (without using two drives in RAID, of course), the PS 110 is the perfect candidate for an automatic backup drive paired to a laptop.

 

[bobwya]

Since 500 GB is the largest size available inside notebooks today (without using two drives in RAID, of course), the PS 110 is the perfect candidate for an automatic backup drive paired to a laptop.

Funny that because I put a WD 750Gb 2.5" drive in my sister's laptop last year. OK so it's 12mm high - but it's still a 2.5" form factor. I didn't have any problems installing it (no need for a hacksaw). The WD Velociraptor I have at 15mm high might be pushing things a bit!! Sorry for being so pedantic...

 

[dconnors]

[citation][nom]bobwya[/nom]Funny that because I put a WD 750Gb 2.5" drive in my sister's laptop last year. OK so it's 12mm high - but it's still a 2.5" form factor. I didn't have any problems installing it (no need for a hacksaw). The WD Velociraptor I have at 15mm high might be pushing things a bit!! Sorry for being so pedantic...[/citation]


::crowd groans::

Let's be serious, you know what I mean when I am talking about a 2.5-inch drive in an external - I am talking about a notebook hard drive. However, I am actually wrong...I forgot that Samsung and WD have 640 GB notebook drives out now.

 

[FilthPig2004]

[citation][nom]dconnors[/nom]::crowd groans::Let's be serious, you know what I mean when I am talking about a 2.5-inch drive in an external - I am talking about a notebook hard drive. However, I am actually wrong...I forgot that Samsung and WD have 640 GB notebook drives out now.[/citation]

Actually, you can buy WD's WD10TPVT (1TB) notebook drive right now on Amazon.

 

[FilthPig2004]

[citation][nom]Anonymous[/nom]Not too impressive. Considering USB 3.0 is supposed to be x10 compared with USB 2.0, why is it only achieving x2 throughput? It is definitely not the drive as a bottleneck-...[/citation]

It is. I'll guess that the BlackArmor is using a Momentus 7200.2. Here are the specs.

http://www.techarp.com/showarticle.aspx?artno=412

 

[Guest]

For the price of that laptop , I would rather buy a M1 Garand or a shotgun or alot of lapdances and beer at the strip club!!!