Review of the Samsung HM160HC, World's Fastest ATA/IDE Mobile hard drive

CBMVic20 · 08-03-2010, 06:23 AM

Great thread this, I've read through it all and wished I'd found it earlier having just recently bought a couple of 7200RPM Hitachi drives. I'm thinking I might upgrade again though to the Samsung.

Here are my results for the two 7200RPM drives I bought. These were both tested on a minty fresh installation of XP with SP3 slipstreamed on a Compaq NC4000, 1GB RAM and 2.1GHz Pentium Mobile CPU. Both disks were no more than 20% used and partioned into C and D with the C drive being 30GB in each case. HD Tune was left at the default settings although I might repeat them tonight on the "Accurate" setting.

Hitachi 7k100 (manufacture date May 07)

Hitachi e7k60 (manufacture date May 04)

The 7k100 has two platters so I'm guessing the single platter Samsung HM160HC with it's greater density is where the perfomance improvements are coming from rather than rotational speed and access time. I'm amazed that this one point would make such a difference given that hard disks are always sold on buffer size, RPM and access time.

However, it's encouraging that my 7k100 recorded similar times to K-Trons original test in the first post with different hardware. This would lead me to believe the Samsung would offer better performance.

The question of course, is whether it's worth upgrading the 7k100 to the HM160HC for the extra 10 MB/sec average transfer rate. Would the slower access time of the Samsung make a hit on performance reducing any gains from the single platter?

Samsung also sell the HM121HC which seems to be a 120GB version of the 160HC. Anyone have experience with this drive, is it also single platter and would it be as fast (or faster/slower) than its bigger brother?

And how important are burst rates and access times for everyday use? (browsing, email, occasional Word doc). Would partioning a disk impact performance? Finally, why set the block size to 8MB in HD Tune? What would be a typical block size to set for the above everyday use?

Thanks in advance and great thread!

Vic

ultrageez · 10-04-2010, 04:05 AM

Hi there, just discovered this thread and just joined the forum to reply to it.

Briefly am a complete computer amateur whose inner geek has just been revived.

My Vaio FS48C (C stands for China) bought in August 2006 was slowly dying on me:

Broken fan and overheating (random immediate shut down)...
60 GB HDD running out of system space extreeeemly slow (Toshiba 4200 rpm)...
No battery life whatsoever....
1 GB of ram not making any difference (had done 1 upgrade from the initial 512mb)...

It was a pretty poor situation. Add in a grubby keyboard and I was about to give up on this machine, admitedly mostly out of laziness.

Then all of a sudden my pocket book woke up and screamed in agony at the potential need to aquire a new machine. My wife had just had to give back her thinkpad to her employer, so we were possibly running out of computers at home! Disaster!

A few sweet words of encoureagement and I dealt with the wife: "go buy yourself a lenovo honey, it's be all yours!". Nicely done.

At that point you should know I pretty much used the machine for only a couple easy going browsing or such other online recreational purposes not requiring much power. Not a power user by any standard. My office machine took car of the more computer intensive tasks, but it annoyed me to be stuck in the office anytime some computing needed doing. Outlook 2007 would take eons to launch on my laptop... it was a no-go. Then came the prospect of a 3 weeks break away from the office (the longest I'd ever planned!), and the much less exciting prospect of catching up on 3 weeks of work once the break would be over (sickening).

It is in that spirit that I boldly marched in the office and demanded that my laptop not only be fixed but improved, so I may work with it. Of course I sweetened the deal with giving back my desktop to soon-to-join new colleagues.

Well, to cut a story short, I wish I'd done that and more years ago.

Basically, we sent the machine to our IT support company and asked what they could do for us. And here's where this story comes back to the original thread: they changed my HDD to a Samsung HM160HC.

They also repaired the broken fan, added another 1GB of ram and changed the battery. But after having read that thread, it seems the extra ram might just be background info.... because my machine feels impressively better than new!

Honestly, it never was as fast as it is now. Lightning speeds!!!

Well, everything is relative. Now that my wife has an Ideapad icore 5, I can see what windows 7 is capable of especially when it comes to file transfers... but whatever, you get my point:

It is fantastic to be able to breathe new life into a 4 year old machine. Absolutely fantastic. I really don't know about this hard drive, so all I can say is that am pleased to see that others praised it before me, coz am happy as a pig on E

Now I wonder what else I could do...

new cpu?
64GB ssd express card via pcmcia slot?

Bottom line is if you can extend your laptop life, and end up with a practical machine for your needs, then why should you give more money to big corporates? It's often said that a laptop's life expectancy is around 4 years. That's complete bollox. Marketing executives would like us to think that, and advances in technology do show a gap, but if you can find the best of the "old generation" hardware, like this Samsung drive sems to be in its class, then you can enjoy your machine for more years to come and save money and perhaps a little bit of the environment for added joy

Ahhh the wonders of geekyness

Cheers,
J.

ultrageez · 10-05-2010, 07:03 AM

I have a question further to my last post:

After more research, I figured out that my VAIO is based on the Centrino Sonoma platform and able to handle a SATA hdd.

So would it make much of a difference to eventually upgrade from the Samsung HM160C to a top SATA drive in the future? Or given the great performance of the SAMSUNG drive, would it be superfuous?

Also, would it make sense eventually to upgrade the CPU to a better version of Pentium M (currently mine stands at 1.7 GHz and I've seen it could go up to 2.2 Ghz) or would it overheat and kill battery life? If the mothrboard is designed for it afterall, as it seems to be (given the intel 915 chipset) it must be just a question of pricing vs performance, so worth it.

Finally, seeing as the motherboard handles PCI express, could I change the PCMCIA reader for an expresscard reader? it seems there is a format of expresscard as wide as PCMCIA...

Thanks if anyone sees this and feels like answering.

Rgds,
J

Dillio187 · 10-05-2010, 11:31 AM

even if the chipset can handle a SATA drive, the connector soldered onto the motherboard is that of an IDE drive, and not compatible.

Your cpu could be upgraded, but you won't gain any performance unless you notice your CPU usage is consistently high.

I doubt you can change out the PCMCIA slot for expresscard.

I would just enjoy the machine for what it is rather than dump a bunch of money into it, or look into upgrading in the future.

tilleroftheearth · 10-05-2010, 03:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ultrageez

I have a question further to my last post:

After more research, I figured out that my VAIO is based on the Centrino Sonoma platform and able to handle a SATA hdd.

So would it make much of a difference to eventually upgrade from the Samsung HM160C to a top SATA drive in the future? Or given the great performance of the SAMSUNG drive, would it be superfuous?

Also, would it make sense eventually to upgrade the CPU to a better version of Pentium M (currently mine stands at 1.7 GHz and I've seen it could go up to 2.2 Ghz) or would it overheat and kill battery life? If the mothrboard is designed for it afterall, as it seems to be (given the intel 915 chipset) it must be just a question of pricing vs performance, so worth it.

Finally, seeing as the motherboard handles PCI express, could I change the PCMCIA reader for an expresscard reader? it seems there is a format of expresscard as wide as PCMCIA...

Thanks if anyone sees this and feels like answering.

Rgds,
J

As great as the Samsung HM160HC is compared to other IDE HD's, it is by no means state of the art when compared to SATA offerings (like the Seagate XT Hybrid).

I think you'll find that the only three things worth upgrading on an older machine is the O/S, the RAM and the HD (in that order).

After that, the return on investment gets a little hazy compared to buying a new machine/platform.

Any same generation cpu upgrade I have seen performed was almost always eclipsed (and for a lot less money too) by the next generation platform offerings. It may seem like a no brainer to get 2.2/1.7=29% more performance with a few $$$, but if you stop and consider what the latest platform will get you (200% or more performance) for just a little more money, you may see it like I do: a cpu upgrade is just money down the drain.

As for trading up from a PCMCIA slot to an ExpressCard slot goes: I think that is wishful thinking. Not only does the chipset not support the connections/signalling for the newer tech, but the O/S (Win XP?) will probably not be able to use it fully - if at all.

O/S: as low as $30 for Win7 student and/or family pack editions.
RAM: as low as $60 for 2x2GB sticks (will ensure dual channel operation good for about 5-10% performance increase in the RAM subsystem).
HD: as low as $50 to see a significant performance increase over stock 4-5yr old HD - if you have SATA connectors then even $140 for the XT Hybrid 500GB is not out of the question - if increased performance is your goal.

So, if you have ~$140-$230 for upgrades, you will get great bang for you buck.

No current netbook (currently the cheapest computers you can buy new) could touch it for the cost and/or performance from such upgrades.

But, the best bang/buck upgrade is always going to a new platform - especially when your demands of your system keep increasing over time (as they usually do).

ultrageez · 10-07-2010, 09:01 PM

many thanks for both your replies.

I understand the point about the CPU. seeing as all I do is use ms office (outlook heavily: gigabytes of emails..., the rest, simple multitasking between word/xls and I.e) then a CPU upgrade would make no difference as am probably not using all the computing power available. The reason am guessing this is because the machine is very fast already. case closed (I checked this with Task Manager and it seems to be true)

on other potential upgrades:

the HDD seems to be maxed already. just the same, I understand the point made: there's 1 HDD in the machine and its a PATA. as such that means there's only a PATA connector on the motherboard, even if the system could have handled a SATA. another case closed. (Still I'm delighted to have that SAMSUNG Drive no doubt!!!)

the ddr2 ram is already maxed at 2G. Case closed too.

Point taken on expresscards and wishfull thinking. I was only daydreaming about fast backup solutions.

Seeing as all my work is on this machine now, and how laptops are a little more fragile, I want a daily system and files backup. The windows system backup function will only work with an internal drive, so I only get 1 choice, the Memory Stick. I think my Memory Stick reader will only handle up to 8GB (there's only one driver upgrade on the sony support site dating back to 2007... up from 4gb capacity to 8GB capacity. So seems am stuck with that), and right now I have about 10 gigs that need regular saving.

I am however compacting my Outlook pst files right now, and hoping for some good savings on space (it's taking forever!!!!). If daily back up on a Mem Stick works, that would be pretty elegant.

Anyway, all these closed cases somehow put me at ease. The inner geek can rest. All that could have been done has been done. Happy pig on E!

That leaves us with the O/S: I suspect the recent reinstall of xp through the new HDD installation may have helped speed things up a bit.

but installing w7? I asked our IT guys about it, and the answer was its not worth it. the machine is barely fast enough to run it, not modern enough to make the most of it. And it seems I might lose some hardware functions too, as it was designed for XP after all (chiefly all the Vaio keyboard and button utilities).

on that note, I will happily keep using the machine for as long as I can. why bother upgrading to a new one when everything works fine?? I think we should all just use what we need for as long as we can. No point creating rubbish for nothing...

only thing I can think of to extend its life a bit further is another bigger battery, although that would add weight to the machine, so not very convenient. That bright screen kills the standard battery (and a new one at that!) in 2:30 hrs... that or a docking station + extra charger for convenience in the office (for extra screen, USB keyboard, mouse, Internet cable, back up HDD). That would a nifty little tool.

So that's it and thanks for the help! To conclude: for an old PATA laptop, the SAMSUNG drive is really the best upgrade!
Cheers
J

ps/ none of these upgrades were paid out of my pocket, the company paid. clearly I would have thought more about buying a new machine if I had to... But still, even if the $ to performance ratio is better with a new machine, the nominal investment remains lower to repair/upgrade an old machine. For example, repairing the fan, changing the battery, adding the ram and the HDD came up to around 3000 RMB. The same day my wife bought a fantastic new Lenovo Ideapad (i.core 5) for 7000 RMB. If sufficient performance vs needs can be attained that way, then it's better to spend less and let your machine live longer... There's a certain ethic to thinking that way I beleive.

ultrageez · 10-08-2010, 03:47 AM

well... quick update on CPU usage. The compacting process in Outlook 2007 took a good 4 hrs. It finished with Outlook completely crashing. I think this might be due to the Xobni plug in, it's not very stable (but oh so useful). In the end Outlook went into recovery mode, managed to force itself to close, sent an error report to Microsoft and resarted without a problem. I checked, my emails are still there, they can be accessed and the PST file was compacted from 3.9 gig to 1.8. That's only 6 months of emails, so I have another 4 Gigs at least to compact in my PST archive file (Although I suspect my IT guys have done this already as it stands at 4 gigs for 3.5 years of emails...

Question within the question: I recently transfered the last half year of emails to the archives folder (it helps Outlook to run faster to have less items in the inbox). Question is, is there a transfer between PST files at that point by adding a folder in the archives within the Outlook program? If that's the case I guess the transfered files were a net increase of gigs to the archives PST with no need of compacting, while the main default PST file had kept those file sizes in its total space (like ghost space if you will)

Anyways anyways, the point is that when I eventually got back to the computer while waiting for the compacting process to finish, Outlook was completely frozen. I opened task manager and no surprise, CPU usage was locked at 100%. I wated for another few minutes until it came down to try and close the program.

I think am an Outlook power user... Hundreds of emails per week (about 100-200 a day), with rules filtering what concerns me and what doesnt. I still need to keep an eye on everything including past years of archived mails for references (am in sales, and it's good to know everything about someone!), and Xobni does a great job for that by indexing everything and providing super fast search results with cross-references (not only mails but files exchanged, links exchanged, ppl cc'ed, contact numbers, mailing addresses etc etc...).

So, maybe I could avoid this sort of mess in the future by improving my CPU per by 30% and going for the 2.3 Ghz?

Sounds logical.

Rgds,
J

Judicator · 10-08-2010, 05:25 AM

Even if Windows System backup only works with internal hard drives, many complete external hard drives come with their own backup or cloning files, and there are also many free and paid backup utilities available for download. Your notebook is listed as having 3 USB2.0 ports and a firewire port, so it still might be worth looking into an external hard drive for your backup needs.

ole258 · 10-09-2010, 01:47 PM

Hi together,

I am newbie here in forum and came from google to you

Hope my english is good enough to describe my "problem"...

My old hdd in my X31 is to slow and "loud", so I decide to buy a new one. So I found the HM160HC.

But I don't found only positive arguments about the hdd. A lot of users said, that their HM160HC died in the first 4-8 month. Other said, that the hdd clicks very loud and often in idle-mode...maybe it's the parking-noise of the head? But it should not click every 5 minutes (or even more!) and much loud!!!

(In front of I heard similar arguments about samsung hdds generally and so my thought of samsung hdds is not positive!)

What can you report about these facts?

Do you mean Samsung hdds are comparable to WD & Seagate, in technical visibility???

Thanks in advance for tips...

ole258

Passa · 10-23-2010, 10:16 PM

Yeah look.. the Samsung HM160HC is a crazy fast PATA drive, definitely. It breathed new life into my ThinkPad R50 (which may finally now be reaching end-of-life, at almost 8 years old, as it appears the USB ports no longer function after a spillage).

But I'm onto my second one right now. First one proclaimed it had an exorbitant number of bad sectors and files stopped working. I purchased a new one (since, hey, the field for new PATA drives isn't very broad these days), mirrored my data (or at least the data that wasn't corrupted) and moved on.

However, it appears some things never change:

Since taking that screenshot, it's now over 100 bad sectors.

Perhaps I'm just particularly unlucky, but given my ThinkPad has an accelerometer and parks the drive heads when it detects rapid movement and others are saying they've got issues with the drive failing.. perhaps you should steer clear.

Might grab that WD 250GB PATA drive instead now.