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Introduction If
you'd asked me back in 1995 where I thought fixed storage technology would be
three years into the new millennium I'd have probably launched into a full-on
rant about how holographic storage would be standard and magnetic drives a rapidly
fading memory, this despite me still getting over the excitement of fitting my
first 1GB unit. Nostradamus I ain't because as we now know I'd have been completely
wrong, hard drives have barely changed at all other than being faster, hotter,
larger and generally less reliable. Serial-ATA
is the technology on everyone's lips at the moment and it's the first radical
change in the way the hard drive operates from a user's perspective though even
here we're being wooed by promises of ever faster bus speeds far beyond the requirements
of even the fastest IDE drives on the market. Western
Digital have worked steadily at increasing their profile among the mainstream
desktop users with innovations like their 8MB "Special Edition" cache
sizes which made it all the more surprising to me that their first ferret into
the realms of Serial ATA was a drive aimed unashamedly at the enterprise market.
The Raptor is a single platter, 37GB drive with a SCSI-class 10,000RPM spindle
speed and a build quality that comes backed by a full 5 year warranty. You can't
fault the vital statistics, but is it all spin? Let's
do the specs:
| Physical
Specifications | | Capacity | 36.7
GB | | Areal
Density | 36.7
GB | | Model
Number | WD360GD |
| Formatted
Capacity 1 | 37,019
MB | | User
Sectors Per Drive | 72,303,840
(44F44E0h) | | Interface | Max
1.5 Gb PHY
serial Interface | | Bytes
Per Sector | 512 |
| Dedicated
Landing Zone | Yes |
| Actuator
Latch/Auto Park | Yes |
| Performance
Specifications | Data
Transfer Rate
- Buffer to Host
- Buffer to Disk |
150 MB/s max 2
102 MB/s max |
| Average Read Seek | 5.2
ms (average) | | Track-to-track
Seek 3 | 0.7
ms (average) | | Full
Stroke Read Seek 3 | 10.2
ms (average) | | Average
Latency | 2.99
ms | | Rotational
Speed | 10,000
RPM | | Read
Cache | Adaptive |
| Write
Cache | Yes |
| Buffer | 8
MB | | Drive
Ready Time | 7.0
sec average | | Start/Stop
Cycles | 20,000
min | Error
Rate
(non-recoverable) | <
1 in 1015 bits read |
| Physical
Dimensions | | Height | 1.028
in. (25.4 mm) max | | Length | 5.787
in. (147.0 mm) max | | Width | 4.0
in. (101.6 mm) ± .01 in. | | Weight | 1.60
lb. (0.73 kg) ± 10% |
| Power
Requirements 4 | | Mode | 12
V (± 10%) | 5
V (± 5%) | Power |
| Read
/ Write | 430
mA | 925
mA | 9.75
W | | Idle | 350
mA 5 | 850
mA | 9.25
W | | Standby | 25.5
mA | 350
mA | 2.1
W | | Sleep | 25.75
mA | 200
mA | 1.3
W | | 3.3
V Serial ATA power not used in this product. |
| Environmental
Specifications 6 | | Shock |
| Operating | 20
G (write), 65 G (read) | | Non-operating | 250
G | | Half
sine wave measured in 2 ms duration, measured without isolation. |
| Vibration |
| Operating
- Random | 0.008
g2/Hz (10 to 300 Hz) | | | 0.0012
g2/Hz (300 to 500 Hz) | |
- Linear | 10-300
Hz, 3.0G (0 to peak) | | | 300-500
Hz, 0.5G (0 to peak) | |
- Rotary | 30
rad/s2 (10 to 500 Hz) | | Non-operating
- Random | 0.05
g2 /Hz (10 to 300 Hz) | |
- Linear | 10-300
Hz, 5.0G (0 to peak) | | Operating
Temperature and Humidity | | Temperature | 5°C
to 55°C | | Humidity | 5-95%
RH non-condensing | | Thermal
Gradient | 20°C/hour
(maximum) | | Non-Operating
Temperature and Humidity | | Temperature | -40°C
to 65°C | | Humidity | 5-95%
RH non-condensing | | Thermal
Gradient | 30°C/hour |
| Acoustics
(average) | | Idle
Mode | 32
dBA average | | Seek
Mode | 36
dBA | | Reliability |
| MTBF
7 | 1,200,000
hours | | Warranty | 5
years |
1Western
Digital defines a megabyte (MB) as 1,000,000 bytes, and a gigabyte (GB) as 1,000,000,000
bytes.
2Maximum burst rate running the specified PIO, DMA, Ultra
ATA, or Serial ATA transfer mode.
3On reads and writes.
4After
24 power on hours.
5Average current.
6No non-recoverable
errors during operating tests or after non-operating tests.
7100%
duty cycle at 50° C on base casting. Other
than the warranty and MTBF and of course the speed and access related parameters
most of the quoted specs are very similar to those of the 7,200RPM Caviar Special
Edition drives. The big talking point is almost certainly that WD have chosen
such a low areal density. With just 36.7GB of available storage on its single
platter you have to wonder how much of the benefit from the faster spindle motor
will be wiped out by having the data so sparsely packed. Let's have a look at
what we're testing. | |
