Samsung SpinPoint F1 (750GB) review

£64
Price when reviewed

Whereas the 500GB and 640GB SpinPoint disks make do with comparatively small cache sizes, the larger SpinPoint drives have a full 32MB as well as a muscular set of features.

Samsung SpinPoint F1 (750GB) review

The result is a huge performance boost. Its average read speed of 98.6MB/sec was only beaten by two other drives on test, and the SpinPoint’s 89.1MB/sec write speed was the best result this month.

A write access time of a mere 1ms is the quickest we’ve seen this month – only matched by the 500GB Samsung EcoGreen – while the average sequential read speed of 104MB/sec is among the top results.

The only black mark against the 750GB Samsung is its power draw, which idles at 9W and makes it one of the hungrier drives in the Labs. It’s double the power drawn of some of the Caviar Green drives.

The £56 asking price is a little more expensive than other 750GB models too, but it’s worth paying extra for superior performance. A deserving Labs winner, once again, from Samsung.

Specifications

Capacity 750GB
Hard disk usable capacity 698GB
Hard disk type Mechanical
Cache size 32MB
Spindle speed 7,200RPM
Seek time (ms) 13ms
Cost per gigabyte 7.4p

Noise and power

Idle power consumption 9W

Performance tests

HD Tach burst speed 220.4MB/sec
HD Tach random access speed 12.8ms
HD Tach average sequential read speed 104.0MB/sec

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