Maxtor Atlas 10K V

Note: Since the publication of this review, this drive has been retested under Testbed4, a newer hardware/software/benchmark platform. Please see this article for updated results. This review remains for reference purposes only.

Maxtor Atlas 10K V Capacities Model Number Capacity 8D073x0 73 GB 8D147x0 147 GB 8D300x0 300 GB Lowest Real-Time Price: Introduction Density increases have slowed down tremendously. Nowhere is the trend clearer than in the enterprise-oriented SCSI drive market where 37 GB/platter products have held the line for over two years. 2003's autumn season, traditionally the period where manufacturers announce the impending arrival of their next-generation units, passed without even a whimper.

Hitachi first pulled the trigger in late February of this year by announcing the Ultrastar 10K300, a more modest design that did not quite deign to reach the lofty 73 GB/platter for which the competition gunned. A stunning nine months have passed since that initial announcement- the 10K300 is nowhere in sight! Maxtor, Fujitsu, and Seagate eventually followed with their launches. Months have passed. Finally, as 2004 prepares for history, Maxtor's Atlas 10K V has commenced trickling into the channel.

As one of a new breed of SCSI drives, the Atlas 10K V crams 73-gigabytes of data onto a single two-sided platter that measures less than three inches in diameter. Par for the course, Maxtor's flagship remains a four-platter design and yields a maximum capacity of 300 GB in a low-profile chassis. The Atlas continues a trend of differentiating seek times between family members with varying platter counts. While the single-platter 8D073x0 model scores a 4.0 ms claim, the 300 GB flagship comes stamped with a slightly more sedate 4.4 ms seek time. Although ATA drives (including Maxtor's own MaXLine III) have started the scramble to a roomier 16 MB buffer, the 10K V remains at an industry-standard eight megabytes.

With the 10K V, the firm has moved the Atlas to fluid dynamic bearing motors and has introduced a host of secondary improvements intended to maintain or increase performance. Maxtor positions the Atlas 10K V to service traditional workhorse server applications where capacity and cost constraints rule out high-speed 15,000 RPM drives. A standard five-year warranty backs the drive.

Delivering best-of-class single-user and server performance, the Atlas 10K IV has enjoyed StorageReview's 10K RPM Leaderboard slot for nearly two years now. Let's see how high Maxtor sets the bar with the 10K V. In the following tests, the 300 GB Maxtor Atlas 10K V is compared against the following drives for the following reasons:

Maxtor Atlas 10K IV (147GB)	Predecessor of the review unit
Fujitsu MAP3147 (147 GB)	Previous-generation competitor
Hitachi/IBM Ultrastar 146Z10 (147 GB)	Previous-generation competitor
Seagate Cheetah 10K.6 (147 GB)	Previous-generation competitor
Western Digital Raptor WD740GD (74 GB) with TCQ enabled	Enterprise-oriented 10K RPM SATA drive