WinBench 99 measures the Cheetah 73LP's
access time at 8.5 milliseconds. Interestingly, the
Cheetah 36XL achieves the same score. Seagate specifies the former's
seek time at 4.9 milliseconds and the latter's at 5.4 ms. This again goes to show that specified seek times can't be compared to each other... even when they come from the same manufacturer! Subtracting the standard 10,000 RPM
rotational latency from the 73LP's figure yields a measured seek time of 5.5 milliseconds... a bit off of that 4.9 ms mark. The 73LP's access time is a bit slower than, say, last year's popular
Quantum Atlas 10k II.
On the other hand, the 73LP's transfer rates forge ahead into record territory. Outer-zone scores come in at 56 MB/sec... 31% faster than the previous record, turned in by Seagate's own Barracuda 180. The 73LP's inner-track rate is similarly record-breaking, besting the previous champ (again a Seagate... this time the X15) by about 17%.
Superior transfer rates are all well and good, of course, but savvy StorageReview.com readers realize that pure STR is useful only in a relative minority of applications. So, how do these access times and transfer rates translate into higher-level performance? Let's move on to WinMarks!
WinMarks...
