Western Digital Scorpio Blue 1TB review

Traditionally, laptop hard disks have lacked the storage capacity of their 3.5in desktop counterparts. Both the number of disk platters and the size of the platters themselves had to be reduced so disks could fit inside laptops and other low-profile devices. However, with the 1TB Scorpio, Western Digital has narrowed the gap.

Certain sacrifices have been made in order to reach this capacity. By adding a third disk platter, the disk housing has grown from the standard 9.5mm height to a slightly thicker 12mm. This might not seem like a lot, but it could be enough to prevent it fitting inside a laptop. We tried installing the disk in several 15.6in laptops from different manufacturers and had mixed success, so you should check before you buy.

As it spins at 5,200RPM, we didn’t expect the disk to break any speed records. In our file transfer benchmarks it was fairly average at handling large files, writing them at 61.1MB/s and reading at 80.5MB/s. It was one of the slowest disks on test when handling small files, managing just 23.8MB/s write and 45.7MB/s read speeds. It also took over 40 seconds to load a level in Crysis.

Speed clearly isn’t one of the disk’s main strengths – it’s all about capacity. If your laptop will take a 12mm tall disk, and you simply want as much storage space as possible, the Scorpio Blue 1TB is a fine choice at only 9p per GB.