Hitachi Ultrastar A7K2000 1TB review

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Verdict:

Relatively low power consumption and a long warranty are appealing but we require faster performance from our hard disks

Review Date: 5 Jan 2013

Price when reviewed: £78

Supplier: http://www.scan.co.uk

Reviewed By: Kat Orphanides

Our Rating 2 stars out of 5

User Rating

When you're paying over the odds for a 1TB hard disk, you're going to want the absolute best. Unfortunately, the Hitachi Ultrastar A7K2000 doesn't get off to a good start, as it uses the older SATA2 interface, rather than the modern SATA3.

Unsurprisingly for an older SATA2 hard disk the A7K2000 didn't prove to be particularly fast in our read/write speed tests. In our large file tests, it achieved a write speed of 93.2MB/s and a rather better read speed of 135.7MB/s. The read speed actually compared well with some SATA3 models, but its slow write performance brought its large file average down to 114.4MB/s.

Performance in our small file transfer tests is also slower due to the more challenging nature of the tests. The A7K2000's small file write speed is actually faster than some SATA3 drives' at 49.4MB/s, but its read speed is a sluggish 47.7MB/s, producing an average of 48.6MB/s.

The price is the biggest issue with this hard disk, as 8p per gigabyte simply isn't competitive. Given that this hard disk uses older technology, that price is very hard to justify, even if it includes a five year warranty. The Samsung SpinPoint F3 1TB is better value and faster.

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