Western Digital VelociRaptor 600 GB

WD has recently updated its VelociRaptor which returns in an even higher performance version, even bigger... even fiercer. Who can stop the old dinosaur? Is it going to cause carnage in our tests again?

In its favour the new WD6000HLHX can count the recent SATA-3 interface which supports up to 6 Gbps. The cache memory is up to 32 MB and rotation speed still at 10,000 rpm. Note that the 450 GB version (WD4500HLHX) offers the same spec as this 600 GB. As with all VelociRaptors, the guarantee is 5 years.
The drive conserves its 2.5 inch format but it will still be impossible to install it in a laptop because it's twice as thick as your standard drive. It is moreover mounted on a 3.5 inch format cooler which isn't only there for decorative purposes. So we put the VelociRaptor in the 3.5 inch drive class. No arguments!

Pure performance

Don't be fooled by the 2-star rating. The VelociRaptor gives good performance... at least as far as hard drives go. Because in contrast to the final overall rating, the pure performance rating is scaled to all current available drives, including the unbeatable SSDs.
All the same, in its category, this drive is a monster. Performance on large files even rivals some SSDs and outdoes plenty of others in terms of writes:
 

In fact it's with small random access files that standard hard drives show their limitations. This is confirmed by the AS-SSD test:
 

Access times are identical to those for other VelociRaptors:
 

In terms of access times, it's certainly very close to the physical limits of hard drives. Only SSDs better these scores, by 20 to 70 times!

All the same, don't think that this gap in pure performance means it's far behind SSDs once we move on to practical tests... far from it!

Performance in practice

Already the application score in PCMark Vantage is worth a second look:
 

7286 is not far behind the score you get for some entry-level SSDs. And more practical tests confirm this:
 

Simply put, this is definitely one of the big boys. The times displayed are not far behind the best SSDs and better than entry-level SSDs. Sure, Windows 7 start-up is systematically slower than with any SSD by a few seconds. But this difference is mainly made up for in situations where you need to both read and write files, like for example when you're installing a downloaded programme. As for starting up a piece of software, it's on a par with your average SSD. Damn good!