Whats the difference between these two hard drives?

[.enigma.]

Right now i have a Western Digital Caviar Blue WD800JD 80GB (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822135106&Tpk=WD800JD).

Some people have reccomended that i get the SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD502HJ 500GB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822152181

Both of them have the same specs except the samsung has a 16Mb cache and the western digital only has a 8mb cache.


Is the difference in speed really worth spending the extra 50 dollars. Id rather not spend more than i have to because the overall cost of my build is only about 550-600 dollars

 

[EnderW]

well the main difference is the samsung has 420GB (6.25x) more storage capacity

 

[.enigma.]

Well, obviously besides that.

Is there any significant difference in speed (does the extra storage provide more speed?)

 

[jtg1993]

Well, obviously besides that.

Is there any significant difference in speed (does the extra storage provide more speed?)

There should be quite a lot of difference in speed because more capacity usually equals denser plater(s) which equal more speed.

EDIT: I have the same drive and here is a speed comparison to a Western Digital 1TB Green.

WD 80GB:
Timing cached reads: 794 MB in 2.00 seconds = 397.37 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 170 MB in 3.03 seconds = 56.12 MB/sec
joel@Desktop ~ $ sudo hdparm -tT /dev/sdb

WD 1TB GP:
Timing cached reads: 804 MB in 2.00 seconds = 402.17 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 258 MB in 3.02 seconds = 85.46 MB/sec

Quite a big difference even though the 1TB is a slower spinning drive.

 

[InvisiBill]

Is there any significant difference in speed (does the extra storage provide more speed?)

Yes. The platters inside the drive are the same size (3.5"), so the larger drive has its data packed more densely on the drive. That means that in the same amount of physical movement of the platter and read/write head, it's actually covering more data in the larger drive.

http://www.overclock.net/hard-drive...database-benchmark-raid-non-2.html#post392304
The WD800JD maxes out around 60MB/s.

http://www.overclockers.at/storage_memory/benchmark_samsung_f3_hd502hj_500gb_210422
The HD502HJ has an average of almost twice that, and a minimum of about 70MB/s.

 

[.enigma.]

Thanks for the help, i think im going to go with the samsung