Caviar Green faster than Black?

[Darxide]

Though you guys might find this interesting.
In addition to my Samsung 840pro as a boot drive, I bought 2 mechanicals for games and data storage.
I got a 2Tb Caviar Black to use for games and steam library, and a cheaper 2Tb green for general file storage.
Was benching the new rig today and found something surprising, and makes me feel a little cheated even. The cheaper green actually benched higher than the more expensive black! How did that happen?

The black is a WD2002FAEX


The green is a WD20EZRX


As you can see, apart from a slightly better access time, the green was a bit faster. For the price difference I was expecting the black to be way better.

[NKrader]

I personally never noticed a difference between my green and black drives other than the constant spin down that the greens do, which never really bothered me

[HWaddict]

Are both SATA 3?

[tiro_uspsss]

Are both SATA 3?

DFI pitbull is that you?

as if that'll make a difference - both HDDs are barely past SATA1 speeds

@ Darxide: it is possible that the green may be using denser platters; WD updates the platters in blacks a little slower as blacks have 5 year warranty vs the 2 years in a green, so maybe WD takes their time 'validating' the denser platters before using them in blacks

[Darxide]

@NKrader that's a good point on the spindown. I guess the black will respond faster from idle.

@tiro_uspass I bought that black because reviews said it was a new 1Tb platter model, and I'm getting around the same results the review article got.
Just didn't expect the green to be even higher! I guess I got the 1Tb platter version of that too, it seems there are two types with the same model number, 1 with 3x667Gb platters and 1 with 2x1Tb platters. But in typical WD fashion the model number on both is the same. One website even gave the weight of both drives because that's how you tell which one you got lol.
And it's not as though the price difference was trivial, in British pounds the black cost me 124, compared to 70 for the green. But I guess the 5 year warranty on the black is worth it.

[tiro_uspsss]

@tiro_uspass I bought that black because reviews said it was a new 1Tb platter model, and I'm getting around the same results the review article got.
Just didn't expect the green to be even higher! I guess I got the 1Tb platter version of that too, it seems there are two types with the same model number, 1 with 3x667Gb platters and 1 with 2x1Tb platters. But in typical WD fashion the model number on both is the same. One website even gave the weight of both drives because that's how you tell which one you got lol.
And it's not as though the price difference was trivial, in British pounds the black cost me 124, compared to 70 for the green. But I guess the 5 year warranty on the black is worth it.

I haven't heard about the blacks being 1x1tb platter... iirc FAEX - oh wait - you have 2TB...mm.. dunno about the 2TB... last I heard was in re: to the 1TB model, & I heard that it has 2x500GB. Where did you find this info, that the 2TB is 2x1tb platter?

[Scubar]

They are probably the exact same drive really. I think WD only use the Black label now to price their drives up for people that want to use them in RAID.

[NKrader]

They are probably the exact same drive really. I think WD only use the Black label now to price their drives up for people that want to use them in RAID.

And warranty

[lowfat]

I am willing to beat the Black has significantly faster seeks and random access.

[repman]

FAEX uses 3 platters AFAIK.

[tiro_uspsss]

They are probably the exact same drive really. I think WD only use the Black label now to price their drives up for people that want to use them in RAID.

Incorrect. Greens are 'intellidrive' rpm or something like that, blacks are 7200

[BlindFreddie]

I am willing to beat the Black has significantly faster seeks and random access.

(think he meant "bet") I think the screenies show exactly that.
Access Times: Black 10.1 ms, Green 13.1 ms.

I've got a 750G green that's still OK after about 4 yrs 24/7 in one of my WCG crunchers. Subjectively, it seems slow.

I've also got a 500GB green that hasn't done much work at all, because it developed a strange behaviour pattern: every approx. 20 min - 2 hrs, it decides to pretend it's a floppy, by going at about that speed for 5 min or so and then it returns to its sluggish normal. Maybe it joined a trade union. The HDD LED just comes on solid during the slow period. It's never returned a single error and passes the WD DOS diagnostics 100% so I didn't think I could claim warranty. I just use it for offline storage now.

I will never buy another green. Last drive I bought was a Seagate 2TB

[[XC] Oj101]

Joined a work union

[ScottALot]

Maybe the green takes advantage of short stroking? I noticed the access times were consistent with their respective RPMs... it was to my understanding Greens operated at 5400RPM.

[HWaddict]

Tiro_uspsss: Perhaps a irelevant question but I remembered that the RAID I build once had mixed versions.
X and Z stands for SATA-2 and 3.

Whatever, sorry for what's blurted out, and I'm not DFI pitbull.