Is this Toshiba 2.5 inch HDD good as other HDD in the same form factor?

[Newblesse Obblige]

https://www.toshiba-storage.asia/l200-laptop-hard-drive/

My local PC store posted a new(for me at least) HDD brand aside from Seagate and Im curious if it is also good as other HDD brands.

 

EDIT: Don't worry, I am not going to buy it. I just want so info about it as Toshiba is faily new brand to me when it comes to hard drives as Seagate and WD is the only brand I know when it comes to mech hard drives.

I just want to know if is a good alternative to other brands if they are out of stock here(yes, HDDs were out of stock once for some reason when I was finding for hard drives for my external drive lmao).

Edited February 25, 2021 by Newblesse Obblige

[RAS_3885]

Looks like a pretty standard hard drive. Toshiba is a big name in computers, so I don't think it's going to be inherently better or worse than a similar model from Western Digital, Seagate, etc.

 

If you're going through the effort to replace a hard drive you should consider a solid state drive. IMO there's no reason to go for a mechanical HDD as a primary OS drive with the cost of SSDs as low as they are.

[AbydosOne]

9 minutes ago, Newblesse Obblige said:

https://www.toshiba-storage.asia/l200-laptop-hard-drive/

My local PC store posted a new(for me at least) HDD brand aside from Seagate and Im curious if it is also good as other HDD brands.

I have a personal aversion to Toshiba products, but I doubt in the long run it's anything different than Seagate or WD/HGST. "Laptop" HDDs are a dying breed in a world of SSDs.

[Kilrah]

SMR on the 1 and 2TB models, no thanks.

 

Indeed makes no sense with the cost of SSDs now. 

[manikyath]

from my personal experience at least, toshiba has proven to be more reliable than seagate.

 

that said... some details:

- the 1TB and 2TB models are SMR drives, which basicly means terrible write speeds. the 500GB model is fine.

- for your boot drive, you should get an SSD, as long as you dont need big capacities they're in a similar pricepoint anyways.

[Newblesse Obblige]

1 minute ago, RAS_3885 said:

Looks like a pretty standard hard drive. Toshiba is a big name in computers, so I don't think it's going to be inherently better or worse than a similar model from Western Digital, Seagate, etc.

 

If you're going through the effort to replace a hard drive you should consider a solid state drive. IMO there's no reason to go for a mechanical HDD as a primary OS drive with the cost of SSDs as low as they are.

Don't worry, I aint gonna buy one. I just want so info about it as only few talks about it and Toshiba drives is fairly new to be sold in my country(dominated by WD and Seagate). 

[SethK]

As far as I know, tobisha is a good brand, I know ive used their products before. The barracuda 2.5" is 7200RPM while the tobisha is 5400. Since SATA III is so slow for the modern days, having the 5400RPM will be another bottleneck in its speeds, you definitely want to get the one that spins 7200 RPM.

 

If you want speed, consider an SDD, but money. so if youre looking for a faster boot AND more storage then something like this will benefit you better https://www.newegg.com/western-digital-blue-1tb/p/N82E16820250088

 

 

[AbydosOne]

Just now, manikyath said:

the 1TB and 2TB models are SMR drives, which basicly means terrible write speeds.

Okay, SMR gets a little too bad a rap. The write speeds are bad after the drive needs to start shingled writing. The drives have PMR sections (usually several gigs) to handle normal write loads. In a laptop, I doubt SMR would be noticed until it was very full. For bulk storage (which, face it, is what you do with a single 2TB laptop drive), it'll likely be fine.

[manikyath]

1 minute ago, AbydosOne said:

Okay, SMR gets a little too bad a rap. The write speeds are bad after the drive needs to start shingled writing. The drives have PMR sections (usually several gigs) to handle normal write loads. In a laptop, I doubt SMR would be noticed until it was very full. For bulk storage (which, face it, is what you do with a single 2TB laptop drive), it'll likely be fine.

it all depends on the use case, you're right that for bulk storage it is fine... if all you're doing is storing. media library is fine, but even for making backups you have to consider how the SMR technology will affect the specific way your flavour of doing backups is processing changes. i'd make the argument that it's a bad pick for a game drive too, if it also needs to pull the duty of storing game save files.

 

as for the "until it was very full" argument.. if you're not going to use more than half, get the CMR drive.

[Vishera]

6 minutes ago, manikyath said:

from my personal experience at least, toshiba has proven to be more reliable than seagate.

 

Seagate laptop drives have the highest failure rates in the industry.

[manikyath]

Just now, Vishera said:

Seagate laptop drives have the highest failure rates in the industry.

i didnt want to put it quite that harsh.. mostly because i didnt want to make claims without actually investigating figures.. but yes.

[Archer42]

4 hours ago, AbydosOne said:

Okay, SMR gets a little too bad a rap. The write speeds are bad after the drive needs to start shingled writing. The drives have PMR sections (usually several gigs) to handle normal write loads. In a laptop, I doubt SMR would be noticed until it was very full. For bulk storage (which, face it, is what you do with a single 2TB laptop drive), it'll likely be fine.

Problem is, once it happens write speeds become way too low for the drive to be usable at all. I mean I'd consider <5MB/s with delay times during which hdd is not responding at all measured in 10-s of seconds outright broken. And that's what you'll get.

And it also depends on implementation, seagate drives, for example, do not support trim, which means they do not have to be full for write speed to drop dramatically - just need enough writes to fill all the drive once...

In general when there is a choice (3.5 hdd-s) it is vastly inferior product for the same price - so instant "do not buy". Since for 2.5 ones there is no choice nowadays... will probably have to either buy ssd or live with it...