Performance in FC-Test 2.0

Now let’s take a look at the results obtained in the second version of FC-Test according to the same testing methodology as in the previous case.

In the second version of FC-Test the situation suddenly changes. Seagate USB Pocket Hard Drive manages to outperform Corsair Flash Voyager when working with 1MB files. Compared with the previous test version, the hard drive writes twice as fast, while the flash drive, on the contrary, works somewhat slower. However, as the files grow bigger, the situation starts looking more familiar: with 10MB files, the flash drive is already ahead of the Seagate solution, while with 100MB files gets five times faster than the rival. Note that, Seagate USB Pocket Hard Drive works almost equally fast with 1MB and 10MB files, while the 100MB file is written at half the speed.

The version of the test didn’t have any effect on the read speed: the flash drive reads files 3.5 times faster than the Seagate drive, no matter how big or small they are.

Conclusion

I have to admit that the results are not very pleasing for the Seagate USB Pocket Hard Drive. Very nice and convenient exterior design cannot make up for the performance difference compared with a regular contemporary USB flash drive. Some time ago there was at least some parity between hard disk drives and flash drives with the same storage capacity. Now, however, we have every right to state that hard disk drives have lost this battle.

Rapid development and production growth of new flash memory chips made these storage solutions faster, more reliable, cheaper, smaller in size and at least comparable with the hard drives in terms of storage capacity. Times change, and it looks like there is hardly a niche in the market these days for hard disk drives on 1” platters. Some additional features, unavailable on flash drives, could have saved them, but there are none – contemporary USB flash drives know to create secure zones and function as a boot-up device already.