Is my hard drive working normally?

[Nuclear Boy]

Just bought a 2TB Toshiba P300 to replace my "dead" WD Blue 1TB from 7+ years ago.

I noticed during file transfers and benchmark tests that the transfer is choppy, swinging up and down drastically, and the numbers look lower than what I've seen from others. (Tried Crystaldiskmark too, numbers are quite a bit lower than expected; peak 150+MB/s, compared to ~200 seen from others)

Read test in HD Tune Pro: https://i.imgur.com/rltsK2N.jpg

There are no bad sectors that I can find, but access times vary wildly (seems to be in step with the huge dips during the read test). In Victoria, there's quite a bit of sectors which took >=160ms (green) to access.

Random read test: https://i.imgur.com/sHKPXwI.jpg


Hence I am unsure if this is normal behaviour that can be expected from a brand new hard disk drive, right out of the anti-static bag.

For reference, here's one from Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIc921hKo3I

 

[Phen8210]

use crystaldiskinfo too see if it say ok or caution

 

[Nuclear Boy]

use crystaldiskinfo too see if it say ok or caution

All are ok

Your Toshiba P300 HD Tune screenshot is worse than the review below (the zig zag line is normal though):

https://xsreviews.co.uk/reviews/toshiba-p300-3tb-hdd-review/

Personally I will never buy toshiba drives, have a few before (320-500GB) and all die already (whereas WD/Seagate/HGST still survives)

Thanks for the reference. CDM numbers similar to mine, so does the zig-zag as you pointed out. But my access time is 20+ms, seems very slow.


My first Toshiba HDD purchase tbh, since it's pretty cheap, so I'll see how down the road.

 

[watzup_ken]

I had no issue with a single Toshiba drive back then, so can't really say about how well it lasts. Cheap drives from any of the brands tend not to last, which is in line with their warranty period.

As for transfer rate fluctuating wildly, it really depends on what type of files you are transferring. It is normal for transfer rate to differ from my experience. You can't compare what you see in real life usage versus what you see on benchmarks.

 

[Nuclear Boy]

I had no issue with a single Toshiba drive back then, so can't really say about how well it lasts. Cheap drives from any of the brands tend not to last, which is in line with their warranty period.

As for transfer rate fluctuating wildly, it really depends on what type of files you are transferring. It is normal for transfer rate to differ from my experience. You can't compare what you see in real life usage versus what you see on benchmarks.

Tbh I'm not too worried about drive life as my previous one also 2-yr warranty but lasted 7+ years, so anything goes. Just going to back up regularly just in case (long overdue).


I am aware that small scattered files will slow down transfer, but I tried with a large sequential write (>5 GB video) and it'll fluctuate between 90 and 140+ MB/s. My prior WD Blue will stay pretty steady 150MB/s throughout, at most only dip to 130MB/s. That's why I'm puzzled by the performance despite similar specs (SATA3 and 7200rpm).

 

[Phen8210]

go rma the disk

 

[Nuclear Boy]

go rma the disk

Will they agree to do it though? Other than the performance, the drive seems to be working fine (ala no bad sectors, no corruption, no clicking etc).

I did contact Toshiba though, asking them to compare the performance of my drive with theirs. I'll see if they get back to me.

 

[Mclairs83]

take note that RMA hard disk usually will result in getting back a refurbished HDD.

which the quality maybe worse than the current one u gotten.

 

[Nuclear Boy]

take note that RMA hard disk usually will result in getting back a refurbished HDD.

which the quality maybe worse than the current one u gotten.

Is it common across all brands here?

 

[Pocoyoz]

Where did you purchase from?
Can exchange with them?

Sent from Amazon using GAGT

 

[Rashkae]

Is it common across all brands here?

No. Every RMA I did resulted in a brand new drive. I've never received a refurb.

 

[Phen8210]

Will they agree to do it though? Other than the performance, the drive seems to be working fine (ala no bad sectors, no corruption, no clicking etc).

I did contact Toshiba though, asking them to compare the performance of my drive with theirs. I'll see if they get back to me.

doesn't mean no issue ah.. slow access time, read/write speeds is also a problem.

 

[DJ Pork Chop]

ts your experience is normal, if you are transferring ALOT of small files.

u can do a test. 5gb file transfer vs 5gb worth of files transfer.

when it is a single file, it would be a stable and high speed transfer.
if you have alot of small files, each file would need to have its name/properties read and prepped before starting to copy the contents.

can u try to copy a 5gb file vs 5gb worth of files, and note the results?

 

[Nuclear Boy]

can u try to copy a 5gb file vs 5gb worth of files, and note the results?

I did test transferring a 4GB video (mkv) file from my NVMe to hard disk and it'll go see-saw around 90+ to 150MB/s, not consistent. Transfer a bit, it'll pause, then continue and repeat. My "dead" WD Blue will just go ~150+MB/s throughout with very little variation and no pausing.


Btw I updated them (Toshiba) with more of my benchmark results but they have not gotten back to me in more than a day. I guess they pretty much ghosted me.

 

[DJ Pork Chop]

I did test transferring a 4GB video (mkv) file from my NVMe to hard disk and it'll go see-saw around 90+ to 150MB/s, not consistent. Transfer a bit, it'll pause, then continue and repeat. My "dead" WD Blue will just go ~150+MB/s throughout with very little variation and no pausing.


Btw I updated them (Toshiba) with more of my benchmark results but they have not gotten back to me in more than a day. I guess they pretty much ghosted me.

Before we conclude it is the hdd issue,
Can u try the following:
1. Transfer to p300 with usb thumbdrive a big 4gb file and observe
2. Change sata port + sata cable and try the same transfer again. Note observation
3. Change esata cable to another one from your psu and observe.

If all 3 yield same results, we can more or less say its highly likely ur p300 is faulty

 

[Nuclear Boy]

Before we conclude it is the hdd issue,
Can u try the following:
1. Transfer to p300 with usb thumbdrive a big 4gb file and observe
2. Change sata port + sata cable and try the same transfer again. Note observation
3. Change esata cable to another one from your psu and observe.

If all 3 yield same results, we can more or less say its highly likely ur p300 is faulty

Yeah I did (1.) with USB, SATA SSD, NVMe. Same observations during transfer of a single large file.



Also did (2&3), swap cable and slots with boot SATA SSD. Same thing. Boot SSD still functions normally so I doubt is slot or cable issue.


Toshiba just told me to visit EA RMA centre to check. Will do so soon within this week.

 

[wongminmin]

Just bought a 2TB Toshiba P300 to replace my "dead" WD Blue 1TB from 7+ years ago.

I noticed during file transfers and benchmark tests that the transfer is choppy, swinging up and down drastically, and the numbers look lower than what I've seen from others. (Tried Crystaldiskmark too, numbers are quite a bit lower than expected; peak 150+MB/s, compared to ~200 seen from others)

Read test in HD Tune Pro: https://i.imgur.com/rltsK2N.jpg

There are no bad sectors that I can find, but access times vary wildly (seems to be in step with the huge dips during the read test). In Victoria, there's quite a bit of sectors which took >=160ms (green) to access.

Random read test: https://i.imgur.com/sHKPXwI.jpg


Hence I am unsure if this is normal behaviour that can be expected from a brand new hard disk drive, right out of the anti-static bag.

For reference, here's one from Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TIc921hKo3I

this 1 is 1 of the symptoms of dying hdd.
i was choosing between toshiba & wd, but reading the reviews..doa...die within weeks months...i rather pay $10 extra and went for wd. even seagate can lasts more than 1 year+ before dying.

 

[DJ Pork Chop]

Yeah I did (1.) with USB, SATA SSD, NVMe. Same observations during transfer of a single large file.



Also did (2&3), swap cable and slots with boot SATA SSD. Same thing. Boot SSD still functions normally so I doubt is slot or cable issue.


Toshiba just told me to visit EA RMA centre to check. Will do so soon within this week.

ah ok
hopefully rma liao np

 

[Nuclear Boy]

I just tested using gnome-disk-utilities in Ubuntu the same drive and the results look like what I expected it be, with no big jumps in transfer speed and <15ms access time. Tested a few file sizes and it is noticeably faster and more consistent compared than in Windows 10.

Has anyone experienced this before (Working fine in Linux, slow in Windows)? Now I'm doubting that the drive is faulty in the first place and that it's just Windows.

For reference, in Win10: https://i.imgur.com/rltsK2N.jpg
In Ubuntu: https://imgur.com/a/LZR8LkY

 

[12122012]

this is why...
https://www.extremetech.com/computi...g-slow-smr-drives-without-informing-customers

Generally speaking, ExtremeTech does not recommend buying an SMR drive for any ordinary consumer use unless you are familiar with the performance penalties that come with using these drives and are willing to live with them. Hard drives are slow enough already. Companies that fail to accurately disclose important specifications that relate to the performance of their products do not deserve your business. In this case, the difference between SMR and PMR is not a trivial one, and they know it.

Update (4/16): It isn’t just Seagate and Western Digital pulling this crap. Toshiba has been caught doing it as well, except Toshiba is selling these drives in the consumer P300 desktop line, where they are completely unsuited.