Seagate's 4 TB Desktop HDD.15 Is Great For User Storage
Seagate’s new 3.5” Desktop HDD.15 ST4000DM000 changes things up a bit in the company's desktop hard drive family compared to its predecessor, the Barracuda 7200.14. Most notably, the spindle speed is down from 7200 to 5900 RPM. The Desktop HDD.15 is the first and only model in this line that operates at this lower speed.
The company is aiming its new drive at the same applications and usage scenarios as the previous generation's Barracuda disks: desktop and all-in-one PCs, home servers, gaming PCs, RAID arrays, external direct-attached storage devices (DAS), and network-attached storage appliances (NAS). You're of course free to use Seagate's Desktop HDD.15 in any of those environments, though our benchmarks show that it fares better in some applications than in others.
A slower spindle immediately casts some doubt on the Desktop HDD.15's viability as a system drive. And once we run our tests on the disk, the potential for less performance is confirmed as fact. The test results come back average at best, particularly in transfer speeds and I/O throughput. Conversely, Seagate's Desktop HDD.15 shines when we look at surface temperatures and power consumption, both of which are low.
The Desktop HDD.15 is Seagate’s first desktop drive boasting a massive 4 TB capacity. When combine that big storage space with conservative thermals and efficiency-friendly power use, you get an ideal target for user data on the desktop. Hook it up next to a 128 or 256 GB SSD and enjoy the best of both worlds. It's also right at home in external direct-attached storage devices (DAS) and NAS appliances.
