Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsMeh
Reviewed in Canada on March 11, 2022
Tested with H2Testw, because I'm too lazy to look for another tool for testing my HDDs than the one I use to test my SD cards, and I'm really disappointed with the performance.
Initially I could see the drive go up to 130MB/s, as expected by the reviews and benchmark I read, but when I came back the next morning, it ended up with an average read and write speed of 80 something MB/s.
Anyways. Since I'm kind of tech savvy, I hesitated A LOT between my different options before buying this product.
- Should I buy an HDD and enclose it myself?
- If so, should I go for 2.5 or 3.5 inches?
- If I go for 3.5, will I get better perf that justifies the bulkyness and the required power adapter to plug in?
- If not, then why should I enclose it myself when there are multiple good if not great options out there with a competitive bang for the buck?
- Do I have to be afraid of over heating?
- Is the solution I'll go with works with a PS5, as an external storage, the day I decide to get one?
- Etc.
On the good side, I like that it is 5 TB.
I came to the conclusion that, in my use case with my PS4, I didn't want anything less than 4 TB and since buying a 4 TB would give something like 3.7 "effective" TB I think this 5 TB fits the bill completely here.
It also works with the PS5 and combined with a 3 years warranty, I think this HDD is kind of future proof, at least for the next 5 years or so.
The form factor is fine. I like that it is USB-C and that the activity light does not blink aggressively. The price per GB is relatively high as well. Quality / performance wise, in reality, you just end up with the equivalent of an enclosed laptop HDD.
Overall I feel satisfied EXCEPT for the performance.
I knew it wasn't a powerhouse before buying it and since I use it for my PS4, it is already better than the stock drive. The difference with a real WD Black 720 RPM is kind of neglectible, since we talk about a couple dozens of MB/s - theoretically 135 MB/s vs something like 155-170 MB/s - which is stupidly slim compared to an SSD at 250-330 MB/s and ever more neglectible for a PS4.
