• Disk Drive Performance testing notes.
• George's HDSpeed Disk Performance Test.
• Raptest, Disk performance Test.
• HD Tune - Disk Utility
• Monitor Temperatures and Voltages with MotherBoard Monitor
• SiSoft SANDRA for Benchmarking and System Info

Common issues that affect disk drive performance.

1. Defrag the drive twice first.
2. Reseat the connectors on the MB and HD.
3. Make sure your using the right cable. 80 Conductor for UDMA66/100/133.
4. Make sure it's a good cable.
5. If an 80 conductor cable, then make sure to have the blue connector connected to the MB.
6. Can be an HD problem, which can be cleaned up with a Low Level Format.
7. Can be a timing problem with the ATA Controller.
8. Can be a voltage fluxuation, causing a timing problem.
9. Can be caused by OC'ing, causing a timing problem.

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by vkr edited by dbmaven
last modified: 2003-09-05 10:56:06

George's HDSpeed Disk Performance Test available at his site.

George's site:

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This is an experimental program to determine the speed of hard disks, including the bus bandwidth. No documentation is available. This program is available strictly "as-is". This program is for Windows NT, 2000, and XP only.

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Use: Run it and hit the start button. Once it starts, wait till it completes.

The Bandwidth, is the Interface Speed, and the Sequential, is the Read Sequential Sustained Transfer Rate.

Sisoft Sandra at ...

HDTach at ...

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by vkr edited by dbmaven
last modified: 2010-06-01 12:51:35

Raptest at the Utilities page, here or at the site

Download, (if from here, unzip first) then execute to unzip the files.



Use: Execute, select the desired drive, then hit the test HD button.

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by vkr edited by dbmaven
last modified: 2003-09-05 10:56:22

A more complete disk utility which provides a wealth of information on your disks.
Available here

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by dbmaven
last modified: 2006-09-20 11:56:42

Monitor Temperatures and Voltages with MotherBoard Monitor

The most popular 3rd party product for monitoring temperatures and voltages is Motherboard Monitor, by Alex Van Kaam.

Free download is available at the MBM Homesite

Be sure to research MBM support for your motherboard before attempting to set it up ! Not all motherboards are properly supported - especially those in OEM computers (Dell, HP, Compaq, etc. Many OEMs disable, hide, or exclude the monitoring hardware chip.) The Motherboard list, including the proper settings, is located here.

Note: MBM is no longer supported. It's still available, but doesn't support 'current generation' AMD or INTEL motherboards.

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by dbmaven
last modified: 2006-09-19 22:01:04

SiSoft SANDRA for Benchmarking and System Info

SiSoftware's SANDRA is a tool that is widely used for benchmarking systems (nearly all review sites post screen shots of Sandra CPU and Memory benches). It also displays a wealth of information about your computer's components - memory, cpu, motherboard, hard drives, etc.

The Main web page for Sandra is HERE.

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by dbmaven
last modified: 2003-09-05 10:56:54