Western Digital VelociRaptor 300GB SATA Hard Drive

The Test System

Before we look at the numbers, here is a brief glance at the test system that was used.

All testing was done on a fresh install of Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit. All benchmarks were completed on the desktop with no other software programs running. All of the modules were run in dual channel mode with a 120mm fan placed on top of them to keep them cool. The XFX GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB used NVIDIA ForceWare 169.28 video card drivers and the ASUS P5E3 motherboard using BIOS version 1009, which was the most recent available when testing was done.

Memory Settings:

• 1333MHz @ 7-7-7-20 (DDR3) with 2.0V

Here is the Intel X38 Express Test platform:

Intel Test Platform
Component	Brand/Model	Live Pricing
Processor	See Above LGA775 CPUs	Click Here
Motherboard	ASUS P5E3 Deluxe	Click Here
Memory	4GB Corsair DDR3 1800C7	Click Here
Video Card	EVGA GeForce 8800 GTS 512	Click Here
Hard Drive	Western Digital RaptorX 150GB	Click Here
Cooling	Corsair Nautilus 500	Click Here
Power Supply	PC Power and Cooling 1KW	Click Here
Operating System	Windows Vista Ultimate 64-Bit	Click Here

It should be noted that Western Digital sent the following notice to us with the test drives.

The VR150 family of drives is in the process of firmware testing and validation in Western Digitals Functional Integrity Test (FIT) Lab using proprietary test software and tools. Overall FIT test coverage is approximately 90% complete. CCC: UX being provided on engineering samples is known to have the following issues:

Performance results are still being tuned and is not representative of the final released firmware

Basically this article should be treated as a preview since the firmware is not final.

The firmware on the Western Digital VelociRaptor that we are testing today is 03.03V0X. When a new firmware version has been released for the final shipping drives, we will take another look at the VelociRaptor performance numbers.