Hitachi Travelstar 5K750 HTS547575A9E384 (750 GB)
Hitachi addresses a broad range of applications with its 2.5“ Travelstar 5K750 product line, including mobile computing and mobile storage, game consoles, blade servers, network routers, and video surveillance systems. There are three models available: 500 GB, 640 GB, and 750 GB. We’re testing the flagship model, the 750 GB HTS547575A9E384, which costs about $80.
The Travelstar 5K750 hard disk has two platters with 375 GB each and features a storage density of 472 Gb per square inch. All models in this product range employ AF and emulate 512-byte sectors. The disks are 9.5 mm (0.374“) high, have an 8 MB cache, rotate at 5400 RPM, and feature a SATA 3Gb/s interface, which is still sufficient for notebook hard disks.
All Travelstar 5K750 models can optionally be ordered with BDE (Bulk Data Encryption) support, which includes a hardware encryption unit, or as the Enhanced Availability (EA) version, certified for 24/7 operation. Unfortunately, as with base and BDE-equipped drive, Hitachi does not specify the EA SKU’s MTBF. The model numbers of the BDE variants end in 1 instead of 4; the model number of the EA variants begin with HTE instead of HTS.
Performance
According to its specification sheet, the maximum data rate of the Travelstar 5K750 is 998 Mb/s. Average access time is quoted as 12 ms, which is a tad optimistic, according to our tests. We measured access times between 18 and 20 ms, with the 750 GB model clocking in at the high end of this range. Hitachi specifies 1.5 W power consumption while active and 0.8 watts while idle. Our tests confirm the idle value, but the power consumption of an active disk varies between 1.2 W and 2.4 W, depending on the benchmark.
With a 73.7 MB/s average sequential read speed and 73.1 MB/s average sequential writes, the Hitachi Travelstar 5K750 places last in the data rate tests. Most of the other competitors with a 5400 RPM spindle speed are significantly faster. Only Samsung’s Spinpoint M8 HN-M500MBB is in the same speed category. Hitachi’s sample is outclassed by the Spinpoint M8 HN-M101MBB and, even more so, the Western Digital Scorpio Blue WD10JPVT.
