Sata HDD only reading @ 100Mbs instead of advertised 6Gbs

[Evan Flick]

I have a Western Digital Blue 1Tb HDD (WD10EZEX) that is advertised as having a read speed of 6Gbs. I've run speed tests, and I'm only getting around 100-130Mbs. I'm assuming there's a bottleneck, most of my components are outdated, however, I don't know which one. Here are my components: (The ones I think would matter anyway)

ASUS P5Q Pro Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo CPU E8400 @3.00Ghz
6Gbs of RAM

I would really appreciate someones help on this. Thanks!

 

[Someone Somewhere]

Firstly, your motherboard does not support 6Gb/s SATA, only 3Gb/s.

Secondly, there is a difference between bits and bytes. You're likely seeing 100 megabytes per second, while the interface is rated at six gigabits per second.

Thirdly, while the interface can support that speed, the actual drive can't. It (and most mechanical drives) can't read or write past about 150MB/s

 

[SuperSoph_WD]

Hey there & Welcome to the community, @Evan Flick!

@Someone Somewhere is totally right. I believe that you have the difference between bits & bytes confused.
As you can see from the WD Blue Specs Sheet here, the drive incorporates a SATA 6 Gb/s interface (this represents the communication rate between the HDD and the motherboard).

The data transfer rate is different and as you can see for your WD model sheet, it's supposed run at 150 MB/s through the SATA 6 Gb/s connection as it was already mentioned. Since your mobo doesn't support it, I guess 100-130 MB/s is definitely not bad and its within the normal transfer speed rate.

Don't forget to backup your files, though. Always remember that "backup" means that you have your data stored in at least two (2) locations. Moving data from your system drive to an external hard drive is not a backup, unless there's a duplicate of it elsewhere.

Hope this helps you as well. Let us know if you have more questions! 😉
SuperSoph_WD

 

[Paperdoc]

Sorry, you've been confused by the labeling, and one suspects that was not entirely unexpected by the makers. The SATA 6.0 Gb/s standard refers to the maximum speed of the COMMUNICATIONS subsystem in the drive unit and the controller on the mobo. The design deliberately can perform faster than the other parts of the device for data transfer; hence, the communications subsystem part will never limit the overall performance of the device.

The reality is that the performance of all mechanical drives (those with rotating disks and moving head arms) is limited by the movement of those mechanical components. There ere NO mechanical hard drives whose average data transfer rate can exceed even the older SATA 3.0 Gb/s standard. The very fastest mechanical drives can get over 200 MB/s, but not up to 300. What you are achieving on your Blue drive is normal.

The only types of storage devices that can exceed the 3.0 Gb/s rate overall (and not reach the 6.0 rate) are SSD's that have no mechanical moving parts.