What is a "Hybrid 4G Serial ATA" hard disk drive?

[cscooper2000]

Customizing a Toshiba laptop, you'll often be provided an "upgrade" option for a "500GB (7200 RPM); Hybrid 4G Serial ATA hard disk drive".

I know what an SSD is. I know what SATA is. But what is this Hybrid 4G? Is it just Toshiba's way of making $40 extra bucks from folks who don't know any better?

 

[fzabkar]

Seagate's Momentus XT is one such drive. It incorporates a 4GB NAND flash memory to cache the most frequently accessed sectors on the HDD.

Momentus XT Data Sheet:
http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/datasheet/disc/ds_momentus_xt.pdf

Momentus XT Product Manual:
http://www.seagate.com/staticfiles/support/disc/manuals/notebook/momentus/XT%20(Anak%207200.1)/100610268a.pdf

 

[cscooper2000]

So would this mean that Windows 7 64-bit would occupy most, if not all, of the 4GB of NAND Flash? Windows requires around 16GB Minimum to install. But the most frequently accessed sectors would likely be those files required to boot up every morning. So is that just about as good, for startup times, as getting a SSD?

 

[fzabkar]

Sorry, I have no personal experience with this drive or with Windows 7. Instead I suggest you read the user reports and feedback at Seagate's forums.

 

[geofelt]

So would this mean that Windows 7 64-bit would occupy most, if not all, of the 4GB of NAND Flash? Windows requires around 16GB Minimum to install. But the most frequently accessed sectors would likely be those files required to boot up every morning. So is that just about as good, for startup times, as getting a SSD?

The momentus ssd part of the drive acts like a cache. It will keep the most frequently used sectors in the cache. What is kept there will change as you use the system. It will also cache the writes to the drive, making the writes faster.

I think it is a very good option for those who can have only one drive, and who need more space than a ssd can hold. The net performance is better than any hard drive alone, but falls short of a pure ssd.

 

[cscooper2000]

Thanks, Geofelt.

I can't seem to find much information about this technology online. I'd love to validate what you've said with a few performance tests. Are you aware of any good links to such?

 

[fzabkar]

Is this review of any help?
http://www.storagereview.com/seagate_momentus_xt_review

 

[geofelt]

Thanks, Geofelt.

I can't seem to find much information about this technology online. I'd love to validate what you've said with a few performance tests. Are you aware of any good links to such?

Here is one from amandtech:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/3734/seagates-momentus-xt-review-finally-a-good-hybrid-hdd

 

[cpatel1987]

I've had personal experience with this hard drive on setting up an ASUS K52F-BIN6. It is well worth $40 or so dollars Toshiba asks to upgrade. The boot time with machines that have similar specs than the BIN6 is almost half the time, thats when even comparing a more powerful machine to it, like a Pentium Dual Core vs an i5! By no means is it like a real SSD, aka, not all your programs will load faster, just the ones you use the most, such as the most important program: your operating system. I think it retails for $99.99 at newegg as well: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822148591&Tpk=seagate%20hybrid%20drive.