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Toshiba P300 3TB 7200RPM (HDWD130) 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Mini-Review

After upgrading from my old Western Digital 640GB hard drive, I've had the chance to put this new Toshiba spinner through its paces with a couple of weeks' worth of real-world use. Here's a CrystalDiskMark bench:

Performance

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CrystalDiskMark 5.2.0 x64 (UWP) (C) 2007-2016 hiyohiyo
                           Crystal Dew World : http://crystalmark.info/
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* MB/s = 1,000,000 bytes/s [SATA/600 = 600,000,000 bytes/s]
* KB = 1000 bytes, KiB = 1024 bytes

   Sequential Read (Q= 32,T= 1) :   188.500 MB/s
  Sequential Write (Q= 32,T= 1) :   179.932 MB/s
  Random Read 4KiB (Q= 32,T= 1) :     1.211 MB/s [   295.7 IOPS]
 Random Write 4KiB (Q= 32,T= 1) :     1.103 MB/s [   269.3 IOPS]
         Sequential Read (T= 1) :   158.114 MB/s
        Sequential Write (T= 1) :   150.601 MB/s
   Random Read 4KiB (Q= 1,T= 1) :     0.405 MB/s [    98.9 IOPS]
  Random Write 4KiB (Q= 1,T= 1) :     0.530 MB/s [   129.4 IOPS]

  Test : 1024 MiB [D: 21.6% (603.7/2794.5 GiB)] (x5)  [Interval=5 sec]
  Date : 2016/12/08 22:21:01
    OS : Windows 10 Professional [10.0 Build 14393] (x64)

Almost 200MB/s. Certainly a bit faster than the old WD.

Noise

The drive is currently installed in a small-form-factor Silverstone SG06 case. I can't hear the Toshiba over the CPU and GPU fans, and it's certainly not louder than my old drive, so I would consider the P300 to be pretty quiet.

Thermals

Under idle conditions, the P300 runs at about 36°C. Under several hours of sustained load, with the CPU and GPU (an AMD RX 480) also generating heat, it rises to 42°C, which is still well below the 50°C threshold that's recommended for most hard drives. Keep in mind that I'm running it in a space- and thermal-constrained mini-ITX case - you'll likely see lower temperatures in a traditional ATX mid-tower.

Toshiba's own data sheet specifies a maximum operating temperature of 60°C, which is pretty typical for hard drives.

Conclusion

Overall, I'm very happy with the Toshiba P300 3TB, especially for the $70 I paid for it on Black Friday. It's a well-rounded, decently fast 7200RPM drive. Obviously, two weeks of use isn't enough to draw any long-term conclusions, but if this drive's Hitachi pedigree is any indication, it should last for quite a while. In my experience, drives that aren't DOA or die in the first few hours tend to last sufficiently long, i.e. well past the 2-year warranty that Toshiba offers on this drive.