Vista ReadyDrive and hybrid hard drives (HHD) bring no power savings for laptops
By Michael Pietroforte | 4 Comments | Permalink | Trackback | Previous | NextThere has been much media buzz about the miracles that hybrid hard drives (HHDs) and Vista ReadyDrive performance with regard to power savings. It has been alleged that the power consumption would be cut by 70%-90%. However, a test in the German print magazine C’t (21/07, p.114-117) showed that the power savings are negligible. Only a laptop with a solid state drive (SDD) showed significant power savings.
ReadyDrive works similar to ReadyBoost. It utilizes a flash buffer to improve hard disk performance. The main difference between ReadyBoost and ReadyDrive is that the latter can also buffer write access. This way an application can save data even if the hard disk is turned off. Some hard disk vendors such as Seagate and Samsung sell HHDs which come with integrated flash memory. Laptops with Intel’s Santa Rosa chipset allow optional NAND flash memory caching branded as Intel Turbo Memory. In theory this technology helps to save power because the hard disk can stay powered off for a longer period of time. Thus, this technology is predestined to be used in laptops.
The C’t magazine tested laptops from Dell and Bullmann using Microsoft’s benchmark BattSAT (Battery System Assessment Tool). This benchmark simulates typical office work with Office 2003 and Adobe Reader 7. The results of their tests are quite disappointing. They measured slight power savings effects, but they were so small that they could probably be due to a measurement error. They also tested an SSD from Sandisk. The results were better here. The laptop was working 40 minutes longer with an SDD than with a hard drive. It is also interesting to note that ReadyBoost can even increase the power consumption when used with a USB stick.
Considering that the measurement conditions were optimal for ReadyDrive, one has to wonder how numbers like the above cited power savings of 70%-90% came into play. Microsoft blames hard disk vendors that the flash memory of HHDs, which usually is 256MB, is not enough. But the vendors retorted that Vista ReadyDrive is just not ready. Vista SP1 is supposed to improve the situation. Since there were significant power savings effects when an SDD was used, there is some hope that ReadyDrive might turn out to be useful in the future. At the moment the huge price difference between HHDs and normal HDs is not justified.
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[...] Vista ReadyDrive and hybrid hard drives (HHD) bring no power savings for laptops You’ll need a solid state drive (SDD) to see any significant power savings. (tags: Power ReadyDrive HHD ) [...]
I think this is expected, as the technology matures and algorithms improve, we should see power (and hopefully) performance improvements.
I guess so. It is just bad marketing. It will take quite some time until the reputation of ReadyDrive will be restored.
In my experience, even with sp1, readydrive and readyboost only causes problems on my laptop. I can gaurantee that 90% of application crash was from intel turbomemory even with most recent 1.6 drivers on a clean vista sp1.