INTRODUCTION

   When the first 2.5" (15mm thick) drives were unveiled to the world roughly 20 years ago the popularity of 3.5" ones thanks to their highest capacities and performance didn't leave much room for debate regarding which form factor was best. In the end it wasn't until several years later with the introduction of the next-gen portable personal computers (laptops) that use of 2.5" drives was deemed necessary mostly because of their size. Today things have changed quite a bit however and although 2.5" drives are still the number 1 choice for notebook manufacturers due to their small size (5-9.5mm thick), lower temperature levels and lower electrical demands they are also starting to take the place of their larger 3.5" brothers both in regular personal computers and in data intense application environments (enterprise-class). Because of that the leading manufacturers are dishing out many new models based on the 2.5" form factor for use with regular laptops, ultra-thin ones and of course with portable enclosures. Lately Toshiba introduced their latest MQ01ACF050 500GB 2.5" SATA III hard disk drive aimed towards casual users and as always we got out hands on one to see what it has to offer.

   Toshiba Europe Storage Products Division (SPD) has remained at the forefront of the storage industry for over 40 years and is the world's only storage supplier that owns design, development, manufacturing, sales and other infrastructure functions spanning the enterprise, mobile and retail environments for both HDD and SSD products. Customers are original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), system integrators and distributors within the EMEA region. As a leading provider of integrated storage solutions and as the principal inventor of NAND flash storage, Toshiba sets many of today’s industry standards for storage technology. Throughout its history, Toshiba SPD has revolutionized the design and development of storage devices and its drives can be found inside the world's leading GPS navigation systems, consumer electronics, computers and enterprise solutions. In addition, Toshiba Storage Products Division offers an extensive range of advanced technology drives such as high durability 24/7, extended temperature and SSDs for the consumer, industrial, enterprise and automotive sector.

   The MQ01ACF050 model already features a small capacity of 500GB but still Toshiba chose to also launch an 320GB variant the MQ01ACF032 and although we don't really know why (for system integrators is the most likely answer) i think that it's never a bad idea to have more models available (i would however like to see a larger capacity variant and not a smaller one). Specs-wise the MQ01ACF050 is one of the latest 7mm thick SATA III drives by Toshiba featuring a rotational speed of 7278RPM paired with 16MB of buffer RAM. Now normally 7278RPM is more than just plenty for 2.5" drives (5400RPM is the standard) but what really had us thinking is the 16MB RAM (data buffer) used with the drive especially since most similar ones to hit the market lately feature twice as much. Regardless this wouldn't be the first time that specifications and real world performance are worlds apart so let's see just how good the latest offering by Toshiba really is.

SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES

THE MQ01ACF050

Toshiba offers their products mostly to system builders so it was no surprise that once again we received the sample inside a static-free plastic bag.

Appearance-wise the MQ01ACF050 looks quite fragile but i think that's mainly because of its thickness (7mm).

On the sticker at the top of the drive we see the model name, revision, serial number, barcode, electrical requirements, factory rollout date, capacity and several certification and warning logos.

Once again all of the components are placed on the interior of the PCB for increased protection.

Right next to the SATA III power and data connectors we see 4 small pins (probably used for firmware updates).

Here we've placed the 7mm thick MQ01ACF050 right next to the 9.5mm thick TravelStar 5K1500 to showcase the difference in size.

TEST BED

TESTING METHODOLOGY 

     Thoroughly testing hard disk drives may require time and patience but that's just about it. Of course that doesn't mean that one must take it lightly, at least not when people base their decision on your results. True many choose to only use 2 or 3 benchmarking suits in order to measure the performance of a drive or drives since quite honestly most benchmarking suites do tend to agree with each other (so it's not really wrong) but we always like to take things a step further not because we have to but because we want to be almost 100% certain of the results we get and post in our charts (one can never be 100% certain about anything).

     So in this kind of reviews we will use a total of 7 different benchmarking suites in an effort to bring you the most accurate results across the board. Now the only reason why i say effort is because real-world usage is not always on par with what results one gets by running several benchmarks on a drive and that's mainly because there are many variables at work from ambient temperatures to hardware configurations and even firmware versions. The benchmarking applications we use are the AIDA64 suite (former Everest Pro), HD Tune Professional, HD Tach RW, ATTO, Sisoftware Sandra Pro, Crystal Disk Mark 64bit and the PCMARK7. These benchmarking tools are the best in what they do and as you will also see later on their results more or less agree. Each test is performed a total of 6 times and then the average is recorded into the charts. Temperatures are recorded using Hard Disk Sentinel and after 45 minutes of continuous testing in a 23 degrees Celsius temperature controlled room. The operating system as usual is a fresh installation of Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate Service Pack 1 with every update installed up until the 5th of December 2013.

TEST RESULTS - AIDA64 / ATTO

TEST RESULTS - HD TACH RW / HD TUNE PRO

TEST RESULTS - SISOFTWARE SANDRA PRO / CRYSTAL DISK MARK

TEST RESULTS - PCMARK 7 / TEMPERATURES

CONCLUSION

   Once we finished all tests i have to say that our very first reaction to the results we got back from the MQ01ACF050 was quite negative since its performance levels landed it right between the 7200RPM Travelstar 7K1000 (1TB) and the 5400RPM Travelstar 7K1500 (1.5TB) two of the latest 2.5" HDDs to hit our test bench. However we missed one very crucial point back then and that was the thickness of the drive compared to that of the other two (7mm vs 9.5mm). Now i don't really know for certain whether or not Toshiba could release an 7mm model with better performance (high performance equals to higher electrical demands and higher temperature levels) but what i do know is that low electrical requirements and temperatures matter a lot with such drives and in those two areas Toshiba has a winner. Also the fact that the MQ01ACF050 is faster than the Travelstar 5K1500 is not a small feat since although the 5K1500 spins at 5400RPM still it's thicker and features a larger data buffer (32MB vs 16MB). The only "drawback" i can think of regarding the Toshiba MQ01ACF050 is its available capacities which may be just too small for some people although to my knowledge the highest capacity for an 7mm drive is currently 1TB (WD).

   As we mentioned already Toshiba makes their products available mostly to system integrators so naturally it's not easy to find them in the market and in the case of the USA we were indeed unable to locate the MQ01ACF050. However it is currently available inside the EU (limited quantities) for a price tag set at around 60Euros which is not at all bad for an 2.5" 7mm 500GB SATA III HDD. In the end however it's quite clear that not many people will have use for a 7mm thick 2.5" drive so it’s understandable that Toshiba would make these models almost entirely available to system integrators. Bottom line the MQ01ACF050 500GB 2.5" 7mm SATA III HDD combines good performance levels with very low electrical demands and temperature levels making it ideal for use with ultra-thin notebooks/laptops and that's why it gets our Golden Award.

PROS

- Build Quality
- 7mm Thick
- Good Performance Levels
- Low Electrical Requirements
- Low Temperature Levels
- Price (For Some)

CONS

- Retail Availability
- Available Capacities