CONCLUSION

   The MQ01ABD100H 1TB SSHD by Toshiba is actually the 6th hybrid drive I’ve gotten my hands onto over the years and so i really was hoping to see something new in terms of read/write performance (although i also knew that's next to impossible right now for a consumer oriented drive). Unfortunately however as was expected that didn't happen and so the MQ01ABD100H yielded performance numbers (some better and some worse) very similar to the Laptop Thin SSHD drive by Seagate we reviewed last year. Of course that doesn't mean we were disappointed far from it since at the end of the day we are still talking about an consumer oriented 2.5" drive so we didn't and can't expect miracles but still we think that hybrid technology has room for improvement (manufacturers however always have to balance cost and performance). What really impressed us quite a bit were the temperatures of the drive which never exceeded 32 degrees Celsius and although this is obviously not crucial for most people it may just be enough of an advantage to give it a head start.

   Hybrid drives currently offer the best price/performance ratio in the market and the MQ01ABD100H 1TB SSHD is not an exception to that rule since it currently retails for just USD120.35 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and for 100Euros inside the EU (Amazon.co.uk). Sure you can find many 1TB 2.5" HDD models for quite less but if you decide to house the OS inside the drive then a hybrid model is well worth the extra investment (purely for backup purposes however a normal HDD is far more suitable). Thanks to its very good performance and impressively low temperature levels the MQ01ABD100H 1TB SSHD by Toshiba is amongst the very few ideal choices for laptops and HTPCs and that's enough for it to grab our Golden Award.

PROS

- Build Quality
- Ideal For OS Use (SSD-Like Performance For Cached Files)
- Very Low Temperatures
- Low Power Consumption (2.5W At Load)
- 3 Years Warranty
- Price (For Some)

CONS

- Mid-End Overall Performance (Un-Cached)