INTRODUCTION

   Professionals, enthusiasts, gamers (both PC and console ones) and even casual users all have but one thing in common, they all own at least one external 3.5" desktop hard drive. Literally to this day I’ve yet to meet a single person that doesn't own at least one and since i use several both at work and at home this doesn't really come as a surprise to me. So, what to look when out to get a brand new external hard drive? Capacity is obviously the first thing to look for followed by connectivity (USB 3.0/3.1/3.2/TB3 are obviously the fastest ones currently) and of course both hard drive and enclosure quality (neither all hard drives nor all enclosures are created equal). Needless to say, brand name also matters quite a bit , still clearly not nearly as much as one would think. So today I’ll be testing two such external hard drives, the Stream S06 and S07 6TB models by Silicon Power.

   Founded in 2003 by a group of enthusiastic data storage industry experts, Silicon Power is committed to delivering outstanding product and service quality. Headquartered and with our own state-of-the-art production site in Taipei, we have become a leading manufacturer of flash memory cards, USB flash drives, portable hard drives, solid state drives, DRAM modules and industrial-grade products. As an international player with four branch offices around the globe, we continuously strive to offer the perfect data storage solution for all requirements of modern digitalized life. With a strong focus on combining innovative technology and award-winning design, we live up to our brand promise to reliably preserve and protect your most valuable data. Because memory is personal.

   The Stream S06 (currently available in 2/3/4/6/8TB) and the Stream S07 (available in 3/4/6/8TB) may both use SATA to USB 3.1/3.2 Gen 1 controllers and feature 3.5" hard disk drives inside their enclosures but that's just about were their similarities end. Their main difference of course is the drives used so even though under the hood of the Stream S06 we find the Seagate Barracuda ST6000DM003 3.5" HDD under the hood of the Stream S07 we find the WD Blue WD60EZAZ 3.5" HDD. Now both are SATA III 6Gb/s drives with rotational speeds of 5400RPM and 256MB Cache but whereas the former features Multi-Tier Caching and AcuTrac Servo technologies for optimal performance and data integrity the latter comes ready with IntelliSeek, Data LifeGuard and NoTouch Ramp Load Technologies. The enclosures however are also different so the Stream S06 features a sleek plastic one that also has a very convenient carrying handle at the top whereas the one used with the Stream S07 is textured. So, time to test them and see which of these two is really the best (at least in terms of performance).