Final Thoughts

The 1.5TB Barracuda is an impressive drive by any standards.  It has surpassed my expectations.  The capacity is second to none, and the performance comes close to the legendary Velociraptor (even besting it in some tests).  The price is also surprisingly competitive for such a new product.

With Solid State Drives nipping at the heels of traditional drives I think Seagate is moving in the right direction by going for an ultimate capacity/price/performance mix that will appeal to a lot of people.  If you're looking for a single drive to use for boot + storage, the 1.5TB Barracuda is a solid buy.  If you have more budget, you might want to look at a Velociraptor for a boot drive and a Barracuda 1.5TB drive for storage (since the Barracuda couldn't match the Velociraptor for seek time, as expected).

If you're looking for a high-performance high-capacity drive, you should do yourself a favor and buy the Seagate Barracuda 1.5TB drive!

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Index: Page 1 - Introduction, Testing Methodology And Test Setup Page 2 - Meet The Contenders Page 3 - HD Tune Results Page 4 - HD Tach Results Page 5 - Real-World Performance And Temps Page 6 - Final Thoughts