Seagate ST2000LM007 2TB 128MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 2.5″ Internal Notebook Hard Drive

Pros: The physical size: 2.5″ width, 7mm thickness. There aren’t many small form factor hard disks that offer this much storage space or the 128MB cache, if any. If you are looking to replace a laptop secondary storage drive, this Seagate 2TB 5400RPM is the way to go. Paired with an SSD to run Windows and applications this is the perfect solution.
And I wouldn’t limit it’s uses to just a laptop or notebook. If you have any small form factor micro-ITX build that is lacking space for additional traditional 3.5″ hard disks this will also be a great solution. Less heat, less noise, and will fit into any SSD designed tray to give you a good extra 2TB.
The Seagate ST2000LM007 is also a great portable option for users. Purchase an external housing designed for SATA SSDs, throw this thing in there, and you’ve got your own 2TB USB 3.0, eSATA, or Thunderbolt portable disk. It’s light weight and low heat producing design also make it a good on-the-go solution.

Cons: For the scenario this device is designed for, I don’t see any cons.

Overall Review: While in actual use transferring 2GB video files from a SATA SSD to this Seagate ST2000LM007 the speeds reached ~185MB/s, while averaging ~120MB/s. Transferring the same files back to that same SSD the speeds reached ~110MB/s, averaging ~85MB/s.

Running virtual tests with a disk speed measuring application using file sizes from 512KB up to 40GB the results averaged at:

Read:
min: 70 MB/s
max: 140 MB/s
total avg: 101 MB/s

Write:
min: 47 MB/s
max: 131
total avg: 94 MB/s

I would say those are fairly good results with a 5400RPM disk housed in this mini 2.5″ form factor.

Pros: – Super Thin Height of 7mm
– Fast Speeds
– Quiet Operation
– Large Disk Capacity for a small HDD
– 2 Year Warranty
– Price versus Storage

Cons: – None

Overall Review: First off, this drive is super thin and has a lot of storage space in such a small foot print. Most modern day ultra books and laptops require a small 7mm HDD. This does a great job at that.The drive operation is quiet and seems to run decently cool under load. I benchmarked the drive nn a Windows 10 machine with CrystalDisk and received the following speeds:

Benchmarks:

Avg. Sequential Read Speed 128MB/s
Avg. Sequential Mixed IO Speed 137MB/s

Avg. 4K Random Read Speed 0.63MB/s
Avg. 4K Random Write Speed 1.44MB/

The sequential reads and writes were expected and even the lower random read and write speeds. I’ve benchmarked a lot of HDD and feel the speed difference with this 5400 RPM drive and other 7200 RPM drives was not very noticeable. The drive is not the fastest but is definitely adequate as an OS drive or as a storage drive.

I ended up using this drive as an upgrade in a friend’s PS4 and bumped his 500 GB HDD up to 2TB. This drive would also make a good upgrade for a PC laptop, MacBook or Mac Mini.

Overall, a good average performance drive for the price. You get a very small footprint and a very large storage capacity.

Pros: For the price, this is a great little 2.5″ HDD. With a 7mm height it is small, lightweight, and great for thin devices that require a lower profile 2.5 HDD. It has a SATA3 6.0Gb/s interface with a 128MB cache, which is larger than other laptop size hard drives, sans an SSHD (SSD cached drive). It is a 5400RPM drive, but operates extremely quiet with zero noticeable vibration noise.

I used this drive in a Micro ATX case, which has limited room for drives and fits perfectly next to the existing SSD. It takes little space and works perfect as a small data drive. Per Crystal DiskMark (see below), it delivers just under 140MB/s on sequential reads/writes, which is on par with most 3.5″ drives.

Cons: My only con is the 2 year warranty. However, looking at other drives at this price point, a 2 or 3 year warranty is typical.

Overall Review: Crystal DiskMark Results:
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Sequential Read (Q= 32,T= 1) : 139.371 MB/s
Sequential Write (Q= 32,T= 1) : 134.606 MB/s
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 32,T= 1) : 1.470 MB/s [ 358.9 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 32,T= 1) : 1.483 MB/s [ 362.1 IOPS]
Sequential Read (T= 1) : 139.034 MB/s
Sequential Write (T= 1) : 135.684 MB/s
Random Read 4KiB (Q= 1,T= 1) : 0.544 MB/s [ 132.8 IOPS]
Random Write 4KiB (Q= 1,T= 1) : 1.486 MB/s [ 362.8 IOPS]

Test : 1024 MiB [E: 0.0% (0.3/931.4 GiB)] (x4) [Interval=5 sec]
Date : 2016/11/19 13:00:42
OS : Windows 10 Professional [10.0 Build 14393] (x64)

Installed System:
—————–
i3-4170 (3.7GHz)
8GB DDR3 1866
256GB Samsung 850 Evo
1TB Seagate 2.5″ HDD
MSI GTX960 Armor2x
Fractal Design Core 1100 Black mATX case

Pros: I can start off by saying that the SeaGate RMA process for the first drive was really good. The online form you fill out was easy to use and submit. After sending my drive to them, a new one arrived quite quickly. This one was better working order than the initial drive I received.

On to the drive, what can I say? Drive is quiet for a mechanical and relatively quick to respond and transfer (for a mechanical). It doesn’t beat my SSDs in a speed test and it does slow down the boot time of the laptop I tested it in to around 15 seconds, down from about 7 from off to desktop. That being said, it’s a great big amount of space on an ultra slim.

It fits in the same place an Ultra Slim drive was in my laptop (there aren’t a lot of options when it comes to a 1TB size drive in 7mm thickness) without issues.

The drive that I received as a replacement is a quiet as a mechanical drive can be and actually produces very little to no vibrations even when outside a device (just getting benchmarked on a test station).

Cons: Well, I had to RMA the first one. It didn’t work straight out of the box. No detection, nothing. I’m going to assume that it was probably the circuitry on the drive as the disk did spin up. However, the drive was never detected by any OS I tried (Ubuntu, Windows 7, Windows 10). There was a faint “drive seeking” noise coming from it when it was connected so something was up with it.

The second drive was fine and has performed well even after being thrashed by Crystal DiskMark and other tests.

It’s worth noting that both of my non-power assisted USB3 drive enclosures were unable to provide the amount of power needed by this drive when it was running at peak power. They would both give up and the drive would disconnect. I’ve tested other drives with the same enclosures and they didn’t experience the problem.

Running it elsewhere, it performs fine. I just feel like possibly my example pulls more power. While I don’t have an official test, the laptop ran 1.5 hours less on battery with this drive as a standard mechanical drive. Also worth noting that another half hour was lost going from the SSD to my 250GB ultra Slim Toshiba drive that I compared this to.

That being said, I believe that this drive draws a little more power than your average Ultra Slim but have no way to accurately show this.

Overall Review: I’m taking one Egg off for the DOA drive. I’m leaving it at four eggs because Seagate was actually quite good at replacing it quickly with minimal hassle.

Speeds from Crystal DiskMark below from the second drive (first drive did not work)

Sequential Read : 139.624 MB/s
Sequential Write : 134.969 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 46.073 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 82.746 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 0.555 MB/s [ 135.6 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 1.391 MB/s [ 339.7 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 1.509 MB/s [ 368.5 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 1.414 MB/s [ 345.1 IOPS]

Test : 1000 MB [D: 0.0% (0.2/931.4 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2016/08/23 18:56:11
OS : Windows 10 Pro (x64)

Sequential Read : 139.768 MB/s
Sequential Write : 137.748 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 42.904 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 73.442 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 0.493 MB/s [ 120.2 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 1.241 MB/s [ 302.9 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 1.282 MB/s [ 313.0 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 1.223 MB/s [ 298.5 IOPS]

Test : 4000 MB [D: 0.0% (0.2/931.4 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2016/08/24 7:06:01
OS : Windows 10 Pro (x64)

Sequential Read : 131.979 MB/s
Sequential Write : 136.241 MB/s
Random Read 512KB : 299.345 MB/s
Random Write 512KB : 142.980 MB/s
Random Read 4KB (QD=1) : 8.595 MB/s [ 2098.3 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=1) : 1.799 MB/s [ 439.1 IOPS]
Random Read 4KB (QD=32) : 13.713 MB/s [ 3347.9 IOPS]
Random Write 4KB (QD=32) : 1.822 MB/s [ 444.9 IOPS]

Test : 50 MB [D: 0.0% (0.2/931.4 GB)] (x5)
Date : 2016/08/24 18:44:47
OS : Windows 10 Pro (x64)

Pros: 2tb at 7mm for under $100. 128m cache? Really? Absolute work horse for quick file dumps, backup jobs, etc. Quite and relatively low heat.

Cons: Not really a con as it preforms just fine, but it is a 5400 rpm disk.

Overall Review: With SSD’s being so low now, I would not advocate using a 5400 rpm disk as a boot disk. If you had to go mechanical you can find SSHD disks that will give you that boost while using your OS and the space you need for an overall good experience. You could theoretically use this as a boot drive, and it would not be a bad option, just there are better choices out there for this.

Now that that’s out of the way, I absolutely loved this drive. When I saw that this thing had 128m of cache it really had me dying to try it out. For small quick file dumps or retrievals, this thing literally is a rocket for a 5400rpm drive. Sub 1.5G files I was writing at over 200 MBps and I was coping those same files from the disk at over 350 MBps. But as soon as you start into prolonged writes or reads, you break into the 50-80 MBps range. And that range is what is about what I expected for a 5400 RPM drive. But you have to ask yourself what you are looking for. Most of the files I store are under 2G and im keeping them on my large storage to keep them, not use them.

Overall I loved this drive for what it is. A faster than normal 5400 RPM storage drive. It offers far greater performance (briefly) than other 5400 RPM drives I’ve used in the past but will fall off if prolonged writes happen. If your trying to compare this with an SSHD or an SSD then your barking up the wrong tree. But if you are looking for a good drive that is not going to break the bank and offer you a ton of storage and fit in a 7mm housing for thin laptops, then I would look no further.

Pros: Nice, small form factor, high capacity, and speedy 2.5″ drive. I had had this unit in service for over a month now and it has worked like a charm in my laptop, not only does it run at a decent speed, but it allows me a massive storage upgrade for my portable machine. It runs cool and quiet. Pretty speedy for a 5400 RPM drive. Lots of space in a small package. I had no trouble getting this drive to run in a Core 2 Duo based laptop, a massive upgrade to my mobile storage!

Cons: Not as fast as a SSD. It’s a 5400 RPM mechanical drive. Nothing else major to report as a con.

Overall Review: I did my benchmarking on a desktop machine with this drive, however I did test it in my old laptop as well since it might find a home there so I can have a huge amount of portable storage. The reason I tested it in my laptop was to see if I could add massive storage to an aging machine to make it more useful again as well as upgrade for more space to use when I am out and about taking pictures. I tested on a desktop machine as well to see where the drive maxed out since the laptop is older and slower. Overall I am very happy with the performance of this drive.

Crystal Disk Benchmarks performed on a desktop machine.

4GiB Test File
Sequential Q32: Read: 132.6MB/s Write: 129.4MB/s
4K Q32: Read: 1.289MB/s Write: 1.274MB/s
Sequential: Read: 131.9MB/s Write: 133.2MB/s
4K: Read: 0.472MB/s Write: 1.354MB/s

100MiB Test File
Sequential Q32: Read: 133.2MB/s Write: 105.6MB/s
4K Q32: Read: 6.086MB/s Write: 1.603MB/s
Sequential: Read: 128.8MB/s Write: 127.9MB/s
4K: Read: 2.314MB/s Write: 1.686MB/s

Benchmark performed on an older Core 2 Duo laptop.

4GiB Test File
Sequential Q32: Read: 111.9MB/s Write: 91.96MB/s
4K Q32: Read: 1.001MB/s Write: 1.235MB/s
Sequential: Read: 107.6MB/s Write: 101.5MB/s
4K: Read: 0.334MB/s Write: 1.225MB/s

Pros: The drive is very slim and lightweight. The height is only 7 mm. The drive interface is 6 Gbps SATA and the cache is a hefty 128 MB. The price for such a large drive is very reasonable. Performance is good overall for a 5400 RPM drive, likely because of the large cache (see other for benchmarks).

Cons: The main con is that the drive runs at 5400 RPM which makes random reads and writes very slow. Also a 2 year warranty is short by today’s standards, which makes you a little worried about reliability. Many other brands have warranties in the neighborhood of 5 years.

Overall Review: The drive runs very quiet and cool while under load. In my testing (Crystal Disk Mark) the drive had very good sequential read and write speeds, 138.2 and 138.7 MB/s respectively. Random read speeds were relatively slow at between .55 and .61 MB/s, while random write speeds were more respectable at between 1.4 and 1.5 MB/s. The sequential read and write speeds are excellent because of the large cache, however, the 5400 RPM spin speed shows it’s weakness with random reads and writes, where the cache is less helpful
In a month of use the drive has proven to be fast, cool and quiet. I installed the drive in a Dell business laptop and was able to install Windows 7 in about 25 minutes, which is on par to a desktop install. Even though the drive is only 7 mm, I was able to install it no problem in a standard 9.5 mm drive bay.
Seagate offers a self-encrypting drive in the same series if that is important to you.
The real test will be to see if the drive is still working a year or two from now.

Pros: Put drive into my Dell D4620 installed windows 10 pro 64 bit on it in about 30 minutes drive seemed to function quite fast for a 5400RPM spin drive, after got all the updates done partitioned it with windows disc manager and had no issues there then I rebooted and setup a dual boot with Peppermint 7 Linux took about 10 minutes to fully install again saw no issues with the job. Then it was time to delete everything and set it up as an external drive in a Rosewill USB2 case transfer speeds seem better that expected transferred 11GB of MP3 files to it in about17 minutes then JPEG files 17.6GB 8776 files took about 13 minutes. The drive never showed signs that it had less than quality build took everything in stride then deleted all partitions and put into the Dell again and put win 10 Pro on it again did not watch time as closely but seemed about 30 minutes again. I took out again and put it into storage for a backup drive in case my SSD dies and I need something quick. Good price factor for 1TB drive in 2½ format. Looks like some of the solder joints use gold instead of cheaper lead but not all the solder points solder points look clean and no slop in them like cheaper drives sometimes have

Cons: it is a spin drive so of course will use more power from laptop battery reducing run time

Overall Review: SYSTEM USED
DELL Latitude E6420 2.5GHZ 8GB RAM
ROSEWILL SATA III external enclosure Aluminum USB 2