Futurelooks take a further look at the Seagate Barracuda XT 2TB SATA3 Hard Drive (ST32000641AS). The Barracuda XT SATA3 Hard Drive has 64MB Cache, platters still spin at a nominal 7200 RPM and power consumption average rates are listed as 6.39 watts at idle.

Hard drives do their best work when coupled with a good Storage Controller. In this particular instance, the Marvell Controller on our test board and/or even the drivers could very well be holding the SATA3 drive back. Unfortunately, we haven’t found any controller cards to put that theory to the test as of yet. When we can acquire one we’re going to give the Seagate 2TB Barracuda XT another shot.

As it is right now, the two monstrous drives are basically in an even race based on real world averages. Burst Rates and CPU Usage are well in favor of the XT which further stems our curiosity for better drivers or a better controller. But, we also get a glimpse as to how dependent these hard drives are on the 64MB Cache in order to keep transfer rates up. It makes you wonder if we can expect to see larger memory caches in the future to further improve performance.

Fortunately for us, the prices haven’t gone up just because it’s “new tech”. Expect to spend the same $299.99 for the 2TB Barracuda XT SATA3 drive as you would any other 2TB SATA2 hard drive on the market. So, you see, it’s not all disappointing news. Not to mention, once the controllers or drivers catch up, you can expect a bit more of a performance boost down the road.

Pros
 * Massive 2TB capacity
 * High density platters for more performance
 * Lower power consumption
 * 64MB Cache

Cons
 * As it stands: slower than its SATA2 rival
 * Limited SATA3 supporting controllers