Please help me understand why my HD access times are so high.

[sethkinast]

I have two 7200.10s running in my new system (non-RAID, one is OS / apps and the other is data). I benchmarked them with HD Tune because they just feel sluggish compared to even my older computer.

Anandtech reviewed the exact same drive and so I compared my results to theirs:
http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/4772/720010fu8.png

Eeeyargh! AT's drive is on the left, mine is on the right. The transfer rates look perfectly in line, but why are my access times so high! I don't think it's the drive's fault, because both drives (which were purchased from different retailers 6 months apart and have different firmware revisions) show the SAME results... normal throughput, high latency.

I run an eVGA 680i motherboard. I am sure I'm running the latest SATA drivers it has.

The two drives are on separate SATA channels. They used to be on the same channel so I tried switching them, made no difference.

What can I try next? Are the Vista 680i drivers just that bad?

Here are n7's results. He has the same drive but the AAK firmware that caps throughput. (My drive is AAE.) Still, his access times look like the "normal" 7200.10 from AT.
http://img183.imageshack.us/im...00gb598mbpersecnj8.jpg

 

[Rubycon]

Acoustic management turned on?

 

[sethkinast]

AAM is not included on the 7200.10 series.

http://www.seagate.com/support...ls/sata/100402371a.pdf (Page 51 footnote)

 

[Rubycon]

Can you try it in another system? Definitely does not look right.

 

[JustaGeek]

Disable NCQ.

 

[sethkinast]

That increased the burst speed significantly (+40MB/s), but the access times look about the same... hovering around 19ms.