Image processing

Adobe Photoshop

ACDSee PowerPack

WorldBench's Photoshop test doesn't stress the storage subsystem, but ACDSee does spread the field a little. The E7K1000 sits in the middle of the pack in that test, where it's notably slower than Western Digital's enterprise-oriented RE3. Switching the Deskstar from performance to quiet mode results in a minor performance hit, but four seconds over more than an eight-minute test isn't much of a margin.

Multitasking and office applications

Microsoft Office

Mozilla

Mozilla and Windows Media Encoder

There isn't much to see through WorldBench's office and multitasking tests.

Other applications

WinZip

Nero

However, both Nero and WinZip provide opportunities for faster drives to differentiate themselves. In the latter, the Deskstar is in good company, hanging just a few seconds behind the RE3. The E7K1000's position improves in Nero, where it's quicker than the RE3 and only trails the 640GB Caviar and 10K-RPM VelociRaptor.

Through both the Nero and WinZip tests, we again see little difference in performance between the Deskstar's AAM modes.