Testing Information
Please note that the times indicated by the tests do not generally indicate
the maximum speed available from the specific devices, but are intended
to serve as a fixed reference that gives an indication of the relative
speed of each device when tested in the same manner, using the same test
programs. Also note that resulting times have been rounded to the nearest
second - except where that would cause a result of 0 seconds, in which
case the result has been rounded up to 1 second. Some tests may also include
directory search or program overhead time, but every attempt has been made
to keep these factors constant with all devices. It is also important to
note that while the test figures indicate the speed advantages of one device
over another, the actual amount of speed increase you will experience with
a particular program will be based on the actual disk access time (excluding
time required to process data being read or written), and will also vary
according to how efficiently the disk access routines in the program were
written. CMD HD test times vary depending on drive mechanism used (Quantum
LPS-105 used for figures shown).
All times presented in seconds
LOAD a 154-Block PRG File
Commodore 64 or 128 in 64 mode Commodore 128 in 128 mode
Stock w/JiffyDOS Stock w/JiffyDOS
1541 95 9 95 9
1571 95 7 11 7
1581 78 6 10 7
CMD FD 66 6 6 6
CMD HD 64 4 5 4
CMD HD (parallel) 2 2
RAMLink 1 1
SAVE a 154-Block PRG File
Commodore 64 or 128 in 64 mode Commodore 128 in 128 mode
Stock w/JiffyDOS Stock w/JiffyDOS
1541 112 36 112 36
1571 112 30 92 30
1581 56 21 31 17
CMD FD 51 20 27 16
CMD HD 50 17 26 14
CMD HD (parallel) 3 3
RAMLink 2 1
Read a 125-Block SEQ File
Commodore 64 or 128 in 64 mode Commodore 128 in 128 mode
Stock w/JiffyDOS Stock w/JiffyDOS
1541 84 15 82 15
1571 84 13 31 12
1581 62 9 16 9
CMD FD 52 9 12 8
CMD HD 48 8 10 6
CMD HD (parallel) 6 4
RAMLink 5 2
Write a 125-Block SEQ File
Commodore 64 or 128 in 64 mode Commodore 128 in 128 mode
Stock w/JiffyDOS Stock w/JiffyDOS
1541 98 33 98 33
1571 98 29 82 29
1581 40 15 22 12
CMD FD 40 15 21 12
CMD HD 37 12 16 8
CMD HD (parallel) 7 5
RAMLink 5 3
Read 500 127-byte REL Records
Commodore 64 or 128 in 64 mode Commodore 128 in 128 mode
Stock w/JiffyDOS Stock w/JiffyDOS
1541 175 61 175 61
1571 175 61 74 49
1581 128 25 34 22
CMD FD 107 21 27 19
CMD HD 104 23 26 21
CMD HD (parallel) 13 12
RAMLink 11 6
Write 500 127-byte REL Records
Commodore 64 or 128 in 64 mode Commodore 128 in 128 mode
Stock w/JiffyDOS Stock w/JiffyDOS
1541 230 82 230 82
1571 205 70 130 85
1581 86 39 47 36
CMD FD 84 34 46 29
CMD HD 87 37 47 35
CMD HD (parallel) 29 28
RAMLink 18 10
