On Sun, 19 Nov 2017 20:25:51 -0500, John B. Smith
wrote:

When backing up one logical drive today I noticed Drive Image was
taking a long time to 'scan' all the drives before it declared itself
ready.
(When I back up my system drive I use Macrium, but when I back up this
particular drive I use old Power Quest Drive Image because it allows
me to set a password).
Eventually I was able to back up the drive. It did seem to take longer
than usual though.
For some reason I later used HD Tune to ck my 2 drives, the 500g
system drive and the 1000g data drive. The 500 reported the usual
170Mb per second. The 1000 reports only 4Mb per second!
Otherwise HD Tune reports the drive healthy and working.
I'm pretty sure it really has slowed down from the above 2
indications. Anybody have any idea what's going on?

All things being equal (XP/SATA), I get a similar result -between two
program file managers- one being faster than the other - e.g., Turbo
Navigator and Total Commander;- TC is the newer and faster of the two,
(as well possessing a greater integrity), although they're both
relatively ancient for publication or release dates.

Not of course neither is so old as possibly to switch into PIO modes,
or otherwise to incur unacceptable discrepancy. CRC redundancy
checking, for instance, sustains an added software layer, at some
higher level, than might, additionally, a defragmentation program,
however disparate, in your case, block-sectional, binary streaming
manipulatives.

A recently purchased MB, I have, suffers marginally slow disc access
due to hardware controller issues, of possible mismatch to their
drivers, as given definable choice to a BIOS selection, both to access
and define the OS install, from a combination of means and resources
available. Of course, a less than standard optimal, I have yet to
address, to presuppose I may succeed, as I wish, to improve
defragmentation through the reinstallation of an OS.

Oddly, nothing else causes noticeably protracted disc-transx
performance, such as stepping on a 4Mb/sec landmine you mention.
Although I'm less than enamored, as well, and though computers no
doubt are precise, they do seem, at times, still, less than exact
about being properly coerced: Seemly being more or less within a
realization of what _I paid_ for a "cheap" $50 motherboard, as may not
apply to either perceived or actual limitation of experience.

I suggest first you separate benchmarks from data-streaming imaging
programs. Satisfy them individually before a final combination for
making inferences between them, that they both exhibit confidence at
an optimal for your hardware. That will apparently involve evaluating
a selection of programs and software to achieve the optimal, since
you've already provided the sub-optimal;. . .no optimal being,
conversely, that then indeed you will be looking at hardware issues.