Notebook hard drives

[Maxxarcade]

I'm thinking of upgrading the hard drive in my Netbook (Toshiba NB205), and I wanted to see if anyone here had any recommendations.

Currently it has a 160GB 5400 RPM Hitachi drive. The new one I am considering is a 320GB, 7200RPM WD Scorpio Black. Is there anything better for less than $100 out there?

[kikkoman]

Re: Notebook hard drives

you should reconsider.
7200rpm HDDs put out way more heat than 5400s.
I don't know your netbook but I assume it's already pretty crammed in there.

[Maxxarcade]

Re: Notebook hard drives

This netbook runs pretty cool already, because it's only an Intel Atom single core (N280). I'm not too worried about heat. Mainly trying to boost performance as much as I can.

[ratdude747]

Re: Notebook hard drives

curious, what OS?

[Maxxarcade]

Re: Notebook hard drives

curious, what OS?

Windows 7 Pro, 2GB RAM.

Runs pretty good once everything is loaded, but opening programs takes a bit longer than I would like.

[washu]

Re: Notebook hard drives

Do you need lots of space? If not get an SSD. I have an X25-V in my netbook and it made it much faster. You'll see a much bigger increase in speed than going with a 7200 RPM drive. Also your heat and power usage will go down, not up.

[Maxxarcade]

Re: Notebook hard drives

Do you need lots of space? If not get an SSD. I have an X25-V in my netbook and it made it much faster. You'll see a much bigger increase in speed than going with a 7200 RPM drive. Also your heat and power usage will go down, not up.

I really need at least 320GB, because I use it to store the 1080P videos from my camera when I am on vacation trips.

[washu]

Re: Notebook hard drives

I really need at least 320GB, because I use it to store the 1080P videos from my camera when I am on vacation trips.

SSD + USB 2.5" HDD?

If you care about space then just get the biggest 5400 RPM you can afford. A bigger drive will still be faster most of the time. A 7200 isn't going to make a huge difference in performance, but it will hurt your battery life and produce more noise and heat.

It's not the most accurate benchmark, but the difference between my 5400 and 7200 Seagate Momentus drives in the Win7 index is 0.1.

[bgavin]

Re: Notebook hard drives

Check your interface. If yours is the older 1.5 SATA, your machine may not accept the 3.0 gb SATA interface. As noted above, heat is a factor. IMO, the slight increase in net performance from 7200 rpm isn't worth the additional heat inside a jammed laptop.

Understand that SSD drives die a sudden (and early) death. They are built on NAND memory technology, which has a limited amount of writes. Do not defrag, etc if you own an SSD because this increases the write count significantly.

I have an SSD in my company provided laptop. I back up my entire projects and documents daily to our team server. I cannot tolerate the complete and unexpected loss of my project data.

Hitachi has the highest rate of failure for me. Next is Seagate Momentus followed by various WD. The stats at Newegg show all makes and models have a very similar failure rate. I run a complete Data Lifeguard pass on all my WD new drives. Any failures at all, and they go back for an exchange. If you RMA to WD, you get a used/recertified disk with a shorter warranty.

[Maxxarcade]

Re: Notebook hard drives

Check your interface. If yours is the older 1.5 SATA, your machine may not accept the 3.0 gb SATA interface. As noted above, heat is a factor. IMO, the slight increase in net performance from 7200 rpm isn't worth the additional heat inside a jammed laptop.

Understand that SSD drives die a sudden (and early) death. They are built on NAND memory technology, which has a limited amount of writes. Do not defrag, etc if you own an SSD because this increases the write count significantly.

I have an SSD in my company provided laptop. I back up my entire projects and documents daily to our team server. I cannot tolerate the complete and unexpected loss of my project data.

Hitachi has the highest rate of failure for me. Next is Seagate Momentus followed by various WD. The stats at Newegg show all makes and models have a very similar failure rate. I run a complete Data Lifeguard pass on all my WD new drives. Any failures at all, and they go back for an exchange. If you RMA to WD, you get a used/recertified disk with a shorter warranty.

I'm pretty sure it has SATA 3gb. I can double check that tomorrow.

If I do replace the drive, I'll probably stick with WD. I've had too many Seagates and Hitachis go bad on me with desktop drives.

And apparently there are two versions of the Scorpio Black. One has a free-fall sensor, the other does not. The plain version is about $20 cheaper.

[stj]

Re: Notebook hard drives

i think you can get 500gig for under 100$ (u.s. that is), i dont know how canadian compares these days.
probably stronger given that country's like russia are buying canadian $ now.

[bgavin]

Re: Notebook hard drives

I upgraded my Inspiron E1505 laptop, but stopped at the 160gb size. It was more important to have fewer platters, than having a lot of storage I won't use.

My machine came with the 1.5 SATA interface, so I replaced it with the same. Good news, Newegg had the 160 5400 on sale for super cheap.

Be sure to run a full pass of WDC data lifeguard tests on you new disk. I've had several arrive clicking, DOA, or otherwise busted.

[Maxxarcade]

Re: Notebook hard drives

I upgraded my Inspiron E1505 laptop, but stopped at the 160gb size. It was more important to have fewer platters, than having a lot of storage I won't use.

My machine came with the 1.5 SATA interface, so I replaced it with the same. Good news, Newegg had the 160 5400 on sale for super cheap.

Be sure to run a full pass of WDC data lifeguard tests on you new disk. I've had several arrive clicking, DOA, or otherwise busted.

Odd, I've had pretty good luck with WD's desktop drives... Are their laptop drives crap?

[Scenic]

Re: Notebook hard drives

usually not..
my experience with WD: either DOA (clicking/bad sectors/no spinup etc.) or working fine.
and if it's working out of the box, it usually keeps working.. ie no dying drives after a month or so..

doesn't matter if the drives are 3.5" desktop or 2.5" laptop ones.. always the same thing.. lol

[stj]

Re: Notebook hard drives

maybe the ones that fail got battered in transit!