5400 vs. 4200 rpm??

Ok, so I'm THIS close to ordering a new merom mbp. I was thrilled to see that there was a 200GB HD available, but am concerned that there will be a perceivable performance difference between the 4200 rpm 200GB HD and the 5400 rpm 160 GB. I use the computer for work/personal use (no high end graphics work or anything), but imagine we will all be taxing our HDs more and more as digital video formats (ie, itunes movie store) continue to take hold.
I know no one has hands on experience with the new mpbs yet, but does anyone have a sense? Is the extra 40GB worth it?
Thanks,
Steve

I almost ordered my new MBP with a 160gb 5400RPM drive thinking "I'll need all the space I can get, but 4200 is too slow!"..
But I've since changed my order to a 100gb 7200rpm, heres why:
If you think about it, your operating system, programs, "virtual ram", streaming audio/video is all going to be pulled from the internal hard-drive.. And the computer is only as fast as the weakest link in the chain, so if you have a 2.33Ghz system, which is bottle-necked by a slow HDD read/write, you aren't going to be using your system to it's full potential...
The other point is, with firewire 800 now available in the 15" models, you can always buy large hdd's (a lot larger than the biggest 200gb, internal option), to store all of your larger data on anyway...
As I see it, if you are buying a MBP, rather than a MB, you obviously need the extra "oomph" the MBP provides, so my logic makes me think you'd be crazy to go for the slower, or even slowest hdd.
Just my opinion though.

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The New Hard Drives - 4200 rpm vs. 5400 rpm?

Hi,
Many thanks in advance for your attention.
The new MacBooks (and MacBook Pros) offer two Hard Drives.
160GB at 5400 rpm
and
200GB at 4200 rpm.
I do a lot of video editing. Isn't the 4200 (slower) HD inferior?
Why would more GB be offered at a slower rpm?
- Ross

Keep in mind that some drives have perpendicular technology in them, improving their performance even if the rpm is slower. the 160 GB 5400 in the current MBP's is one of those.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perpendicular_recording

200G 4200 rpm vs 160G 5400 rpm?

I'm considering a 200G drive for the extra capacity -- it seems like you can never have a drive that's too big. I'd love to be able to partition it for different development/OS environments. But can you get a drive that's too slow? Would I notice the speed difference on a "slower" 4200 rpm drive? Thanks for any thought you might have.

...does anyone know the exact model and - most importantly - the exact >seek< time (and throughput) of the different hard drive models...
You can find most of your answers here:
<a class="jive-link-external-small" href="http://">http://www.storagereview.com/articles/200511/notebook_1.html
http://www.storagereview.com/articles/200512/ST910021AS_1.html
http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/10/12/fujitsus_mhv2200bt/
Webb
PM G5 1.8/A 3GB, MBP 2.16, PM G4 DA , iMac600SE, 9600/G4, Older Macs/OS 7-10.3 Mac OS X (10.4.7) G5 has 2 Raptors, 4X 300GB eSATA. G4 has dual 1.2GHz, 2 X SATA, FW & SCSI drives

5400rpm's va 4200 rpm's

if I look at the choices for the new macbooks, I see that one with a larger HD has Less rpms . "160GB 5400-rpm drive or 200GB 4200-rpm drive" what is that telling me? Is that telling me that a larger hard drive runs slower?
thank you joanlvh

Hi joanlvh,
It is not noticeable for normal usage, but if you use the macbook for saving and loading large file, importing, converting and exporting movie, maybe the 5400 will make you done faster, that also have faster seek time.
With 4200 rpm, maybe your battery will keep a bit longer, but job done faster on 5400.
My macbook comes with 5400, but when I upgrade to 7200, I notice the increasing performance on moving big file back and forth to my external HD.
Good Luck

200GB hard drive at 4200 rpm

I'm about to purchase a MacBook Pro 15", would like to know the read/write speed of 200 GB 4200 rpm hard drive vs 160GB at 5400 rpm

Actually the response you get from a drive generally depends on how full it is. The fuller a drive gets the slower the overall performance gets. So the 40GB may come into play the more data you have and the 200GB drive may prove to be faster.
Additionally, even though the rotational speed is slower the higher density compensates for this so performance is in fact rather similar in this case.
If you intend on having 100GB or more in your drive then I would opt for the 200GB drive. It'll perform at least the same as the 160GB drive in this case.

320GB Serial ATA @ 4200 rpm

Does anyone have any experience with this MBP drive's performance? I see it spec'd on a model and wonder about it's performance.
Thank you

I was looking at buying one on eBay and the spec listed seemed odd, as it turned out the seller had installed his own 360GB upgrade and it was 5400 rpm - not 4200 rpm as he had it listed.
I did buy this one which has the 7200 rpm drive. The 7200 rpm drive was my preference although the other listed MBP had other features of the listing which made it worth looking at (came with MS Office Pro 08).
Thank you for your feedback.

Hard Drive Upgrade from 5400 to 7200 RPM

Well my logic board died and i have gotten that replaced and now i need to upgrade my hard drive from 5400 to 7200 rpm. I just dont know how to replace it. I have the memory upgraded so im good there just need help upgrading the drive
So how would i replace it?
Please help
thanks
and if there are any websites that could help me upgrade my HD

It is easy....
http://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook-Core-2-Duo-Hard-Drive-Replacement/514/1

Portable external raid - should I get 5400 or 7200 rpm?

Hi,
I'm in need of a portable external raid 1 for live data protection. I do illustration work in photoshop and I use bridge to access and view files and reference. I would like to write all my files and read all my files from an external raid 1 and I am wondering if I should get a 5400 or 7200 rpm setup.
My concern is read and write speeds.
My portable setup is a mbp 2.16 intel core duo. I'm thinking of getting the g raid mini 2.
Thanks in advance

Thanks for the response.
To clarify my question though -
1. I'm wondering if either will be fast enough to work off of - I'm planning on keeping the internal drive clean and all data would reside on the raid(so no incremental backups will be needed).
2. will the difference between 5400 and 7200 be worth the difference in price - ie. lag time or a noticeable speed difference.
Thanks

Using FCE HD with a 200 gb HDD 4200-rpm drives

I am thinking of getting a 15 inch mac bok pro with the 200 gb hard drive
Is the disc speed of 4200 fast enough to run Final Cut Express HD?
I will get 3 gb of RAM as well with the system.
Thanks
Jerry

Hello Jerry,
while it is true that 7200 rpm drives are recommended with video editing, I have just finished editing a project on a friends G4 1.66 Ghz Powerbook with only 512 MB RAM.
The project consisted of roughly 3 hrs of raw video and was stored on an 60 GB LaCie Pocketdrive (4200 rpm) and editing was done in FCP HD 4.5 and After Efects. The ext. hard drive was powered by the FW bus. We encountered no problems whatsoever, although I have to say that we captured to the internal HDD using BTV Pro, then moved the video files to the external drive.
mish

Question about the 300 gb hd with 4200 rpm

I will be purchasing a macbrook pro, but I was wondering is the 300 gb hd laptop that has 4200 rpm speed much slower than the 200 gb hd laptop at 7200 rpm? The extra hd space would really help me out, but I also don't want it to be too slow.

There is a significant difference in a hard drive that spins at 4200 and one that spins at 7200. If you do not want to sacrifice speed, then I suggest you purchase an external drive for your excess storage needs.

5400 or 7200 rpm?

Upgrading my hard drive and was wondering what everyone recommends for rpm. I've heard 7200 suck up battery but provide a lot better performance. Which do you prefer?

Find a 5400 and a 7200 drive that interest you then look at their respective specs. You will likely find that the 7200 does not use any more electrical current than the 5400 and therefore will not deplete your battery any quicker.
Far better to use actual numbers than the advice of others, who probably don't use the numbers either

5400 ROM & 7200 RPM HD's

I hope this is the right place to post this.
I have a 250GB 5400 RPM HD in my Macbook Pro. I want to replace it with the biggest HD I can find. I think I will get a 500GB or a 400GB @ 7200RPM. What I was wondering is if you guys think that the 7200RPM drive will run warmer than my 5400 drive? I need more space, please give me some suggestions?

The largest drive you can actually fit in your MBP is the Samsung 500 GB Spinpoint. You will also need to know how to disassemble the computer and you will need a few specialized tools. User replacement of the drive is not authorized or approved by Apple, so if you have any warranty remaining that warranty will be void with respect to any consequential damage caused by replacing the drive. To prevent that you would have to arrange for the work to be done by an authorized Apple technician or by your local Apple service center.
7200 RPM drives are not noticeably warmer than 5400 RPM drives in the same size class because they both use nearly the same amount of power and, thus, dissipate about the same amount of heat.

5400 versus 7200 rpm firewire disk: does it matter?

I'm in the market for an external firewire drive. The model I'm considering (LaCie Rugged Hard Disk) comes in 5400 rpm and 7200 rpm versions. I will be using my iMac G5's FireWire 400 connection. Given the transfer speed limitations of FireWire 400, will I see a difference between the 5400 rpm and the 7200 rpm models?
I will typically use Retrospect to backup my entire hard disk, and Synchronize Pro to synchronize folders between the external and internal disks.
Thanks.

Probably not with 400 transfer, however if you want to upgrade your computer later to an intel with 800 Firewire, you might be glad of the greater speed.

Is the 200GB 4200-rpm HDD fast enough to use for Final Cut HD Express?

Just saw the option of having a 200 gb HDD on the MBP
Is this fast enough to work with HD files?
Thanks
Jerry

Of course it is. It will mean slower speeds but a consistent factor (4200 divided by 5400) at most. I tend to tell people if they need extremely powerful video processing software to skip the macbook and get a mac pro. Anything thats going to take an extremely long amount of time on a 5400 isn't going to take all that much longer with 4200 (in fact once loaded into memory, its virtually the same).
So yes it is fast enough but a Mac Pro is even better for high performance video work.

RPM of the new HDD

Recently my harddisk was replaced.
There two version of the mk8025gas (5400 and 4200 rpm)
Is there a tool so I can find out which rpm the drive is running?

Hi Rene,
I believe the MK8025GAS has a revolution speed of 4200RPM whereas the 5400RPM version is called the MK8026GAX.
Check in device manager which one you have installed. (Or check the BIOS details at start up).
HTH

5400 vs. 4200 rpm??

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