7200 2.5" hard drive speed/cost

tangle · 01-22-2007, 06:40 PM

I currently have a Fujitsu MHV2100AT PL hard drive and am not happy with the performance. Does anyone have any suggestion for a replacement hard drive for my laptop. I would like to have at least 60gb-80gb and a price around $100. I am really looking for the best performance for the price/capacity range. Thanks

macemoneta · 01-23-2007, 11:55 AM

I use the HITACHI Travelstar 5K100 HTS541080G9AT00 80GB 5400 RPM 8MB Cache ATA-6 Notebook Hard Drive, and have been very happy with its performance:

Code:

# hdparm -Tt /dev/hda

/dev/hda:
 Timing cached reads:   1276 MB in  2.00 seconds = 638.30 MB/sec
 Timing buffered disk reads:   88 MB in  3.05 seconds =  28.85 MB/sec

It has a much higher load/unload cycle rating (600,000) than most hard drives, and this was important for me as I try to keep the drive spun down as much as possible. It also has better operating shock ratings (300 G / 2ms, 160G / 1ms) and is much quieter than other laptop drives I've used (27dB operating).

tangle · 01-23-2007, 03:54 PM

Thanks, I will take a look at it.

Electro · 01-23-2007, 05:45 PM

Hitachi's 7200 RPM model for their 2.5 inch drives are a little faster (actually lower latency) than their 5400 models, but are a little noisy. In Linux you can use hdparm to decrease the acoustic management to 128 or 64 instead of the normal 255 (fast).

Fujitsu and Seagate has 10000 and 15000 RPM 2.5 inch drives has an accessing time of <4 ms. These are only for SATA or SAS. If your notebook has a power supply that can handle the consumption of these hard drives and you do mind about noise, these types of 2.5 inch drives can be used instead. However, they cost about $600, so probably solid-state hard drives will be a better buy if you do not forking $600+ for a storage device.

tangle · 01-23-2007, 07:08 PM

Noise and power consumption are not a real concern with me ( it is plugged in the wall 99.9% of the time). I have a safety reward from work that equals $100, so I would like to keep in around there. I did look at a 80gb 7200rpm Hitachi after I looked at the 5400rpm one that macemoneta mentioned. The one I have is a 4200rpm and the seek time are 14ms. Thanks for the info.