New hard drive

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bubba
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New hard drive

Post by bubba »

ok I have a Dell Inspiron 9400/E1705 laptop for my work and is over due to be nuken and reinstalled. I want to shove a new hard drive in it, the 120GB one I have in it is starting to get a little snug for room. I'm also wanting to start using Linux more, so I will be dual booting XP and Ubuntu or openSUSE (havent decided yet). I'm leaning towards 250GB minimum, but not sure whats a good hard drive for lappies. I have a Seagate Momentous now (Seagate ST9120822AS), and was thinking about replacing it with another just bigger. Just wondering if there is something better... well other than SSD, cost is too high, I'm footing the bill for this upgrade.
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Re: New hard drive

Post by dicecca112 »

Keep in mind, an even bloated Ubuntu install is only going to use 5GB tops (min with VMs is about that). You can get a 30GB SSD for 80$, which is the same as the Seagate.
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Re: New hard drive

Post by FZ1 »

I just order one of the new GSkill Titan drives... :P Newegg had them in stock for a short time. If you want to spend the $ on on SSD, I'd get one of these or the OCZ Apex. They will be on the lower end of cost but great performance with built in RAID 0.
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Re: New hard drive

Post by dicecca112 »

Jesus Joe they paying you to shill these? :finga:
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Re: New hard drive

Post by martini161 »

from my experiance, opensuse hates nvidia graphics cards :vom:
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Re: New hard drive

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dicecca112 wrote:Keep in mind, an even bloated Ubuntu install is only going to use 5GB tops (min with VMs is about that). You can get a 30GB SSD for 80$, which is the same as the Seagate.
30GB :lol: I want more space not less. I need 60GB for my AutoCAD install alone, not to mention the project files. AutoCAD has to run in windows, well until AutoDesk gets off its rump and make a Linux version.
martini161 wrote:from my experiance, opensuse hates nvidia graphics cards :vom:
My lappy has an ATI mobility X1400
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Re: New hard drive

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dicecca112 wrote:Jesus Joe they paying you to shill these? :finga:
LOL, I've been looking at these a lot...what's good is good!
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Re: New hard drive

Post by hnzw_rui »

I'm currently using a Seagate Momentus 5400.4 250GB (ST9250827AS) on an Atom build and it's pretty quiet. Now that I've replaced the stock northbridge fan with a Scythe Mini Kaze, the Atom build is inaudible, save for times when I need to use the optical drive. I think most laptop drives are fairly quiet so really, you're only looking for something with a good price point and enough storage. The 5400RPM 500GB drives can often be found on Newegg for $100 after coupon. They use slightly more power than older models, though (at least the Seagate Momentus 5400.6 500GB does from reading product specifications), which can be important if you're running on batteries. There are also faster 7200RPM models. :)

Warning, one of my laptops came with a Toshiba MK1637GSX hard drive and it makes occasional beeps which can be irritating. I'm not entirely sure it's the drive making the beeping noise, but since it's accompanied by a seeking noise (actually, it sounds more like the head's moving from park), I concluded it was the HD. In fairness to the drive, it's survived quite a number of falls. :oops:

Just bought a couple of Seagate Momentus 5400.5 320GB (ST9320320AS, $80) recently but I haven't had the chance to install them yet. One's for the PS3 and the other's for a second Atom build which will be used to multi-boot XP Pro, Vista Ultimate, Windows 7 Beta and OS X. If anyone can give me any pointers for multi-booting (hard drive prep - partition sizes & file system format, which OS to install first, etc), it would be much appreciated. :prayer:
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Re: New hard drive

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narrowed it down to 2 drives

Seagate Momentus 7200.3 ST9320421AS 320GB 16MB Cache
Seagate Momentus 5400.6 ST9500325AS 500GB 8MB Cache

Both will get me the added space I want, now just need to figure out if I just want space or space and speed. Its a 17" laptop so running on the batts alone isn't for long anyway, I may end up with the 320.
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Re: New hard drive

Post by FZ1 »

I think I have the smaller version of the 7200.11 Momentus in my macbook pro...runs great and is quiet. It had the 5400 in it originally and I noticed a small improvement in responsiveness.
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Re: New hard drive

Post by hnzw_rui »

bubba wrote:Both will get me the added space I want, now just need to figure out if I just want space or space and speed.
You know you want both space and speed. :snakeman:
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Re: New hard drive

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bubba wrote:
dicecca112 wrote:Keep in mind, an even bloated Ubuntu install is only going to use 5GB tops (min with VMs is about that). You can get a 30GB SSD for 80$, which is the same as the Seagate.
30GB :lol: I want more space not less. I need 60GB for my AutoCAD install alone, not to mention the project files. AutoCAD has to run in windows, well until AutoDesk gets off its rump and make a Linux version.
martini161 wrote:from my experiance, opensuse hates nvidia graphics cards :vom:
My lappy has an ATI mobility X1400

holy ..........! what are you installing with AutoCAD? i install AutoCAD2009 on less than a Gb of disk space...... As for Autodesk making a Linux version of AutoCAD, you are a funny guy :lol:

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Re: New hard drive

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AutoCAD2009, Inventor2009 Simulation Suite, local vault client, standard fitting library, the SQL sever and database, MasterCAM... The you got all my little projects for work and play LOL crap piles up quick. I'm not in engineering anymore, but you wouldn't know y looking at my machine :lol:

So its more then just AutoCAD, but all for the same purpose :lol: , just a force of habit... no matter what it is the old guys here call it AutoCAD... but yeah it does take a !@#$ load of space.


EDIT: Typing all the above out made me realize how long I will be staring at my machine to reload all that... 2 hours easy just for CAD/inverter and the little crap it needs. ](*,)

do I really need the space :-k
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Re: New hard drive

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Well I went with speed. I ordered the 320 and an enclosure for the old drive. This gets me another 200gb in the lappy, with a nice 100gb of external space. Should have the stuff by the end of the week.
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Re: New hard drive

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bubba wrote:Well I went with speed. I ordered the 320 and an enclosure for the old drive. This gets me another 200gb in the lappy, with a nice 100gb of external space. Should have the stuff by the end of the week.
Great! The 7200RPM drive will give you a nice performance boost, the system should be more responsive and quicker when loading programs...

I was going to say... If you really need 500GB for a laptop then you need to be looking at a good external drive for file storage, or a NAS, or something. ;)
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Re: New hard drive

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My laptop bag is pushing 30lbs with the crap I have to carry with me. I don't need to be hauling a NAS around with me too LOL, its bad enough I'm adding yet another external drive.

In the bag...

-1x 17" dell laptop
-1x full size mouse
-2x (soon to be 3) 2.5" external hard drives for off site back up
-8x SLR60 data tapes, roughly the same foot print of a VHS tape but half as thick, again off site backup.
-1x set of ear buds
-1x 6ft cat5 cable
-2x 3 subject note books for well.... notes LOL
-some times a random Ninja Turtle or Storm Trooper because of my son.
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Re: New hard drive

Post by Kougar »

Yeah, that's a good bit of weight to be lugging around! After reading the rest of your post I guess this wouldn't exactly meet your needs either, but I was going to suggest if you need portability what about a NAS you can access when on the go?

configured my NAS to be accessible from home or anywhere I have an internet connection. As long as you have a good upload bandwidth and take all the necessary security measures it works fairly well. Honestly what you really need is a 1TB USB flash drive... :mrgreen:
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Re: New hard drive

Post by doghucat »

Do we see that much of a improvement going to a 7200rpm drive or is it worth the SSD upgrade just picked up a Notebook has a 160 and a 250 5400 drives and one show error sector count issues so i might have to replace the one. Plus is is worth the switch to 64 bit OS. HP dv9720US is the Model and this must be one of the good ones because there are a lot of this series with video issues or heat problems.
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Re: New hard drive

Post by bubba »

there wasnt a noticeable boost in speed, not like the switch to a good SSD would be, but SSDs are not exactly cheap for large storage space.

If you need space, go with traditional drives or the a Hybrid drive, if you need pure speed then the SSD route.
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