PB Hard Drive Options

filmmaker2002

Well, I think I am about to break down and buy a 1.25 15" Superdrive Powerbook...to hell with waiting for the G5. I do a lot of video editing, and I am in a dilemma...



Option 1: Spend the $112 on the 5400rpm drive and suffer from increased heat and decreased battery life, but get faster transfer rates for video.



Option 2: Stick with the stock 4200RPM drive and still edit video, but with longer battery life and reduced heat. Also, for serious editing, take that $112 and put it toward an external FW800 drive enclosure with a big ol' 7200RPM drive in it. I can also share that drive between my AlBook and Dual 1Ghz MDD.



What do you guys think?

luca

Option 3: Use that extra $112 to buy your own 5400 RPM drive, and sell the stock 4200 RPM drive. End up spending about $40 for the upgrade rather than $112. Use the extra leftover money for an external fast hard drive.



I'm not sure how practical that would be, but it might work. 5400 RPM drives aren't THAT much more expensive than 4200 RPM ones, certainly not $112 more.

machem

I think you're just rationalizing that the dual 1GHz isn't good enough to do your editing. Hey, don't worry, that is one rationalization I'd be proud to call my own.



I think you should put the extra money toward a 100+G 7200 full-height drive. That should cost something like $200. Isn't a 5400RPM drive questionable for video anyway? It seems to me that a "real" hd off firewire would do you the best.

theidiot

Three questions:



1. How big is the differece between 4k and 5k?



2. When would a faster hard drive be noticable?



3. Is the 5k noticably louder than the 4k?



Thanks.

filmmaker2002

On the contrary Machem, my Dual Gig is VERY adequate. It's my power-editing machine. But my production company is starting to roll again and I need a portable editing solution to take to clients to show them their projects. That and I have found myself wanting to do editing in places other than my office...I like to get out every once in a while and still get work done...I live near lake Michigan and it is beautiful to sit down by the lake and work. I obviously can't do this with a Power Mac. But I do think I will buy an external FW800 160-200GB drive, and just leave the portable editing to quick/light stuff.



theidiot,

1. Not sure what the transfer speed difference between the 4k and 5k drives are, Barefeats.com is supposed to post benchmarks soon, but I am kind of on a deadline as I need to get in on the Buy a Bundle rebate for edu buyers.

2. The faster drive SHOULD be noticeably faster when accessing extremely large files such as massive photoshop files and FInal Cut Pro media.

3. Sound isn't a huge factor, but battery life certainly is.



I think I am going to track down the specs from the manufacturers and find out what would be better. But I am definitely leaning toward going with the 80GB 4200RPM drive and buying a Lacie 200GB FW800 external drive. This way, I can also just pick up a Powerbook at my Apple Store and search for dead pixels, exchanging it if I find any. I'm still open to suggestions, thanks guys.

machem

Quote:

Originally posted by filmmaker2002

On the contrary Machem, my Dual Gig is VERY adequate. ...





I think I am going to track down the specs from the manufacturers and find out what would be better. But I am definitely leaning toward going with the 80GB 4200RPM drive and buying a Lacie 200GB FW800 external drive. This way, I can also just pick up a Powerbook at my Apple Store and search for dead pixels, exchanging it if I find any. I'm still open to suggestions, thanks guys.

Hey, I support you 1000%! The only limiting factor is money, dangit. I have the same problem.



I'm glad you can work at the lake --- my dad lives on a bluff on the east shore in Michigan.



The 4200 drives does have an 8M cache, which is pretty good. I'm interested in seeing how it feels. This machine I'm working on now has a 5400. But it will be difficult to see any difference because it's so old (400MHz G3).

filmmaker2002

Quote:

Originally posted by machem



The 4200 drives does have an 8M cache, which is pretty good. I'm interested in seeing how it feels. This machine I'm working on now has a 5400. But it will be difficult to see any difference because it's so old (400MHz G3).

Yeah, my TiBook that I sold a month ago in anticipation of getting the AlBook had that 48GB 5400RPM drive. It was a 667 VGA. Now I am on my mom's 12.1 iBook 800 with a measly 128MB of RAM. It's her school's, so I can't upgrade it, and it is SO incredibly slow in OSX. It takes about a minute to open iChat, Mail, and Safari if I click them all. used to take about 4 seconds on my Ti. I was going to wait for the Powerbook G5s, but I figured, I put my cash aside for THIS powerbook, so I might as well get it, that and I don't want to wait 8-12 months without a Powerbook. The 1.25 AlBook will last me a good couple years and then I'll go 64-bit with a 3Ghz G5 with 128MB Radeon 10000 Pro, 160GB 7200 RPM drive, 4 GB DDR400, and 4X Superdrives. <<droool>>

amnesia

I can't seem to find any info on the 4200 rpm drive and the 5400 rpm drive to compare, I ordered a 15 AlPB last night with the upgraded 5400 rpm drive and now reading the posts im hoping the power consumption isnt a huge factor. I was hoping to get at least 3 hours of battery life out of this with most of the stuff turned off. If anyone knows exactly the info I need to look it up or know where I could find the info so I can look at the power consumption on the data sheet of the hard drives it would be much appreciated.



Hoping they will make a higher watt battery for it to get me at least 5 hours of real world time on my PB with about half of the power options turned down. Something you guys should consider is this: http://store.mcetech.com/Merchant2/m...t_Code=NCHG4IB . It looks like a good alternative.



At only 0.5 inches thick I think I could slap that into the case with my PB and be good to go. Though 300 bucks IS alot but not when you consider an extra regular battery from apple.com is around 140 or so and this battery is 2 to 3 times the life of that.



BTW this is gonna be my 1st Mac ever . I have been converted from PC kinda. Still keeping my Desktop PC but after working with Windows XP and thinking that they finally got an OS that is totally awesome and stable, and then the blaster worm hits and I see the impact it has on the world of PCs, I got fed up and decided to buy a PB instead of the new Centrino notebooks.



So the point of that is if you guys could toss me some links to some websites where I can learn more and more about Macs and OS X, etc please post them here or email me at infinity080@hotmail.com.



Thanks in advance

ensign pulver

I saw a post about this drive being an excellent performer:



Toshiba MK5024GAY (Toshiba 50 Gb 2"1/2 7200 RPM 16 Mb)



Anyone with experience with 7200 RPM notebook drives? Are they really that fast? Do they eat batteries and heatsinks for breakfast?

filmmaker2002

amnesia, welcome to the family,



you couldn't have picked a better time to get a Powerbook, except maybe a year from now...but we won't get into that. I am gonna just love my Powerbook, as you will yours. They are totally sexy notebooks, perhaps the only tech gadget out there that can be referred to as such. I'll keep an eye out for that HD info for ya, but keep an eye on www.barefeats.com for benchmarks of the new Powerbooks, and they are gonna post some of the varying hard drives soon. Welcome to the light side again...

c-bear

A good thread on this subject from MacNN:



http://forums.macnn.com/showthread.p...hreadid=177019

filmmaker2002

Well, utilizing a little common sense and the fact that it is three in the morning and I am on about three different drugs (got wisdom teeth pulled this morning), I have concluded that if 60GB 4200 RPM drives were good enough for the 1Ghz Titanium Powerbooks for nearly a year, 80GB 4200RPM drives should be more than adequate for my 1.25 Ghz Aluminum Powerbook. The $112 that would have gone to that overpriced 5400 drive will now go toward a second 512MB RAM dimm from ramjet.com or crucial.com. Thanks to all who sparked this brilliant idea

666

I was hoping there would be info on this! I'm currently agonising over my pending p.b purchase and tend to overthink shiznit way too much. wizard!