9300 with 80gb Hard Drive

I just orded my 9300 and I got the 80gb hard drive instead of the 60gb 7200rpm HD. Have any of you gotten the 80gb with 512mb RAM on the 9300 and regretted it from a speed standpoint or is it just fine? I wanted the large drive for pictures and MP3's and I don't play many games.

Any info from people who already own a 9300 would be greatly appreciated as I can still make changes if need be.

 

After speaking with a Dell rep, my understanding is that you can upgrade most of their notebook hard drives to 54000rpm from 4200 -- if you call them with the request. Is your HD 5400 or 4200.

My impression from others is that the performance difference between 5400 v. 4200 is greater than the 7200 v. 54000. That doesn't make sense to me (29% increase v. 33%), but what do I know? Maybe someone else can offer their expertise.

 

I've used both, the 7200 is faster. A lot of it depends on what you are doing. If you just surfing or burning discs the difference won't be as great. If you are doing something where a lot of data is being swapped to the drive, the performance difference will be more noticeable. I personally would go with the 7200, if you can swing it, unless you need the extra space. Good Luck.






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Thinkpad T42:
* 1.8Ghz Pentium M * 1.5GB Memory * 60GB Hitachi 7200RPM * 15" SXGA+ Flexview * CDRW/DVD Combo *

 

Wassct,
I have to totally disagree .Of course these are opinions! If you're into Hardcore gaming ,etc...then you want the fastest speed,best graphics card,etc.

You want to save tons of movies,pictures,photography and music then you're going to want the largest HD also!

You are not going to see enough,if any difference switching to a 60GB 7200 Rpm except for possibly not having enough memory. If you change anything then go for the 100GB HD and at least 1 gig of ram (you might have plans for doing that yourself like most on this site) !!!

You're talking about pictures and music. You need a large HD ! My immediate suggestion is only upgrading to a 1gig of Ram (yourself or purchasing if you can)! I don't know how much you do with pictures and music but a 100GB HD is going to be better for you than going down to the 60HD 7200 where you wont even see a difference except possibly not having enough space for your pictures and music.

You will always come across the selected few that insist they see the difference in the 7200 HD no matter what! I'm not putting them down because it's an opinion!

I would say "if" there was ever a really "affordable" option to go with an 80/100 GB HD 7200 Rpm's ...then go for it! In this case if you make any changes at all for mainly pictures and music, it would be the 100GB HD and/or at least the 1 gig ram!

It's my opinion I know! I still think if you go down in size to the 60HD 4200/5400/7200 It's not good enough for what you are describing! You also made a huge comment about regretting from the speed stand point! No way! You need the larger Hd ,you wont see practically any difference (some people could guide you to a comparison chart) !

Maybe at another later time you can purchase a 80/100 7200 Rpm HD. You were smart enough to know you needed a large HD for pictures and music...don't regret your decision!

Typically it is gamers that swear by the speed! Right now for you you need the larger HD possibly down the line with an compatible upgraded huge 7200 HD.

I guess I can't express enough that for your needs you seem to have made the correct decision and if possible going with a 1 gig of Ram.

Best Regards!

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Wassct,
I have a 9300 with the 80GB hard drive and 1G of RAM and it works perfectly fine. If you plan on having alot of MP3's Video's and Picture's then I would recommend going out and getting yourself an external HD. For a couple $hundred, it will be well worth it.

 

Hi,
Also the 80gb is 5400rpm, I'm not sure if the 100gb is shipping at 4200 or 5400 . I'd check into this before getting the 100gb over the 80gb one. I bought the 80gb drive, and as the previous poster mentioned, you can always buy an external usb2.0 hard drive, and also burn to dvd. From a price standpoint, I think the 80gb is a better buy than the 100gb anyway...

 

If you do a ton of video editing/processing, yes you will definitely notice a speed improvement with a faster drive, but if that is the case I recommend an external enclosure anyway -- to keep the "work" drive separate from the "system" drive for better reliability and better performance.

You will see virtually NO gaming improvements with a faster drive, as the only thing it helps is with load time. We are talking about 5 seconds for a slower drive verses 4 seconds for a faster drive. I'll wait a second more and get a bigger drive anyday! lol

Yes Windows will boot slightly faster if you have a faster drive, I'm sure you don't spend the bulk of your time booting Windows either...

Pretty much yea, I don't think you'll regret it unless you plan to use the machine to do extensive video processing, and even then a *better* solution would've been getting an external enclosure. You can get a 300GB HD for $119. [ ]

cheers,

yass

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by wassct

 

C,
If course the 80 HD is fine. The main concern for Wassct was the possible regret about not switching to the 60HD 7200 Rpm's. that was the point of this post! Obviously you agree that the 80 HD was the better choice as I do and wassct definitely for the mentioned way it'll be used, made a good appropiate choice!

I peronally don't understand your post except that it's saying go with the first choice not a the 60 7200 HD. Correct ??? Forget about me mentioning a 100 HD that wasn't the point!

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See your first choice seems to be right and you have the other options mentioned by others. I think the closest answer that helps you is what Yass said. He gave you more detailed specifics on the difference.

All the best,
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