M6809 HDD RPM?

Hi, haven't been able to find that much info online on this model and the customer support at emachines wasnt too informative either... Anyone know the RPMs on the 80GB HDD with the M6809?

How does the battery life last? I was ALMOST gonna buy a Dell Inspiron 8600, mainly because it was a good compromise between performance and battery life. Can this machine last approx 4 hours on battery life under normal usage? I will be using it mostly for word processing, spreadsheet and database design and creation of powerpoint presentations.

Does the machine get really hot/noisy?

Any other issues/concerns I should know about before buying this machine? Where can I get it for cheap? Right now, emachines is selling it online for $1550 after the $100 rebate.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

Hey there. I bought my M6809 yesterday at Best Buy. Right now they're offering it for $1649 + $100MIR + $150MIR, which means it comes out to $1399 after rebates!

I'm super happy with my purchase so far. The screen is amazing. I've been burning DVDs and playing games and the noise is negligable (ie: not noticable) and no overheating (just some mild warmth that doesn't bother me).

From reading other posts, I've heard the rpms are 4200 on the HD. This is slow, but I didn't see any other option.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

 

As far as battery life goes... If you keep the laptop stock (no overclocking of the CPU) the PowerNow will kick in while on batteries and the cpu will run at a slower speed. My 6805 will last about 3.5 hours if I do not do much but just long enough to watch a DVD. With the powernow disabled it sucks the battery pretty quickly.

 

I called emachines too about a week ago, and all they could tell me is that they're still gathering information on the hd speed because the 6809 was a new model. Personally I have no idea why the manufacturer couldn't tell me the specs unless they weren't always using the same parts in each machine. Maybe they swapped HD vendors in early production and there are two versions out there.

I think I've heard some people say that theirs came with a 5400 RPM drive, but others say 4200 RPM. I would have to go with 4200 RPM because you're already getting an incredible deal on everything else. Plus, an 80 GB notebook drive is nothing to complain about for $1399.

I'd say go grab it from BB. On the BB note, I don't see it listed on their website, so I'm guessing that it's just starting to appear at BB stores. I would call before heading down there.

 

The drive is a Hitachi/IBM TravelStar 80GN
http://www.hitachigst.com/portal/site/hgst/?epi_menuItemID=2f0fd7e4292e213aa5a8f2b6aac4f0a0&epi_menuID=0f34be57a7adb6fd25ad4e8060e4f0a0&epi_baseMenuID=22f0deefa8f3967dafa0466460e4f0a0
and it is slow. I do S/W development so I'm using that drive for work and went out and bought the 7K60 (60G at 7200 RPM) for gaming. Loaded that drive with XP Pro and Suse Linux 9.1.

 

Hey MAB45, since you saved so much with rebates, you could buy a 7200rpm hard drive and put it in your machine:

40gig 7200rpm @ $150
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=22-146-036&depa=3

60gig 7200rpm @ $220
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=22-146-020&depa=3

Just a suggestion.

 

I really appreciate the information! Thank you so much. I think for the time being that a couple seconds of hesitation, etc, is worth $220 for me though. But in the future, as prices might come down or my bankroll goes up, this will be very handy.

Thanks again,
mab45