Is this difference really noticeable? 160gb vs 200gb 7200 rpm

Hi guys:

I currently have both hard disks. One is mine (160 gb Hitachi), and the 200gb is my dad's (200 gb seagate).

My dad doesnt care about the extra 40 gigs so he told me i could swap them if i want to. I run hdtach on both of them, and the seagate performes a bit better. the 160gb gets like 160 mb/s while the 200gb seagate gets like 175mb/s

Cpu utilization is also a bit less on seagate.

However, the seagate is also as well noticeably louder.

What would you recommend? To stick with the quieter, a bit slower, hitachi, or go for the full performance seagate sacrificing quietness? Because if this performance increase is not noticeable at all, then i'll probably just stick with the quiet drive as 40 gb extras isnt THAT much.

Thanks

 

Do you need the extra 40gb and do you want to go through the hassle of swapping them and reinstalling windows? Its 40gb... you can get an external HDD much larger for under $100.

 

That extra 15 mb/s transfer rate is really gonna open up the performance floodgates, huh.