Questions: XP or Vista, Damage, Hard Drive, EPP???

I'm looking to buy a Dell laptop but I have some question:

1) What is the difference between a 5400rpm and a 7200rpm hard drive? Do I will see a big difference?

2) Do it's better to have the accidental damage? I will not travel so much with it and I will have a bag to protect it when I will travel...if I choose I want it after my laptop is delivery can I add it?

3) Can I install XP and Vista on the same laptop...create 2 partitions or something like that?

4) Can I have a rebate if I work somewhere they only use Dell?

Thanks

 

2)
I got a addition on my insurance policy. It covers theft and basically anything I do to my laptop except spilling liquid onto it. I pay a $50 deductible per incident, but it only costs $19 per year. Not as good as dell's completecare, but it costs $100 less.

If you're getting 4 year coverage (it costs $120 to add to your warranty, however long it is) or if you think you will damage your laptop more than twice a year, then go with completecare I guess.

I only got a 1 year warranty ... ill probably extend it to two later, but that made it uneconomical to go with completecare. I guess I'll think differently when my laptop goes swimming?

 

3. You should have no problem doing this. Vista's install disc can repartition the hard drive - though if you want a good amount for XP, you'll have to re-format the default C:\ drive using Vista's repartitioning tool. They can both be set up on one hard drive. I've done this with older Windows versions (namely 95 and 3.11), installing the newer one first on the same hard drive (different partitions), and they both worked fine. My dad set up a 3.11/OS2/95 triple-boot on the same hard drive at one time, too. XP and Vista are certainly more designed with dual-booting in mind than 95 and 3.11 were.

Pretty much just partition the drives, and then install the OS'es on separate partitions, and it should work. Getting the boot loader to work perfectly is the only thing I'm not sure about - I know there are guides around here that explain how to do that, but I don't have a link for them now.

4. Maybe if Dell has a special deal with your employer. Not really sure on this one.

1. A 7200 RPM hard drive rotates faster, which means for you your data loads quicker. Once it is loaded, there won't be a performance gain, but programs, the OS, and data will load faster. It also will help if you run out of RAM and have programs using virtual memory instead - but it would still be much slower than RAM, so hopefully you won't need that benefit of a faster hard drive.

 

If you buy using AMEX card it doubles your warranty to a max of 3 years I think. So with even a 1 year warranty you can pretty much have a 2 year warranty, at least that is what I did.