1TB notebook drive

Apparently WD now has Scorpio Blue 2.5" notebook drives in 750GB and 1TB sizes.

The only problem--the width of the drives is 12.5mm, a little larger than the 9.5mm of most notebook drives.

Which laptop brands will take that size drive?

Or--is it just the largest notebooks (17", etc) from any brand?

Any tests on the performance? Is it faster than 500GB drives? (I guess a moot point though, if it does not fit in any of our laptops!)

I wouldn't be surprised if in a few months one of the manufacturers figure out how to fit 1TB in the standard 9.5mm form factor. (They keep figuring out how to fit more data in less space.)

 

Both the 750GB and 1TB drives are dog slow compared to anything in the 500GB range.

But did you see the new 'slim' HD's from Seagate?
See:
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/seagate-momentus-thin-laptop-hdd,9242.html


Only 7mm thin, but I can't see these being 'performance' oriented.

 

these drives are slow.. the hitachi 7K500 is the a 500GB hard drive and is the fastest mobile one for now...

 

Does it really matter if I only use it as an external drive? I would think that the USB port would be the bottle neck.

 

Where are the Benchmarks.

 

These drives are so slow, they are still working on the benchmarks.

 

The 1Tb one is 333GB platters, should be better than 500GB with 250GB each platter.

 

Yeah, but it is only one metric and doesn't take into consideration the time the heads have to 'settle' before they are able to first find and then read/write to the much smaller tracks the higher density platters have.

This time needed to 'settle' the heads goes up exponentially as the drive speed is increased, or as the platter density is increased and is the major reason we don't have these high capacities in 2.5" HD models now.

I can already see this in my 7K500 (compared to the 7K200) and the 1TB models will only be much worse.

They might have a higher sequential throughput, but as system drives they will be beyond horrible (well below the Scorpio Blue 500GB as my previous best notebook HD with the capacity I need).


This link is for the 640GB Scorpio Blue and it shows it as a bad replacement as a system drive (otherwise I might be using it now - I too need space).

See:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/640gb-mobile-hdd,2451.html


Cheers!

 

perhaps just use a 1TB external drive via firewire ?

 

or e-SATA... i use Western digital My book with e-SATA... max speed of 60-70MB/s... or u can buy an internal drive which is faster..

 

does it still require an external power source?

 

yes sadly so it is not portable... if u want a portable one , ur stuck with USB which allows pathetic speeds... wait for USB 3.0... its will be awesome...

 

Actually, Vantec has external HD's with eSata and USB2 connections that do not require an additional source of power (A/C) other than needing an extra USB port to power up the HD.

See:
http://www.vantecusa.com/front/product/view_detail/177


This is what I use for my 2nd, 3rd and 4th backup for my images while I'm on location (away from the studio).

 

WD's data sheet shows that the 750GB and 1TB drives actually run at 5200rpm instead of the usual 5400rpm which will tend to offset the faster transfer rate provided by higher platter density.

John

 

portable (2.5") external drives don't need AC power, and WD already has them with these 750GB and 1TB 2.5" drives in them. (In fact, I think that is the main use now for those drives, as I don't think they fit inside many notebooks.)

The larger 3.5" external drives all do require AC, but I think provide better performance, and cost less per GB.

It all depends on whether you want a portable external drive to carry with you, or one that stays in one place. If the latter, the 3.5" external drive or enclosure (requiring AC) makes more sense.

 

maiki,

Not true about the 3.5" providing better performance. (Unless you're putting a VRaptor in the external enclosure which would be a waste).

Simply get the enclosure in post #13 above and use eSATA with a current 2.5" HD and no external A/C power required.

 

@ Tiller - LOLOL!

even the wd 640gb laptop drive is larger than regular drives - not only the 750s and 1tb.

that's insane tho. i cannot imagine drives that small holding so much data. this rocks!

for my personal use tho, storage space is more important than speed (im not gaming or transferring 50gb on a daily basis)....... maybe by next year, my laptop will be running dual 1tb drives

 

The WD Blue 640GB drive is 9.5mm in height (the most common size now):

http://www.wdc.com/en/products/products.asp?driveid=683

The WD Blue 750GB and 1TB are 12.5mm.

 

oops, my apologies - i think i got the 640s and 750s mixed up.

thanks for the correction!

 

Now prepare to have our minds blown by the pureSI 1tb SSD, when that becomes available and affordable to the public then magnetic storage should become obsolete.

Someone mentioned internal drives being faster than eSATA, wouldn't they be exactly the same speed seeing as they are usually the same physical drives, just mounted in enclosures and eSATA should be exactly the same speed as normal SATA? :S

 

Yah.. they should.. and I believe there are some benchmarks proving that. From what I remember, they may be 1-2 MB/s slower than if the drive was internal (which is nothing).. not really sure why unless it's some sort of processing taking place in the enclosure or loss over distance or whatever...

 

That's within the margin of error of practical tests, I'd say. eSATA external drives should run at the same speed as internal SATA drives.

 

wait 10 year dude... it will be so expensive till then...