Hybrid vs Hard Disk

To all those moderators with their panties in a bunch, I'm truly sorry if this has been posted before, but I did look around this sub-forum and didn't see anything like this.

Does anyone have any experience with a Hybrid Hard Drive Disk (HHD)? This is not the same thing as a Solid State Drive (SSD). It's a combination of standard hard disk technology and flash memory (for supposed quicker performance and more energy efficiency). On Sony's website, a 160 GB HHD is offered for 30 dollars more than a 160 GB HDD. Does anyone use an HHD? What are your thoughts? I'm thinking for the extra 30 bucks I might as well try it out.

 

the additional flash memory does absolutely nothing to help increase performance. Do not waste $30 on a failed technology. This was only implemented on one drive, and is no longer implemented because it does not work.

I would try and upgrade to a faster 250gb 5400rpm drive or so with the $30 saved.

K-TRON

 

I am not sure about the HHD, but I would definately stick with a 7200 drive if I were you...

 

Actually the only 7200 rpm drive which is faster than a 5400rpm drive, are the 250gb 7200 drive from Samsung and the 320gb 7200drives from Fujitsu and Hitachi.
The 160gb 5400rpm drive will be able to maintain an average of 34mb/sec
The 250gb 5400rpm drive will be able to maintain an average of 43mb/sec
The 200gb 7200rpm drive will be able to maintain 52mb/sec
The 320gb 5400rpm drive will be able to maintain 53mb/sec
The 250gb and 7200rpm drives should be faster, but they are brand new, carry a very large premium and have not been tested.

Based on these results, you should not want to go for a 7200rpm drive because the 5400rpm drives are faster, have more storage and generally cheaper than the 7200rpm drives. The only advantage of a 7200rpm drive is its access time, which is only like 2millaseconds faster.
The 5400rpm drives are more power efficient and will get more battery life.

K-TRON

 

lmao. that's a good way to get the moderators panties bunched up.

 

I've been told that the Hybrid is only beneficial if you are using Vista, as that is the only OS made to use its features. That's what I've been told, I can't verify that.

And even then, it's main benefit is that the the drive will spin less... Plus it has only existed for a year or so, and hasn't been adopted by most manufactures.

I'd stick with the proven technology.

 

Well I can't dispute your numbers here, when you are doing large files that extra speed can help, and quite frankly the HD in a laptop does not use very much power at all compared to the CPU and GPU, so I wouldn't even consider power consumption when choosing a HD...

 

Well, put it this way, if money is no issue...

A 7200 one will always be better than a 5400 one in the same capacity.