M17xR3 new hard drive question

Hey guys,

So I am quite new to installing hard drives and all that business. I would like to add in another internal hard drive into my M17xR3 but I have a few questions.

First of all, I went on Newegg and found this
Newegg.ca - Seagate Momentus ST9750420AS 750GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache 2.5" SATA 3.0Gb/s Internal Notebook Hard Drive -Bare Drive

I am really considering it because it has 7200RPM but not 1TB hard drive space. Due to financial limitations, I cannot afford the drives that have both. Is it more useful to have the extra space or the higher RPM?

Second question I have is, will it fit into the hard drive bay in the back? I have been looking for 2 days and have not found a definitive answer to the bay details.

Third question, the M17xR3 have capabilities to run Sata 3.0 Gb/s?

Thank you in advance!

 

Extra space generally means bigger density and thus faster speeds. Even with lower RPM.

 

This entirely depends on what the HDD is used for. If it is a system drive, you need a really high RPM otherwise your system will get laggy really noticeably. If you want really fast transfer speeds (i.e. storage drive), you need High density primarily (and high RPM as well). The only issue is there is a bit of an engineering tradeoff. High density drives actually have worse agility (i.e. Random Performance) because it becomes more complicated to seek the data on an extremely packed platter. Plus, HDD manufacturers are not really optimizing their HDD firmwares for random performance anymore (because of SSDs) so access times have been steadily getting worse even though transfer rates are still improving.

I think what would really suit your needs if you are upgrading your system drive is the Seagate Momentus XT with 8gb Flash. The 8gb of Flash cache does wonders at improving random performance, much more than any conventional HDD.

I think you mean SATAIII (6gb/s)? this doesn't really matter since no consumer HDD in existence can saturate the SATA II (3gb/s) link let alone SATA III. This feature is more relevant for SSDs. I would try calling the Alienware reps.

 

Excellent info/post from Marksman. And while SATA 6Gbps is somewhat irrelevant in relation to speed with HDDs, there is still the upside of other implementations in the revision, such as NCQ [management] and improved power management. If you're focused on SATA revision 3 speeds over SATA revision 2 speeds, the former won't compliment a HDD.

 

I'd encourage you to ask about hard drive installation in our Alienware M17x forum: Alienware M17x Forum

If the drive bays in your M17x accept normal hard drives, then any SATA 2.5" drive with a 9.5mm height will fit.

P.S. this Western Digital drive is a better buy:
Newegg.ca - Western Digital Scorpio Black WD7500BPKT 750GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache 2.5" SATA 3.0Gb/s Internal Notebook Hard Drive -Bare Drive
Not only is it [currently] $10 less but offers better quality, performance and has a 5-year warranty vs. the Seagate's chintzy 2-year.

 

To be fair, OP, you can find a Seagate SSHD for about the same price - or even cheaper if you shop around - and it will perform better. I've seen the 500 GB SSHDs go for about $80, and they have higher capacities.