Need advice on new Hard disk (M17rX4)

Hey .

I have an Alienware M17rX4 with an integrated Seagate HD that makes 7200 RP/M but unfortunately has only 500 GB space. That's not enough for what I want / need to store, so I'm thinking about buying a 2 TB 2,5' internal HD as a replacement. I don't have any ideas which one I should take, I only found 5400 RP/M ones, except for 1, but that one costed like 4 times as much as the 5400 ones.
If you think I should take an external HD instead, plz say so. I'm generally against an external HD, but I'm open to good arguments.

Tia for your advice .

Seraiel

 

You need to actually say what you want / need to store on it and how that data will be used.

Is it static data? Is it photos/videos that you edit? Is it a database?

Even without knowing the above, I would recommend the 7200RPM model without reservation. It is more expensive for a reason (performance) and just like an SSD would be your best O/S storage drive upgrade that you can do for your system, buying the criminally obsolete 5400RPM drive as an O/S and storage drive would be like putting a Chevette engine into a Corvette body.

Also look up my post on partitioning a HDD for optimal performance.

See:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...tachi-7k500-benchmark-setup-specifics.442289/


Today, I would update that old post with a 150GB C:\Drive partition size (and still 'shrink' it down to ~25GB bigger than the capacity used when all the Windows Updates and Programs are fully installed).

An external drive today is not needed with the drives available. Unless the data is accessed only once every couple of days or so...

Convenience, (data) availability and much higher performance with an onboard HDD far outweighs any mere $$ extra spent to get there.

But my real recommendations are: Clean install of Windows 10 x64 Pro with maxed out RAM and a 1TB+ SSD (properly OP'd, of course).

Good luck.

 

I agree with Tiller (on the SSD). If you want performance, you really want an SSD.

If you have bulk content that you need to store (videos, music, photos, pr0n, etc), then you can store it on an external USB hard drive whenever you need to access that content. But for OS / apps / games, an SSD is absolutely unbeatable for performance.

 

Sry that I forgot to tell:

I have a 256 GB Samsung 840 Pro SSD on which I store only Windows, programs, games and personal documents + pictures. I have installed Win 10 Pro cleanly following some great guides on this page by Matrix Leader just a week ago, and my Notebook also has 16 GB of 1866 Mhz RAMs, 1.5y ago, that was the maximum the M17rX4 supported, today, 2133 Mhz is also possible.

What I search for is a Harddrive as large as possible to store all my music, my videos and especially also system-backup-images on, so the disk doesn't need that much performance, and the difference between a 2 TB 5400 and a 7200 was something like 100€ for the 5400 and 300-400€ for the 7200, so the difference is massive! What I tried to ask for, was, if there are any specific manufaturors or models that you could recommend. I heard that Seagate is supposed to make very good harddrives and that WD oftenly isn't that good, but that knowledge is from some years ago, don't know if anything has changed in the meantime .

I greatfully take the advice that external HDs aren't needed anymore and that they perform better and I'll read the linked guide now. I hope it'll tell me what you mean with "properly OP'd" , the only "OP" I know of stands for "overpowered" , are the options to make harddisks (or also SSDs) to perform faster than normal? If the guide answers that question, you don't have to answer that . What I'd also like to know btw., is, why the Intel software installed on my system notifies me that my 1st drive has 6 GB / s and why the HD only has 3 GB / s. I don't know, if this is of importance and / or if it's a problem, maybe it's only a wrong setting or 3 GB / s don't matter at all for a HD, because non-SSDs cannot reach that speed anyhow.

Tia for any answers or helpful tips .

 

Seraiel, 2TB Seagate-Samsung M9T is the only 2.5" HDD to be considered. Can be bought in external enclosure as well as bare drive. Have 2 of them, btw.

 

Agreed, this will be the best option if you want the most space....

 

I bought 3 of the Samsung M9T 2tb 5400rpm drives that was going to be used on a alienware m18x r2. I bought them for $90 each last year on ebay. I bought the external version, the internal version was $50 more.

I know use 2 of them on a Clevo p370sm3 in Raid 0. I have a 256gb for OS and some games, I have lots of Steam games. I fit most of the games I have on both the Samsung HDs. I like the performance, they are quite and they are working good. I dont move that heavy laptop much. Plus I get 4tb out of them, enough space to fit all of my torrented movies.

I have not heard much failure reports from them so they seem to be reliable.

 

That are some very clear answers that help me . Thx m8tes .

 

Let us know what you decide on

 

I took the advice for the Seagate / Samsung M9T . Seagate is the brand I always had, and my SSD is from Samsung and I read that they also produce very good, cheap memory, so I trust, that the M9T Harddisk will be very good .

 

I btw. took the 1.75 TB version of the Seagate. Some suspect, that it's a technically inferior 2 TB disk, that only has 1.75 TB because of faults, but I don't believe that. Regarding the price, the 2 TB costs 95€, the 1.75 costs 65€, that's a really strong argument for the 1.75 TB.

 

Post some benches if you can... HDTune for starters...

 

DLed that program that you mentioned, and because of goodwill, I set it to "test: fully" and "accuracy: accurate" . Now, almost 1h has passed, and I'm not sure, if I've already reached the 20% mark ^^ .

Could have seriously needed a warning about this software ^^ .

Whatever, tomorrow you'll get "the most precise benchmark ever done on a Seagate M9T 1.75TB" .