Samsung 500GB 5400RPM vs Hitachi 320GB 7200RPM

I own a Dell XPS M1530 15.4'' notebook. I'm having a hard time deciding which notebook drive is better. What would you choose?

Samsung 500GB 5400RPM - 8GB Buffer
2.6W Seek, 0.25 W Idle
http://www.samsung.com/global/busin...72&type=62&subtype=67&model_cd=373&ppmi=1159#

or

Hitachi 320GB 7200RPM - 16GB Buffer
1.8W Seek, 0.2 W Idle
http://www.hitachigst.com/portal/site/en/menuitem.57ddeb9b412fed7ac41d3814eac4f0a0/

Power Consumption while seeking for the 500GB is a lot higher than the Hitachi 320GB.

Buffer for the Samsung 500GB is 8GB, which is half the size of the Hitachi 320GB with 16GB Buffer.

 

The 320GB 7200RPM is not only faster but it's cheaper. That 500GB is also way overpriced at the moment.

 

You can't really judge a harddrive by the specifications. They don't give you the whole picture.

I do not recommend the Hitachi 7K320 because there have been some reports on heavy vibrations and noise. ( link)

It's really a matter of do you want/need 500GB or do you want maximum speed? If you want maximum speed your best of with a 320GB 7200rpm. Maybe Seagate or Western Digital. There is also the option of the 64GB or 128GB OCZ SSD which will be priced well below current SSDs.

You can find synthetic benchmarks of the new harddrives in this thread: link

 

You need to look at the notebook's overall power consumption when running on battery. You can use the battery page of RMclock to see the power drain under different load conditions but typically:

12.1" notebook with integrated graphics - 10W to 15W

14.1" notebook with integrated graphics - 13W to 20W

15.4" notebook with dedicated graphics - 18W to 25W

These indicative numbers are for low CPU load, low to medium display brightness. Higher CPU usage and wireless, etc., will add to the power drain.

0.5W is 5% of 10W, so that's +/- 15 minutes on a small notebook that can run for 5 hours on a 50WHr battery but maybe +/- 5 minutes on a big notebook which can only manage 2 hours on the same battery.

John

 

I'd say get a Seagate (ST), simply because they generally come with 5 yrs warranty.

However, I read in another forum (can't remember where atm) that STs don't last too long is USA- maybe it was aplpicable for only a small batch or something like that.

 

Wasnt it already said that the 500GB hdd wont fit in the XPS 1530?

 

i had the same question.

my m1530 has 250GB HDD @ 5.4k

i dont really need big space, but would upgradin to a 160-200GB HDD @ 7.2k yield any REAL difference for me?

 

No that is the Hitachi 500GB, this thread refers to the Samsung 500GB. The Hitachi cheats by adding a few mm to height, but the Samsung 500GB is identical in size to standard 2.5'' HDs.

 

The difference is .05W, not .5W according to the OP. In any case, I'd go with the 7200rpm drive personally, but that's just because I know I'll use the speed more than the 180GB extra space (which I'll never fill).

 

Depending on what applications you use and how you use them, a Hitachi 7K200 200GB could
yield real differences for you: Storagereview.com

 

lol...i clicked on yur link and man...i had this face on ~>

i've never done any of those benchmark testings and stuff like that. but it does look like the hitachi 7.2k HDD's were at the top of the lists (hope that means i'm readin it right)

its for a xps m1530. my specs are in my sig and i just usually surf the web, watch alot of streaming/torrent movies, and play maplestory and counterstrike right now. they aren't spec intensive games but i will be buyin diablo 3, mortal online, and maybe age of conan. i just dont want the HDD to be a big bottleneck

 

Well, I don't own the Samsung, but I can vouch for the Hitachi 320GB. I just replaced my bad Seagate 320 GB (stay away from that one!), and I couldn't be happier. This thing is quite, efficient, and works great; highly recommended.

 

The improvement in harddrive will be noticeable with games and booting (or hibernating) your system.

Here's how these drives perform with games:
http://www.storagereview.com/Hitachi250WD320.sr?page=0,3

Note that the newer 320GB 7200rpm drives are not included in these benchmarks.

 

Is that a 7200rpm or 5400 rpm drive?
I am asking because there were two people complaining about the vibrations of the 7200rpm.

 

5400 RPM, dead silent, and as smooth as I've ever experienced from a hard drive. This is a fantastic unit.

 

really appreciate the help.

i'm gonna use the m1530 for a bit and see how it is. but i'm prolly gonna upgrade to the hitachi 7k2000 160-200GB.

and sorry for jackin OP's thread =P

 

I also have a Hitachi 7k200 that I'm using with my eSATA port, and it's an awesome drive. It's been fast, quite, and perfectly reliable, and remember, with both of these Hitachies, there is no repeated head parking sounds going on, and they are amazingly quiet and efficient; can't go wrong with them.

 

So wouldnt the 500GB be better? I mean, samsung is a good brand for hard drives right? I was always under the impression that platter density meant a lot and that 320GB 5400RPM drives were just as fast as 160GB 7200RPM drives.

 

The 500gb 5400rpm samsung drive uses three 160gb platters, so it will score near identical in speed to the 320gb 5400rpm samsung drive which uses two 160gb platters.
The 7k320 will offer higher speeds, of around 12-14mb/sec over the 500gb samsung drive. The 7k320 can do 66-68mb/sec while the 500gb samsung can do 53-56mb/sec.
The difference is not very high, as both are extremely fast drives.
If you need higher capacity get the 500gb drive, but if you want more speed get the 7k320.
The 500gb drive does carry a price prmium since the demand for it is still low, and it has not become mainstream yet.
The price of the 7k320 is also a tad high, and that will come down $40 or so withing the next two months or so.
The difference between battery life may be 10 minutes at the most between the drives, so it is not a big difference.
Both drives are very power efficient, and fast, so either is quite suitable for your application.

K-TRON

 

In terms of Vibration, is there a noticeable difference between

Vibration / Operating 0.76Grms
and
Vibration / Operating 0.7Grms
?

Thanks a lot K-TRON, your advice really helped. I think I will just wait another month or two.

 

0.76GRMS = G's times Root Mean Square.
How you calculate the value, I am not sure.

however a very basic look, can tell that the only difference is 0.06Grms.
I would expect the 7200rpm drive to generate more vibration since the higher rotation speed of the motor generates more centrifugal acceleration inside of the drive, and more turbulence between the filtered gas in the drive and the platters.
The 5400rpm drive will genertate less vibration, and should take a beating more than the higher rpm drive. This is because in every instant, the disk in the 5400rpm drive spins slower than the one in a 7200rpm drive.
So if the drive sustains a fall for 0.1 seconds the disk in the lower rpm drive will have less of a effect than the higher rpm drive. It is hard to explain, so I hope this makes sense.

K-TRON

 

What doesnt make sense to me is the fact that despite you saying the Read/Write is slow, according to Toms Hardware Charts, it comes out on top:

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/...2027,1885,1916,1888,1889,1886,1887,1891,1915#

Specwise on Samsungs homepage also indicate at the 500GB 5400RPM actually has a higher vibration than the 7200 by like .6g.

Im thinking about upgrading to the 500GB from my current 250GB Samsung 7200RPM drive.

 

I am saying that it is slower in comparison to the 320gb 7200rpm drives. That chart on tomshardware does not have benchmark results for the 320gb 7200rpm drives. If tomshardware benched these new drives, they would be on top of the Samsung 500gb disk.

Actually that makes sense. The Samsung drive has three disks, so it has 1.5x the centrifugal force than a standard 2 platter 5400rpm drive. This means that the vibration can actually be more than the vibration from a 7200rpm drive.
It is good that you caught me on that. I was comparing two platter 5400 drives to 2 platter 7200rpm drives.
I dont think the vibration difference is all that high. The difference is mot likely unnoticeable.

K-TRON

 

Welcome man. Just to add: The 160GB version of the 7K200 does not perform as well as the 200GB version.

 

The benchmark you picked is a synthetic benchmark. There's 3 non synthetic benchmarks on Tomshardware:
Windows XP Startup performance
Webserver I/O benchmark pattern
Workstation I/O pattern

If you select any of those you get a completely different picture.

The problem with the synthetic benchmarks is that people tend to forget how important accesstimes are.

 

i found the 200GB 7k200 for $120 shipped + $20 rebate today

and i really appreciate that tip. rep'd

 

I've had good experiences with Samsung drives, I don't think you could go wrong with one.

 

Yeah, though 500GB is a nice amount of space to have... its 5400RPM as opposed to 7200RPM. Perhaps 320GB at 7200RPM from Hitachi would be more appropriate? I don't and never want to use an external hard drive. Ever. I dont like the thought of having to lug this thing around that depends on a power adapter to work.

Maybe I should wait till 500GB 7200RPMs come out.

 

Diverting eyes towards Samsung 500GB. I just checked and it uses only 2 x 250GB platters! Does this mean it is as fast as 250GB 7200RPM?

 

Where do u find it only uses 2x250GB?

 

Disregard earlier post, 2 platters is for the SpinPoint T166.