Should I upgrade the T61 hard drive?

The 100gb 7200 RPM hard drive seems kind of small. Should I upgrade it to a larger 7200 RPM hard drive?

 

Well, you have to consider your options. You can buy the 160 / 200 GB 7200 RPM HDDs from Seagate/Hitachi (Hitachi sells the 7K200 200GB, I think Seagate only goes up to 160). However if you find that you can afford to take the performance hit, then you can get a 5400 RPM HDD. With the advent of perpendicular recording performance between the 5400/7200 are very similar. 5400s are cheaper, cooler, generally. I still stick with the 7200 RPM HDDs, and plan on buying a 7K200 for mine.

 

I've been thinking about getting an ultrabay HD adapter ( link) and buying a large HD to go in it. I have about 100+ gigs of music and video that I'd like to keep with me. The downside is now I have to carry around the optical drive somehow, or just make do without it in the field.

 

In my personal use I dont use the optical drive at all. So if you are like me, then you dont need to bring the optical drive with you. As for the UltraBay you may want to research and look for threads on these forums about it -that way you may find out if there's anything good / bad about it

 

How much faster are 7200 RPM hard drives compared to 5400 RPM's?

 

1800RPM faster

you will probably see avg transfer rates increase about 3-4MB/s, seek times will drop about 2ms.

it comes down to what you're using your laptop for, for a number cruncher like myself, its not significant.

 

The RPM difference only matters upon HDD intensive tasks, such as boot up / shut down / starting / shutting down applications.

Otherwise if you are mainly doing just word processing / internet / email it wont make that much of a difference.

Another thing you may want to consider is that a 7200 RPM hdd will produce more heat and drain the battery faster. As to how much hotter / faster the battery will get drained depends upon the brand / specific model. I am using the Seagate 7200.1 that ships with the T60 as an option - another factor is noise as well, as the 7200 RPM hdds will generally have a higher idle / seek noises. I have found though that Hitachis actually produce the quieter of the 7200 PRM notebook hard drives.

 

I have the Hitachi 7k200 200GB drive. I'll be putting it in my laptop when I get it. It supposedly has a ~20% performance increase over the previous 7200RPM drive (the 7k100). It is also suppose to be about as quiet and energy efficient as a 5400RPM drive. I got it for $229. That might sound pricey, but at $1.15 per GB it isn't much more than the average cost.

 

Please let me know how it goes when you install yours - i really want to get one but am going to wait until the price begins to drop.

 

You don't have that much porn do you?

 

MotoDave, Do you know if you can use any 2.5" laptop drive in that adapter? I bought that adapter but I didn't buy a hard drive to go in it. Should I have? I will let you know when I get it if you don't know.

 

I am pretty sure you can use anything.

 

Haha! He caught you gamerdan!

 

That is what I thought also, but I talked to a lenovo rep and he was pretty sure it was the other way around. Then again he is a salesman and he might be just trying to make a sale.