OEM hard drive vs new?

Compared to an aftermarket 5400rpm hard drive, how does Panasonic's OEM drive perform? Would an upgrade to another 5400rpm drive be worth the cost? There are some nice 160gb drives put out by Hitachi, WD, and Seagate, but if there won't be a signficant increase in performance, I could just as well put the money towards a backlit keyboard or RAM.

On the other hand, would a 320gb drive perform much better compared to a 160gb drive?

I'm just trying to get the maximum performance from the laptop, as I can't look too bad in a room full of Macbooks!!

Thanks,

Brian

 

Panasonic will just use a HDD made by one of the big brands, so there shouldn't be much (if any) performance difference between OEM and retail. If you really want to ramp up the performance, you should look at getting a 7200rpm drive.

 

all the OEM panasonic hard drives are are mostly hitachi anyways... i would suggest a 7200 RPM drive... 100GB + toshiba drive 7200 RPM + 16MB cache would be good

 

(Don't listen to the Dell people!)
The CF-28 and CF-29 come with a Fujitsu 4200rpm hard drive as stock. BY going up to a 5400rpm drive you do pick up a little speed boost. Going to a 7200rpm drive will give you a definite boost in performance... But since this is an ATA drive... You'll have a VERY hard time finding a 7200rpm hard drive as Hitachi stopped making them for some reason. Seagate also makes them but those are pretty much gone too.

So.... Your options? It depends on what you want/need. If you want space? Hitachi makes a nice 250gb, 5400rpm drive. It will be faster than stock and if you max out the RAM you will have a serious machine!

If you want outright performance? Try to find a new or gently used 100GB, 7200rpm hard drive. the 7200rpm drive screams in the laptop and will give you close to desktop speed depending on the processor. Again... If you max out the RAM and put in this drive... You will see a definite speed boost! Unfortuantely... The 7200rpm drives that used to go for $89 are now going for $200+ (If you can find them!)

Hope this help... Have a great weekend!

 

Thanks for all the info. Toughbook, from some weird reason, I thought CF-29's came stock with 5400rpm drives...hmm...now there's more reason to get one replaced ASAP.

I do have another quick question, though. The CF-29 being delivered has been wiped clean with XP reinstalled. If I went to ebay and purchased a $20 USB CD drive, could I use Acronis, back up the entire drive to a CD, then transfer everything to the new drive? No recovery disks have been included with this latop. Or should contact Heartland and pay $$$ for a new recovery disk?

I rarely use my optical drive (all software are free downloads from gov't websites) and spending $160+ for one is just...not worth it.

Thanks,

Brian

 

You can't just copy a drive to a CD and then copy it over to another one using the CD... You need a migration tool. I think you'd need a drive to drive type setup. I have two different setups depending on the hard drive type. I have two ATA hard drive enclosures and also two SATA enclosures. It sure makes it easy to copy hard drives. You can pick up the enclosures on ebay for $5 - $10 each.

 

My CF-29 came stock with a 4200RPM Drive... Havn't checked availability in the last year and a half or so (because I don't have a CF-29 any more), but when I did have mine I put in a 100GB Toshiba 7200RPM 16MB cache drive and that really helped from the stock 4200RPM 40GB drive.

 

JB, I looked around quite a bit and I don't think Toshiba is making those drives anymore. I think I may just have to settle for a 5400RPM drive. The going prices for 7200's just isn't worth the price/gigabyte. I don't really plan to run any intensive programs, just some office programs and some databases (perhaps a small difference during searching may occur).

I would love to find a 7200RPM drive going at the approximate rate they're SUPPOSE to go for, not one that's marked up 150%!!

 

lol... everyone wants sata thats why (+ the CF-30's r sata)

 

WOWOWOWIE! holy cow they went up in price: http://computers.pricegrabber.com/hard-drives/m/64918715/search=hts721010g9at00/st=query/

 

Now you know what I mean!!! The drive must now contain some rare earth metal!!

 

I think its more because they have stopped manufacturing these things on mass production and have switched to John Smiths basement manufacturing incorporated

 

the best is to upgarde to SSD (solid state drive) but subject to your budget. Carefully check your old hdd is IDE or SATA interface.