Replaced Hard Drive with 7200 rpm in my Z

Hey Everybody

Just went through the whole replacing hard drive thing on my new Z....they sure don't make that easy. Anyways...what a performance increase from my 5400 rpm drive...Just one question. Did you guys notice more vibration after the install of a 7200rpm vs the 5400.....Maybe I didn't mount it right. It isn't noisy but it definitely has more vibration than the old one. Anyways, let me know

 

It's quite normal. Which drive did you get?

I've read some reports of vibration on every 320GB/7200rpm. Most about Hitachi, then WD, then Seagate.

 

its a seagate 7200.3-320gb

 

Does it void the warranty changing the drive?

 

I believe so. if they find out.

 

How about the noise and heat of the seagate 7200.3-320gb?

I currently consider to replace HDD, and want to make a choice between 320G 7200rpm and 500G 5400RPM.

I prefer to the 320G 7200rpm because of its speed.
however, if it has more vibration, that make me hard to make a decision. :-(

 

it has more vibration....but the speed is nice. I have been using it for a few hours now and I don't notice the vibration anymore, but I still notice how fast it is.

 

I am happy with my 500gb hd spinning at 5400rpm. Except it make this clicking noise.

 

well, I am starting to wonder if this speed increase is worth it. I am getting use to the vibrations but I am finding that the fan is running all the time. No matter what mode I have the computer in (stamina or speed) the fan is on all the time. I also formatted this computer from a Vista disk and re-installed the drivers from sony's site. Could I have done something wrong to have this fan running all the time or is it the extra heat from the new 7200rpm hard drive. Thanks for you help.

 

Most of the times it's possible to make it stop clicking. I suggest you use the search function.

 

Most of the times it's possible to make it stop clicking. I suggest you use the search function if you'd like to try it.

That's interesting you may have gotten a hot 7200.3.

You can check the temperature with HDTune.

 

the temp says 41c. That doesn't seem all the hot to me..

 

Not at all. But then agian that may be because of the aggressive fan the Z has.

With some activity for 10/20 minutes it should go over 50C before I would consider it hot. You could run some HDtunes.

 

does your fan run most of the time?

 

hi chong67,

what model of 500g hdd did you upgrade?
how about the fan speed of your laptop? is it still normal or running all the time?

I feel really hard to make a decision to choose between 320G 7200rpm and 500G 5400rpm.
I chose the cheapest 120g hdd option when I OCT my Z540 because I thought that was worth to upgrade the hdd by myself (can save about $150)

:-(

 

Well, I switched back to my old drive. It is running much cooler and no vibration. That totally sucked...what a waste of an afternoon. I put this same drive in my macbook and it worked perfect, no vibration, not to much heat (mind you that computer isn't as portable as this one and I am sure that the hear tolerances in this laptop are very tight). O well...live and learn. At least this 5400rpm drive is fairly fast.

 

did you notice the fan running before your upgrading?
I think probably that is some kind of "psychological reaction", because people will pay more attention to observe his/her notebook after he/she did some thing to the notebook without full confidence.

 

I didn't really notice before...you are probably right about it being psychological. I also didn't like the vibration....it really was starting to bother me more and more. I am going to wait another 10 months or so and get a 256gb SSD for a few hundred dollars...that will be a great up grade.

 

Keep in mind there are differences between individual drives.

Some people get a quiet Seagate 7200.3 while others get a louder one.

And there's always the option of changing the Acoustic management, thus reducing heat and noise. Changing the Acoustic management can be done for example with HDTune Pro trial version.

 

I had the Samsung 500 at 5400 rpm.

My fan is always on. I know the fan really goes up another notch when it does the benchmark thing on Vista. Normally its just on.

As far as my Z vibrating, its not vibrating.

I feel that the 5400 rpm is good enough speed. I think maybe I am running
x64 w 4gb ram which helps alot.

Also, I have read the thread about clicking on the hd. Has any Z owners try out the fix or do whatever it does to get rid of the clicking or maybe some of the clicking?

 

The Samsung 500GB is a 3 platter drive with higher power consumption and it gets pretty hot. If anyone is considering 500GB drives I recommend the WD5000BEVT, 2 platter drive. It's faster, stays cooler and uses less power.

chong67, if you want to try to limit the clicking download the free trial of HD Tune Pro, change the AAM value and see if that makes a difference.

 

I should have know better to get the 2 platter.

Quickie, where is the AAM value?

 

On the last tab. (acoustic management)

 

PhilFlow or anyone,

How much of a difference in heat and noise between Samsung 3 platter vs the WD you recommend?

Does the WD make clicking noise?

I dont mind getting the WD if I stand to loose $50 and sell the 2 week old Samsung on ebay.

 

I can't garantee it won't click or will make less noise.

I think it will be quieter but not sure.

Clicking can happen to any drive, and like I said, there are several ways to prevent it.

 

I'm happy I choose the 200gb 7200rpm hitachi with my Z. All this upgrading and worrying about vibrations and heat and warranty doesn't seem like to much fun. I can say my computer is very fast with this hard disk, however I cannot compare it to a 5400rpm because I simply never used it in this laptop.

From my desktop experience, a fast HD is more important then a couple hundred mHz.

 

I have a WD black scorpio 160 GB 7200 in my sony and I'm completely happy with, no vibration, no clicking and no heat (I think because of the single platter design)

 

Curious... exactly how hard is it to replace the Z's HDD? I've never modded anything on a laptop before. Building my own PC is about as far as I've gotten in terms of hardware installation experience. :S

I got a really basic 160GB @ 5400 RPM unit on mine, and am kinda considering getting a faster HDD later... also because I found out PS3s use 2.5" HDDs, I'm possibly planning on grabbing a couple to upgrade things.