5400 vs 7200 hd speed!

[firehawk68]

i'm considering a 5400 silent fujitsu 40gb drive. a 7200 same brand is $30 more or so... is it worth $30 more?
will that, that greatly improve performance? or maybe i should stick with a 5400... or get a 60gb instead of 40gb atleast 20gb extra i KNOW will come handy... but 7200 instead of 5400? if it's only slightly faster i dont know if it's worth it...
what do you think?

 

[CQuinn]

Yes, No, Maybe...

If you are not clear on what you intend to use the drive for, then there is no way to say which is better for you.

7200 rpm drives are considered sufficiently faster to be reccomended as boot drives and work space partitions,
where the improvement in access time brings more of a benefit,

5400 rpm drives are better for static storage, where most of the time the system is only reading from the drive,
or storing new files to be read later, but is not spending much time editing, compressing/uncompressing, swapping,
or otherwise changing the data in those files. If you are storing a lot of MP3s or other such files, then a 5400
might be the better choice.

 

[qIat]

<< Yes, No, Maybe...

If you are not clear on what you intend to use the drive for, then there is no way to say which is better for you.

7200 rpm drives are considered sufficiently faster to be reccomended as boot drives and work space partitions,
where the improvement in access time brings more of a benefit,

5400 rpm drives are better for static storage, where most of the time the system is only reading from the drive,
or storing new files to be read later, but is not spending much time editing, compressing/uncompressing, swapping,
or otherwise changing the data in those files. If you are storing a lot of MP3s or other such files, then a 5400
might be the better choice. >>

a 5400rpm is never better, it's just a 7200 may not be needed. that's like saying ata66 is better than ata100:disgust:

 

[salsal]

a 5400rpm is never better, it's just a 7200 may not be needed.

Agree. You will be amazed how soon 5400 will be the past like ATA 33. Will you get an ATA33 even you don't need 66 or 100 for now?

 

[neccrixx]

well, a 5400 RPM ATA100 drive is shown to be slower in read/write than a 7200 RPM ATA66 drive (i think Tom's has the review). So i think that is definately performance you can use. not only that but I have found it more obvious in NTFS formatted drives and even more obvious in FAT32 drives under 2000/XP.

 

[rwalterk]

The 7200 is markedly faster; I was able to tell the difference immediately. Unless you're absolutely strapped for cash and have to have the extra storage space, I'd get the 7200.

 

[gump47371]

Agree. You will be amazed how soon 5400 will be the past like ATA 33. Will you get an ATA33 even you don't need 66 or 100 for now?

while that may be true somewhat sal, I did buy a 5400 ONLY as my mp3 drive. So what quinn is saying is true, if all you are going to use it for is a fancy stereo, go cheaper.

 

[neccrixx]

seems like it's gonna be his boot drive as well to me. In this age of GHz+ processors there is no reason to slow yourself down like that

 

[Earwax]

If you are just using it for MP3s/storage, go 5400.
But definitely consider the 7200 for a boot drive, it makes a siginificant difference, and is probably worth the extra cash.

I have a 30GB 5400 RPM Maxtor drive with my mp3s on it. I have about 3500 MP3s and the only complaint I have is it takes about 90 seconds to load all of my songs onto one list. But once the list is saved it's unnoticeable. Songs play without any delay for load time or anything, so I'd say a 5400 is a cheaper alternative if you have storage in mind.

 

[firehawk68]

thanks for the replies. to clear things up, im going to use it for EVERYTHING i.e. bootdrive, storage, games - the lot!

 

[Kingofcomputer]

see the hd spec.
the real transfer rate - to/from media, sustained OD, sustained ID of 7200rpm are 25% more than 5400rpm of the same series.
assume the price difference is 10-15%, you pay 10-15% more and get 25% more real transfer rate, isn't it a good deal?

it's not wise to buy 5400rpm for just $10-20 saving. even for just mp3 storage, don't you want to play/copy/write the mp3 files as fast as possible? unless you're building an extremely cheap system, you could consider buying 5400rpm.

check hot deals forum, there are often hot deals on 7200rpm hd, the price is even lower than same size 5400rpm.

 

[neuralfx]

how much is this fujitsu drive? you can purchase a 40gb 60gxp (60 not 75) for about 90-100 bucks, they are so cheap now, i see no reason to get a 5400 unless you were trying some QuietPC project or something .. good luck ..
-neural

 

[firehawk68]

im in europe so i dont get such a good deal, a 40gb 5400 is like $120 or so.. but if the difference as much as 25% then im going for a 7200. thanks for the advice you guys!

 

[Syborg1211]

Think about how crappy it would be to have a 1.6 ghz Xp or so and then not be able to experience the best loads times because your hard drive cant transmit fast enough and has become the bottleneck. That's what happened to me, load times are cut by a lot of time, but are not the fastest because the hard drive is not my bottleneck.

 

[rbV5]

<< a 5400rpm is never better, it's just a 7200 may not be needed. that's like saying ata66 is better than ata100 >>



Not true, if its just for static storage, or for an upgrade to an older pc that only supports ATA33, a 5400 drive could certainly be "better" due to pricing, also, if reliability is important, you can certainly find 5400 rpm drives with a higher reliability factor than certain 7200rpm drives. Never say never, and "better' is a very general term.

 

[Halogen]

you guys are blowing this out of proportion, the difference is so small between the 7200 and 5400 that you not even notice if i switched the drives around on you

if you look at REAL benchmarks you will see that the 7200 is faster but only by like a tenth of a second, omg i lost a tenth of a second of my life and i want it back!! wah wah wah
as a side note, 7200RPM drives get WAY WAY WAY hotter and are totaly not necessary unless you are running a server or doing hard core video or sound editting

 

[Tomek]

7200 rpm drives are not all that much hotter, unless something is wrong with the drive of course... I would go for a 7200 rpm

 

[jamarno]

<< a 5400rpm is never better, it's just a 7200 may not be needed. that's like saying ata66 is better than ata100 >>



ATA100 has no disadvantages to ATA66, but comparing 7200 to 5400 is more like comparing a 7L truck engine to a 6L engine; the larger engine may let you carry a bigger load, but it also uses more fuel.

5400 RPM drives almost never need supplemental cooling, but many 7200 drives still do. The more important number seems to be the power draw when the drive spins but does nothing else, and if it's under 6 watts the drive will probably stay cool enough.

 

[firehawk68]

well i dont know what to believe, one of you guys talked about 25 percent difference, then others say there's hardly no difference and you won't even notice it...

makes you wonder what to believe..

 

[veryape]

Trust me on this, the difference is very noticable so if you have the cash to spend on it you would be much better off to get the 7200 rpm drive. I mean think about it, if the drive spins up at 7200 rpm and the 5400 rpm spins up at that speed, is it not obvious which will access your information more quickly? It's a simple mathmatical equation. No matter what anyone else here says, a 7200 rpm drive is much quicker than the 5400 and it is very noticable in my opinion.

 

[rbV5]

<< 7200 is faster but only by like a tenth of a second >>



Ha Ha, he said ONLY a tenth of a second. Good lord dude.

Anyway, I can certainly tell the difference between a 7200 drive and a 5400 drive when capturing video, not hardcore video editing, just simple video capture.

 

[igowerf]

The family computer has an ATA33 5400 rpm backup drive. The thing clicks like mad when I download files.

 

[igowerf]

<< 7200 is faster but only by like a tenth of a second >>




It depends on the density of the platters too. An 80GB 5400 rpm drive would probably be fairly fast compared to a 15gb 7200 rpm drive.

 

[Kingofcomputer]

<< well i dont know what to believe, one of you guys talked about 25 percent difference, then others say there's hardly no difference and you won't even notice it... >>

That's me saying 25% difference, here is the proof:

Maxtor D540X
http://www.maxtor.com/products/DiamondMax/diamondmax/DataSheet/D540X133_datasheet.pdf

Data Transfer Speed (MByte/sec, max)
To/From Interface 100/133
To/From Media 43.4
Sustained at OD 35.9
Sustained at ID 17.8

D740X
http://www.maxtor.com/products/DiamondMax/DiamondMaxPlus/DataSheet/D740X_datasheet.pdf

Data Transfer Speed (MByte/sec, max)
To/From Interface 133
To/From Media 54.2 <----------- 25% higher than similar 5400rpm model
Sustained at OD 44.4 <----------- 24%
Sustained at ID 24.2 <----------- 36%

 

[Doomguy]

You're forgetting one of the most important things, access time. 7200 rpm drives are quite a bit faster at seeking than their 5400rpm counterparts.