If I bring the powerbook to apple centra, is it possible to fit a bigger and faster hdd then the stock one? i would like to see something like 7200rpm hdd in my powerbook... i think that would increase the speed of the powerbok as well...
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what's the chances of upgrading a 12" powerbook hdd to a fast driver...
- Thread starter SLJ
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i don't think there is a 7200 RPM for the PowerBook yet. you can probably find a 5400 though.
try:
http://www.macsales.com
try:
http://www.macsales.com
There are 7200 RPM 60 GB notebook drives right now. They are fast, but expensive. See http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/ for more info. There are also 5400 RPM 80 GB notebook drives. Cheaper, more capacity, faster than what you have now, but not as fast as the 7200.
Buy them both at Old World Computing, but make sure you get the 9.5mm 2.5" drive. The 12mm won't fit. Hitachis are good.
edit: Apparently they're all 9.5mm now, so don't worry about it.
Buy them both at Old World Computing, but make sure you get the 9.5mm 2.5" drive. The 12mm won't fit. Hitachis are good.
edit: Apparently they're all 9.5mm now, so don't worry about it.
save yourself a ton of time, effort and the warrenty and just get a firewire drive with the oxford 911 chipset.
it depends what you are doing. if you are doing alot of video editing or audio production than yes, absolutely yes! anything that requires constant reading of the disk is going to be much faster. things like typing and surfing the net? no, not really. i replace my 4200 with a 5400 in my old TiBook and my track count (Logic Audio) increased by a bunch. however, i have to say i agree with the others. get a FireWire drive with the Oxford chipset. it will be 7200 RPM and much cheaper than an internal laptop drive replacement. maybe even check out a FireWire chassis for a regular desktop drive. you'll save even more money in the long run and have the option for larger storage. i would have to say that unless you absolutely MUST have an onboard drive then go for FireWire. it will probably be more reliable as well.
7200RPM drives have better bearings than the 4500's and 5400's. Better bearing = less friction = less heat.
http://eshop.macsales.com/Catalog_Item.cfm?ID=5930&Item=HIT08K0939 -- 7200rpm dissipates 5.5W
http://eshop.macsales.com/Catalog_Item.cfm?ID=5822&Item=IBM08K0634 -- 4200rpm dissipates 4.7W
-SLJ
Yes, 7200 would be better for video on an internal, but then, as others say, if you could find one, you'd have power draw and heat issues.
An even better solution, as hugemullens suggests, is an external as a media/scratch disk. Your boot drive still must make reads/writes to the drive for OS and Application needs, and external drive will separate the read/write loads and you can get better performance.
Personally, I use the OWC Mercury On-The-Go as it has the Oxford 911 chipset. This particular one has a big 16MB Data Buffer, thus compnsating for the 5400rpm spindle speed.
I use it to edit FCP on my 12PB.
I REALLY doubt it. 200 bucks for the drive, god only knows how much to actually install it, and if you install it yourself goodbye warrenty. And the firewire drive can be used acrossed multiple computers. Firewire all the way!
good points Abstract and Freg. i didn't even think of that. i'm sitting here with my 12" PowerBook and my legs are hot as hell and my battery life is already only about an hour or so. i don;t think a 7200 RPM drive would help at all.
i agree totally. in that first sentence i wasn't actually suggesting the purchase. i was just answering the question of if it would speed things up at all. i don't think it's a good idea at all. i'm using FireWire on my 12" PowerBook for Logic and Final Cut data and my machine is still super hot and has a very short battery life. the 12" PowerBook is an awesome machine because of it's size, design, feel, etc. but i still always get jealous when my girlfriend can get over 4 hours of battery and her iBook is still not even warm to the touch. note to all potential 12" PowerBook owners: You must wear pants when using this machine. it's hot as hell.
-tjwett
Well, it's hot because Aluminum is an excellent heat conductor. The iBook will run cooler, but imagine how much heat is held inside that plasic case. This is one of the reasons why the 12PB can be so thin BTW.
As for your battery, have you run it out to forced sleep, then recharge - without interruption on the recharge? Check to see if Bluetooth and Airport are active if you don't need them to be so. Also check your Energy Saver preferences for a more efficient setting than you are running now.
Well, it's hot because Aluminum is an excellent heat conductor. The iBook will run cooler, but imagine how much heat is held inside that plasic case. This is one of the reasons why the 12PB can be so thin BTW.
As for your battery, have you run it out to forced sleep, then recharge - without interruption on the recharge? Check to see if Bluetooth and Airport are active if you don't need them to be so. Also check your Energy Saver preferences for a more efficient setting than you are running now.
<shudders> I did that ONCE Never again. It was an out-of-warranty iBook with a crashed drive. (yeah, ker-klunk, crashed head) 30 some screws. And you're right, the old powerbooks were nice. Open, keyboard, remove one screw, remove hard drive.
That's one thing I will miss when I replace my G3 Powerbook with a newer model. It really is just a flip of a keyboard and one screw and then you are free to upgrade your HD, RAM, processor, etc. I was shocked how quickly I tripled the RAM, it was 10x easier than when I had upgraded the RAM in my old Gateway I had before I switched over. (With the Gateway it is 4 screws to get the door off, remove the HD, remove the cage holding the HD and a fan, remove a jungle of cables, then *finally* get to the RAM...then reverse the process when completed)
Sorry to double post, but, I have been looking around online and there are a few PC laptops that have 7200 rpm drives as built to order options already. I wonder if this could be a near future possibility for Apple, as well. I realize the 12" is a firebook as is because of the HD, but if there are that many laptops that have them on the high end or as an option already, the technology must be there.
i understand about the Alluminum thing. it's a great idea and very efficient, just wish my legs weren't always sweating. re: the battery thing, i have calibrated the battery a few times as instructed by a local Genius Bar dude. it may have helped a little but it's still really short. the thing that really worries me is that it drains even when it's a sleep. and not just a few points. like i could put it to sleep at 75% and wake it up the next day and it will be at 5%. i know, i know, i'm gonna bring it back for a new battery asap. in the meantime i'm gonna try calibrating again, this time with no interruption during recharge. i don't think i did that before. no one ever mentioned that you shouldn't use it during the calib ration recharge. i'm glad you brought this up. thanks.
I don't know if it'd help or not, but try trashing your power management pref files, resetting your PMU, etc. All those little things can make a world of difference. I remember I left my Powerbook off for a couple of months during summer vacation and came back to the battery not even charging or keeping more than 10% and after all my tinklering it wasn't until I reset the PMU and trashed my pref files that it suddenly went up to about 4 1/2 hours after it charged back up.