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Dembo

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 14, 2007
185
13
London, UK / Frankfurt, Germany
Hi all,

my 120GB harddisk (stuck in a 6/2007 2.2GHz MBP (SR/LED)) is running out of space and I cut the available SATA options down to two candidates:

2.5" Toshiba 200GB MK2051GSY 7200 (16MB)
vs.
2.5" Samsung 320GB HM320JI (8MB)

I would usually go for the increased storage capacity of the Samsung but the 7200 min^-1 sound tempting - would I be able to notice a difference at all? Shouldn't the higher capacity compensate for the (theoretically) higher speed of the Toshiba?

Any advice welcome.

Cheers,
Dembo
 

fpar

macrumors regular
Feb 11, 2008
109
0
it all depends on what you do, if you comp is for everyday use there wont be much difference in speed, the only difference will come in if you are into heavy photoshop of video editing. The faster hard drive will not increase gaming performance but will speed up load times slightly however the difference between these hard drives is minor, you wouldn't see more than a couple seconds difference. Good luck.
 

nick9191

macrumors 68040
Feb 17, 2008
3,365
189
Britain
You should go for the new 500gb Samsung drive coming out, apparently its faster than the 200gb 7200rpm despite only being 5400rpm. And it fits as well unlike that 2.5" Hitachi.
 

Kaupa

macrumors regular
Apr 16, 2008
172
0
Germany
Hi,
i prefer the WD3200BEVT as it has better access times than the samsung and isnt that noisy. Two friends ordered their MBPs with 7200 disks and both are not as loud as my original fujitsu 5400:eek:
Mine arrived today and i am looking forward to getting it installed...
 

alphaod

macrumors Core
Feb 9, 2008
22,183
1,245
NYC
The 320 and the 200 should have similar access times, but the 7.2 will stomp the 5.4 in random seek.
 

Dembo

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 14, 2007
185
13
London, UK / Frankfurt, Germany
Sorry guys,

meant to give my usage profile and completely forgot about it when posting - sorry!

Main usage aside from the usual internet/office/PIM stuff is managing m digital photos, working with and on them using Photoshop. I do have a soft side for other media types (audio, video some design stuff) but usage is much lighter. Aside from this I like to play around with the machine itself and write the occasional bit of code in Python or Objective C.

Pretty much it. I am outgrowing the 120 GB stock drive due to the RAW images accumulating and I actually prefer having all my image on the internal HD.

Sounds like the 320, doesn't it?

Cheers,
Dembo
 

Tom Sawyer

macrumors 6502a
Aug 29, 2007
686
40
I'll chime in and say that I had the WD 320gb drive and it was a VERY QUICK little drive for 5400rpm. I'm a bit of a speed freek, space is not a big issue so I've recently picked up the Hitachi 7K200 (200gb)... reportedly the quickest 2.5" sata drive currently and a pretty good chunk of space.

My new MBP should be here on Monday and it will be promptly upgraded! :D
 

CWallace

macrumors G4
Aug 17, 2007
11,959
10,616
Seattle, WA
I'd rather have the 320GB unit. I'd only boot my MacBook Pro once a day so I can afford to wait a few more seconds for it to launch. And the majority of my time working with the machine would not be spent launching applications, so the slightly longer load times would be negligible. But I will always benefit from more space (I am already hitting the limit of my 320GB HDD on my iMac).
 

jason999

macrumors member
Apr 10, 2008
53
0
Hi all,

my 120GB harddisk (stuck in a 6/2007 2.2GHz MBP (SR/LED)) is running out of space and I cut the available SATA options down to two candidates:

2.5" Toshiba 200GB MK2051GSY 7200 (16MB)
vs.
2.5" Samsung 320GB HM320JI (8MB)

I would usually go for the increased storage capacity of the Samsung but the 7200 min^-1 sound tempting - would I be able to notice a difference at all? Shouldn't the higher capacity compensate for the (theoretically) higher speed of the Toshiba?

Any advice welcome.

Cheers,
Dembo

5400rpm is to slow for me. I's always go for 7200rpm and would favour seagate 2.5" drives.

Samsung make great lcd's but not sure about their hard drives.
 
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