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Advice on a 17" PB

B

barkster

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 4, 2003
7
0
And now for my first post...

I am getting ready to order a 17" powerbook, but I would like some advice on the optional hard drive. Do people recommend getting it, or is it not really worth it? Apple's on-line store has the ship time for the faster hard drive at 5-7 weeks! Thanks for your help!
 
Ok, worth it for what?

To take to school: is too much.
To leave it at your desk and move it once in a while: is ok.
To edit video: get a tower.
To surf the net only: get and iMac.

¿?
 
I'll be using it mainly around the house, but I like to move around too. So I'm fairly certain I want the 17" PB. However, I am not certain whether or not to get the optional 5400 RPM hard drive versus the standard 4200 RPM one.
 
If your going to get into video editing etc, then I'd say the 5400 drive would be a good move, but for web, e-mail, music, bit of photo editing, iMovie here and there, I reckon your money would be better spent on extra RAM (though NOT RAM from Apple).
 
RAM from apple basicaly cost twise the regular price, BUT I have neer heard of anyone having problem with it.

As for the HD, it depends of what you want to put on it. If its just a speed concern, you could buy a good FW external HD with 8meg of ram FW800. This are very fast drive, but you woulnd be able to walk around with it in your house wich may be a big problem for you.

Basicaly, the 5400rpm drive will give you a speed increment less than 15% when starting application and will greatly reduce your battery life. Its a big trade off.

You want a faster laptop or one that last longer?

Personnaly, I would go for battery life and eventualy get a FW800 external drive.
 
I didn't go for the 5400 hd because I figure, if speed (and battery life...) are an issue at some point, I will be able to upgrade the drive (it would cost maybe double the price difference, but I get to keep the old hd as a backup drive - plus small big fast drives will get cheaper).
I also couldn't bear the thought of waiting weeks.
Good luck
 
there are now several threads about this subject. A good suggestion seems to be an external firewire drive.
 
Thanks to everyone for their advice. I went ahead and got the 4200 RPM drive. But the big news is that this is my first mac--thanks again!
 
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