Best internal HD for an iBook g4?

[burningbright]

Hello, I've got an iBook G4, (1.2Ghz, 768 MB RAM, 4200 RPM 30GB HD) and would like to upgrade the HD to something a bit more capacious and speedier. Is there any consensus on what's the best HD for iBooks out there? Battery consumption and speed are far more important to me than huge capacity.

Also, would it make a big difference to upgrade the RAM to the 1.25 GB maximum? I'm running Tiger and mainly just do the basics. I get beachballs fairly frequently. An update would mean removing the half gig I added a couple of years ago... If I upgraded is there anything I could do with that, such as get a discount on the RAM price or put it in my parents' Dell Dimension 5000 desktop? Thanks in advance!

 

[xJulianx]

In answer to your RAM question, upping the RAM to 1.25GB should help a lot with the beachballing you experience. As for the spare 512MB stick you will be left with you may well be better to just keep it spare incase you ever need to swap out one of you're other RAM sticks. You won't get much for it on eBay as it is flooded with them.

 

[burningbright]

Thanks for the advice! I might as well put in some more RAM whilst the computer's opened up! Does anyone have a recommendation for hard drive? Is any make particularly good for power consumption?

 

[mkrishnan]

Does anyone have a recommendation for hard drive? Is any make particularly good for power consumption?

I don't think there're huge differences in terms of power. You might use slightly less power over all if you get a faster drive (although on Newegg, I only see 4200/5400 drives, and there don't seem to be huge cache differences).

There are differences on loudness, though, FWIW.

The major options are probably Seagate Momentus, Hitachi Travelstar, and WD Scorpio. The Scorpio seems to be slightly on the more popular end (e.g. here) around here.

Just make sure it's a 2.5", 9.5mm height, PATA / IDE drive.

 

[OrangeSVTguy]

The largest and fastest IDE/PATA hdd they make are 7200RPM 100gb drives(that I found anyways). I'd also suggest putting the 1gb memory stick in there as well. For what you do, will definatly notice a big difference in just the basic tasks that you said you do. Your boot times and seeks times will definatly increase as well. I had both a 5400 & 7200 60gb in my ibooks and I could tell a difference. Stock are 4200RPM.

 

[burningbright]

Much obliged!

Thank you very much, I now know everything I need! I think the 100GB will just be a touch too small for me, so a 5400rpm 160/250GB to mkrishnan's specifications is what I'll go for! Thanks again!

 

[caribiner23]

I bought a Fujitsu 120 GB PATA drive at my local Fry's for about $70. I installed it in my daughter's iBook a few weeks ago. I'm a huge fan of the Fujitsu drives-- I've been using them for years and never had a day's problem.

My advice: be very very very patient and allow yourself a lot of time. You'll have to go through about 90 screws and several gyrations to get to the hard drive.

Oh, and don't drink beforehand.

 

[California]

Best one is actually the Western Digital 250gb 5400rpm drive. Five year warranty.

It is almost identical in speed to the fast 100gb 7200rpm because the bigger teh gigs size the fast the spin speed.

The 160gb is slower. But if you can get it for like fifty bucks new somewhere, that's a deal.

DON'T GET FUJISTU. I have actually returned apple machines that come with them OEM. They are slow, slow cache and suck.