Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Hard Disk Upgrade - 13" MBP

N

Neo-Tech

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 19, 2009
126
3
Hey guys,

I'm looking to upgrade the hard disk of my 13" MacBook Pro (Specifications located in my signature below). I currently have the stock 320GB Hard Disk, but as it turns out, I'm starting to run low on space, lol.

I want at least 500GB or more, but as I've read, 640GB and up are thicker drives. I'm also wondering whether to go for 5400RPM or 7200RPM. I've been using 5400RPM hard disks all my life and I'd love to see the differences. But the question is, are there any? I'd love to see benchmarks.

Oh, another thing. I've been reading reviews and around the forum, Western Digital are better than Seagate is the general final thought. What are your opinions?

Thanks for your help guys, in advance!
Mo'
 
I used Fujitsu 500GB 5400 RPM hard drive

Check the power specifications on the drives you're researching. Most 7200 RPM drives use more power, and would adversely affect your battery life, if that's important to you. I recently upgraded my MacBook using a Fujitsu 500 GB 5400 RPM drive, which uses less power than WD and Seagate. Fujitsu's 500 GB drive uses less power than their 320 GB drive. I'm very satisfied with new Fujitsu drive.
 
WD 640GB will fit (9.5mm tall), but is only 5400RPM.

For 7200RPM you're stuck at 500GB.

Neo-Tech said:
Hey guys,

I'm looking to upgrade the hard disk of my 13" MacBook Pro (Specifications located in my signature below). I currently have the stock 320GB Hard Disk, but as it turns out, I'm starting to run low on space, lol.

I want at least 500GB or more, but as I've read, 640GB and up are thicker drives. I'm also wondering whether to go for 5400RPM or 7200RPM. I've been using 5400RPM hard disks all my life and I'd love to see the differences. But the question is, are there any? I'd love to see benchmarks.

Oh, another thing. I've been reading reviews and around the forum, Western Digital are better than Seagate is the general final though. What are your opinions?

Thanks for your help guys, in advance!
Mo'
Click to expand...
 
Thanks for the replies guys!

Are there any benchmarks on the Fuji drive? My MacBook Pro came with a 320GB Fujitsu, it's doing quite well for me.

As for the power consumption, how much would I lose? Would I lose something small like 10-20 mins? Or an hour?
 
I'm also in the process of upgrading my HD as well.

Just last week I ordered the WD 500GB Scorpio Blue drive, which has excellent benchmark figures. I cloned the drive and plugged it in and had a problem with the HD 'pausing' or 'lagging' every once in a while. I put the original drive (250GB) back in and it worked perfectly again. I have about 30 GB free, so I am not in a hurry to have the issue resolved.

I did some research and it seems that the EFI 1.7 and 1.8 firmware are the culprit. But I'm not entirely sure.
 
I think that if you think about it, it would be the same thing, maybe the faster one uses more battery but at the same time takes more to load which also takes you battery time, usually hard drives don't eat that much power as Graphic cards or even smaller things
 
I can highly recommend the WD 500Gb Scorpio Blue drive. Works great and feels like a 7200rpm drive.

If you have the money I would do an SSD and 500GB dual drive. You'd have to purchase an Optibay or something of it's clones which takes the place of the DVD drive.
 
Aaargh! Can't decide.

500GB Western Digital 5200RPM - Google Product links if interested
500GB Seagate 7200RPM - Google Product links if interested

With a 7200RPM hard disk, I gain a speed boost. And I lose a few minutes in battery life, more noise and more heat. Heat is not an issue for me, most of the time I take my MacBook Pro out of my bag, it's ice cold :p That's what you get for living in the UK, but meh.
With a 5400RPM hard disk, it's just the same as my current hard disk, but with more speed. And it's also a good £20 cheaper.

I think I'll go for the Seagate, I've been using a Seagate in my PS3 for a year or so, and I've had no significant issues at all, but it is the 5400RPM version.
So in terms of speed, there isn't much to gain, right? Apart from a speed boost (small) and battery loss. What would you pick?
 
Other options

Just to make the decision harder.....:D
There are other options; OWC (and other sellers too) has a Toshiba 500GB 5,400 drive for about $99. In my experience (several drives), Toshiba drives have always been very quiet with very good performance (My Macbook has the 250GB 5,400 drive and it is virtually silent, has no vibration I can feel, and while it is a little slower than the WD Scorpio Blue, the 500GB may be comparable).
I have seen posts saying the 500GB Hitachi 7,200 is very fast and available now, but I haven't researched that yet.
I suggest you get your priorities fixed before you make a final decision. Do yu want speed? - 7,200. Or a quiet drive with low vibration - 5,400. Then look at the characteristics of the various makers.
:cool::apple::cool:
 
davidlv said:
Just to make the decision harder.....:D
There are other options; OWC (and other sellers too) has a Toshiba 500GB 5,400 drive for about $99. In my experience (several drives), Toshiba drives have always been very quiet with very good performance (My Macbook has the 250GB 5,400 drive and it is virtually silent, has no vibration I can feel, and while it is a little slower than the WD Scorpio Blue, the 500GB may be comparable).
I have seen posts saying the 500GB Hitachi 7,200 is very fast and available now, but I haven't researched that yet.
I suggest you get your priorities fixed before you make a final decision. Do yu want speed? - 7,200. Or a quiet drive with low vibration - 5,400. Then look at the characteristics of the various makers.
:cool::apple::cool:
Click to expand...
Lol, thanks xD
My experience with Toshiba drives hasn't been the same though. I have 2 in my laptop, and one of them died, the OS one. And the second hard drive is clicking quite a lot. It's also pretty noisy I must say, but not much vibration. My parents Toshiba drive died as well.
Aren't Hitachi drives known as Deathstar though? :p
Like I said, I think I'll just go for the speed. I'm 90% of the time on plug anyway, so battery isn't a major issue. As long as I don't lose hours, I'll be happy.
 
Ah f*** the Seagate. As much as how I've had no issues with the 320GB 5400rpm version of the Seagate, and the 60GB one, the amount of reports I've read on dead drives has really turned the tables. As this is my main computer, I can't afford to have downtime and loss of data.

I'll go for the Western Digital Scorpio Blue (500GB) 5400rpm. The general consensus of these drives is that they perform nearly the exact same as a 7200rpm drive, but with less heat, less power usage and not as much vibration. Even though the speed results on the Seagate are much higher, WD is equally as good.

Or...if any of you do own a Seagate (ie. October 09-December 09), if your having any issues or had issues or it's just perfect, let the world know ;)

I'll be ordering this very soon, I won't be cloning it because I want a clean install of OS X to get maximum speed of Snow Leopard (I did an upgrade last time) and maximum speed of the hard disk. I have one final question though. I'm looking for an external enclosure for my old 320GB Fujitsu drive, USB is nice, but Firewire would be nicer :p Any ideas on what I should be looking at? I'm looking to order off http://www.cclonline.com or http://www.overclockers.co.uk

Thanks!
 
Sorry for bumping another thread :rolleyes:

@HaroldC; Did you get beachballs when you got the lags/pauses? I seem to be getting some lag and beachballs more than before. I even downgraded my EFI and it made no difference.

I got the hard drive a month ago and it's been fine-ish. When I initially got it, I did an SMC reset, zeroed the drive, and ran AJA System Test. Both read and write speeds were 69Mb/s. Now I'm getting 59Mb/s each, WTF. I also seem to be getting slow boot ups and logins as well as slow shut downs, I've removed all the stuff I installed when the slowness began and it made no difference. This is really ruining my first time Mac experience :( Anyone have any ideas? I don't want to resort to a reinstall, simply because it's takes the p*** backing everything up and restoring it.

Thanks for the help
Neo-Tech
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back