I guess it’s a rule of life—you can’t have everything: Apple giveth and Apple taketh away.
This morning when Apple granted mobile users the power of the Core 2 Duo processor, they also removed the option of a 7200 RPM hard drive from the 15” MacBook Pro. The only drive-speed options in the 15” line are now 5400 and 4200 RPMs—a rather disappointing move. I’m not quite sure what Apple’s plan is here, but the option of a 200GB drive loses its appeal as soon as you realize its only 4200 RPMs.
Perhaps Apple made this move to further differentiate between the 15” and 17” MBP lines. Or maybe it’s because these machines would just be dangerously fast if Apple left in the 7200 RPM drives. Who know what the real reason is? All I know is that I’m disappointed.
I would venture to guess that rather than the machines being 'dangerously fast', the more likely scenario is that they would be dangerously hot!
I'm not sure whether it would affect battery life as well, but heat must definitely be an issue.
And on that, I don't understand why apple is having so much trouble with heat issues (even before the switch to intel - my 12" powerbook suffers as well). Sony have some very compact full-featured laptops, such as the SZ series, and they don't have the same heat issues afaik...
Rotational speed is not the be-all and end-all of hard drive specifications.
In fact, since platter size is constant while the recording density increases, you get an effective speed increase in read mode that tends to compensate nicely for the loss of physical speed.
Is what Michael Long stated true? Can someone back up his statement? It seems really logical too......
If what he says is true then I'll get the 200GB 4200rpm instead of the 160GB 5400rpm
But on the other hand, wouldn't data that is on the outer edge of the platter read faster than data that is nearer to the center of the platter?
What Michael said is true, however a 7200 RPM drive still is faster than a 4200 (or 5400) RPM drive. If you're just word processing, internet browsing, emailing and music playing (with an occasional venture into some photos or video) a 4200 RPM drive should be sufficient.
As the hard drive head works its way to the outer edge of the platter, read and write speeds do increase. Keep in mind, though, that that increased speed will still be slower than the increased speed on a 7200 RPM drive.
I have done some personal tests, and 7200 RPM drives definitely do run faster than 5400 (and especially 4200) RPM drives. Check out this Barefeats benchmark test and you will see that the 7200 RPM drive really starts to shine in longer sustained reads and writes (ie: transferring large files back and forth).
Basically, it's like Michael said, "rotational speed is not the be-all and end-all of hard drive specifications," but there is definitely a correlation between RPMs and MB/sec write & read speed. Ultimately you have to make up your mind which is best for you and find some balance.
I chose the speedy 7200 RPM 100GB drive for my MBP. Then I built two portable 160 GB Firewire drives (at 5400 RPMs) which hold my photo, video, and audio-recording projects when I'm on the go. For me, this was the perfect balance between speed and storage space. Now you just need to think what's right for you (and your pocketbook.)
I looked at the seagate site and they have a 160GB 7200rpm drive. Is it shipping yet? But it's probably going to be expensive!!
I mainly use Aperture, I shoot lots of RAW, and I'm planning on getting a 120GB LaCie firewire 800 ext hd (5400rpm) anyways.
Should I go for the 160GB 5400rpm or a 120GB 7200rpm (Can I install that myself or I've got to get Apple to do it?)
Thanks
Another thing, what if I buy the MacBook Pro and upgrade the RAM myself. How do I know which slot is for the 2GB stick? I hope both slots can accept 2GB though so I can max it up to four....
Any ideas?
Thanks