Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

urzsite · Jan 10, 2007, 10:32 AM

Hello all !

The Seagate and Hitachi drives are almost 1 year old, so I was wondering if there are updates comming ? I can't seem to find anything on google or newssites.

My problem is that I have the stock 120GB hitachi drive (5400rpm), which is crunching like mad! The speed is good, but I was wondering if it would get less noisy with a Seagate Momentus 7200 ? It is REALLY loud.

So far you can get a 100GB for about 180 Euro (160 Dollars?), and im not sure if I should wait a little bit or just get it done now and "be happy".

I mostly use my Macbook for Photo editing, Graphical work and a little gaming. I also play around with some video editing for fun.

Get the Seagate Momentus 7200 now, or should I wait for update ?

Any help is appreciated!

Simon · Jan 10, 2007, 11:00 AM

Interesting you mention that. I had to go back and check to make sure I really had a the same Hitachi 120 GB in my 2.33 GHz C2D MBP. I find it to be one of the most quiet notebook HDs I have ever used. Unless the room is absolutely silent and I put my ear up to the case, I can't hear the disk crunch. Are you sure your disk isn't failing? Does the S.M.A.R.T status in DiskUtility show 'Verified'?

urzsite · Jan 10, 2007, 05:32 PM

Thanks for replying Simon.

I checked and its very "verified" in S.M.A.R.T. Im sure its my Hitachi which is a bad model (its electronic), so thats why I wanted to exchange it, since the Apple Genius will probably say its A-OK!

And I haven't seen any errors with the harddrive, so I got a pretty bad case ;-)

Exchange now ? or wait for updates ?

I have a keyboard exchange too this friday, so im gonna have to know before then :-) So they can do it all at once.

Hope to get some experiences or knowledge.

olePigeon · Jan 10, 2007, 05:47 PM

Originally Posted by urzsite

So far you can get a 100GB for about 180 Euro (160 Dollars?), and im not sure if I should wait a little bit or just get it done now and "be happy".

Closer to US $232. Dollar's not doing too well.

urzsite · Jan 10, 2007, 07:36 PM

Originally Posted by olePigeon

Closer to US $232. Dollar's not doing too well.

I forgot about that since its been years since I shopped in the U.S.

Ouch!

uruiamme · Jan 11, 2007, 01:04 PM

Are you looking at the Seagate ST910021AS drive? 7200.1, right? I bought one at Newegg for $150. They are now lower than that here in the US. Try Froogle. ST910021AS - Froogle

The main problem I see is that at least for the 17" Macbook Pro core 2 duo, I have heard at least that they aren't so easy to swap out. Mine is in a USB external box that I got, since I was unsure about swapping out my 160GB drive. It sounds like there's a lot of screws involved, anyway.

urzsite · Jan 11, 2007, 01:46 PM

Urui: I think I will wait until Leapard gets out until I change harddrive. I will have to reinstall everything anyway

(I always do clean install).

I am going to get a certified to put it in, so I dont crash the warrenty and my apple care protection plan.

Heres to hopeing that Seagate or any other brand brings out some nice 2.5 SATA's by then.

Happy New Year.

solofx7 · Jan 11, 2007, 03:07 PM

i currently have the Gozilla of the MacBook Pro Line...
It has the 160gig drive.
I need help though.
i am just now getting into Digital Artwork and such, and the drive is nearly full.
I would like a larger drive.
Does anyone know what is the fastest largest internal laptop drive that is out there that will work with my MacBook Pro?

Javizun · Jan 11, 2007, 05:04 PM

Hey Solo

The 200gb 4200rpm have been proven to be a nifty hard drive, despite its rpms.
Or what you can do is purchase a firewire 800 or usb external hard drive and use it strictly for your digital artwork (i know how much space that can take).

My boss gave me a western digital 160gb passport drive and i love it. I use it for all my digital artwork.

Apple will be releasing the new airport express with airdisk and i plan on buying a 1tb or 500gb harddrive and strictly use that for all my backups and just use the passport harddrive for when i need to be mobile. So many solutios to a laptop but if you want just research the 200gb HHD alot of reviews claim is actually faster then a 7200rpm.

solofx7 · Jan 11, 2007, 05:48 PM

thanks, i will look into it.
i am thinking about an external drive.
do you know what the difference is between the silver ones and the black ones?

uruiamme · Jan 11, 2007, 08:57 PM

As for the boxes you buy already built: fine for some. But a cheap OEM (not retail-boxed) drive plus a cheap USB 2.0 enclosure that supports SATA is a nice option. See my post above for where I bought stuff.

Mine didn't support Firewire at all, but USB 2 was fine for me. Of course with so much USB stuff, using firewire at least frees up those slots. But they end up being the same speed, from all of the benchmarks I have seen.

Or if you want a fatter external box that has a "full size" 3.5" drive, those offer of course huge capacities, 750 GB for a single drive enclosure. BTW, it's very easy to install one in your own enclosure, in fact if you have a two disks and one enclosure, you might be looking at 10 minutes to switch drives... maybe.

The problem with getting a box already containing a drive, is there is no telling usually what is in it --- often they are old-style ATA drives. So slower, less compatible with newer systems, etc. By rolling your own, you can specify the drive you think has the best performance, etc.