[Toyin]

Originally Posted by teknishn 

That depends on what you consider close. And you only looked at one of the many read/write benchmarks. Here are sone others in mb/s

Read rate max: 7200 = 54.4 5400/160 = 45.9
Read rate avg: 7200 = 40.8 5400/160 = 35.8

Write max: 7200 = 53 5400/160 = 45.7
Write avg: 7200 = 40.3 5400/160 = 35.1

Access time: 7200 = 15.1 5400/160 = 16.4

Personally I dont consider max transfers of 8-10mb/s faster and averages of 5+mb/s on read/write "close". The point is that people on this and other boards out there have been saying the 5400 is faster than the 7200.... and others that its the same. Neither is true. 7200 is faster PERIOD. And if you pour over the benchmarks that are out there besides this one, its even more convincing and a far greater disparity. Im not overly concerned about power. At idle the difference is .6 of a watt and under load the difference is about 2 watts. Furthermore, I dont plan on encoding video on battery power.

Don't get me wrong here though. Im not trying to tell everyone to buy 7200. I just want to set the record straight on the performance facts. If 60 extra gb is what you need and you're willing to sacrifice some performance and spend an extra $90 then get the 5400/160 perp drive. I happen to keep my bulk storage external with about a terabyte of firewire disk. Then I have another 2 small external 100gb 2.5 fw disks for travel/mobility. As a result, I opted for the higher performing 7200 disk and saved $90 in the process on my new 17 mbp. Cheaper and faster =

As far as I understood this was a theoretical discussion on how a 5400rpm drive COULD be faster than a 7200 drive. Even in the website you mentioned there's a 5400rpm drive that's faster than the 7200 drive in several benchmarks.

All that said and done, I've been using my C2D MBP for a few days and I'm happy with the speed. There may have been one or 2 instances where I thought it felt slower than my PB with its 7200 drive. However during those situations I was running Parallels with XP. Personally I need the extra space. If they release a 200gb 7200rpm drive I'm all over that.

[teknishn]

No, I took the best performers of each to give each the benefit of the doubt. But, don't take my word for it. If you read the whole thing... and other tests out on the net, the results are that the 7200 is always faster. I upgraded my 15 mbp from 5400 to 7200 and noticed a considerable improvement. However, that was not the denser perp 5400 drive that I was going from either.

Originally Posted by rach 

I hope that you didn't include those 160 GB ATA hard drives that are listed on your site to get your averages.
I wonder which drives Apple will be using mainly in the C2D's MBP's? For those who already have their MBP's i would be interested to hear what drives Apple used in your machine.
I know that Apple typically use Seagate drives and the Seagate SATA PMR drive did well in these tests compared to the higher RPM 7,200RPM drive.
I posted this link earlier and i said that the 7,200RPM are the fastest but the PMR 160GB HD's are not that far behind.
I have used both a 7,200RPM and a 5,400RPM in a MBP and to me i found that the MBP with the 5,400RPM ran cooler than the MBP with the 7,200RPM drive.
I would have jumped at it if Apple did offer a 7,200RPM drive in the MBP 15inch model but if i have something that runs as fast as these 160 GB PMR HD's do and cooler i am very happy with that.

[rach]

Ok, but i to have used a 7,200RPM drive in a MBP for six months plus and a 5,400RPM 100GB drive in a MBP and i did not notice any difference in terms of speed at all.
Also just to point out that in that test the 160GB drive MHV2160BT that faired badly was a 4,200RPM drive.

Originally Posted by teknishn 

No, I took the best performers of each to give each the benefit of the doubt. But, don't take my word for it. If you read the whole thing... and other tests out on the net, the results are that the 7200 is always faster. I upgraded my 15 mbp from 5400 to 7200 and noticed a considerable improvement. However, that was not the denser perp 5400 drive that I was going from either.

[teknishn]

The only tests the 5400 was better in were I/O (the interface), and that really doesn't affect the performance of the drives day to day use at all.... as they stated at the end of those particular tests.

If space is what you need then the 160 perp drive is definitely a fantastic option.

Originally Posted by Toyin 

As far as I understood this was a theoretical discussion on how a 5400rpm drive COULD be faster than a 7200 drive. Even in the website you mentioned there's a 5400rpm drive that's faster than the 7200 drive in several benchmarks.

All that said and done, I've been using my C2D MBP for a few days and I'm happy with the speed. There may have been one or 2 instances where I thought it felt slower than my PB with its 7200 drive. However during those situations I was running Parallels with XP. Personally I need the extra space. If they release a 200gb 7200rpm drive I'm all over that.

[teknishn]

Originally Posted by rach 

Ok, but i to have used a 7,200RPM drive in a MBP for six months plus and a 5,400RPM 100GB drive in a MBP and i did not notice any difference in terms of speed at all.
Also just to point out that in that test the 160GB drive MHV2160BT that faired badly was a 4,200RPM drive.

Thats odd, because I couldn't stand the abysmal performance of the 5400 drive in my mbp so I went and bought the 7200 and dropped it in there myself. I found the difference to be night and day in what I do... which is actually using the hdd. If you're just surfing the web and reading email.... then yes you won't know the difference.

[rach]

No that is not quite the extent of what i do. I do more than that which does involve using the HD but as i said i did not notice any difference. In fact i thought that i was using a 7,200RPM drive until i checked the part number through google and discovered that i was not.

Originally Posted by teknishn 

Thats odd, because I couldn't stand the abysmal performance of the 5400 drive in my mbp so I went and bought the 7200 and dropped it in there myself. I found the difference to be night and day in what I do... which is actually using the hdd. If you're just surfing the web and reading email.... then yes you won't know the difference.

[teknishn]

Yeah, I'm just suprised is all. I thought the difference was night and day.

http://forums.macnn.com/69/powerbook...n/#post3188276

As you can see here, when you're not talking about perp drives the 7200 really lays the wood to the 5400.

Originally Posted by rach 

No that is not quite the extent of what i do. I do more than that which does involve using the HD but as i said i did not notice any difference. In fact i thought that i was using a 7,200RPM drive until i checked the part number through google and discovered that i was not.

[Toyin]

Originally Posted by teknishn 

Yeah, I'm just suprised is all. I thought the difference was night and day.

http://forums.macnn.com/69/powerbook...n/#post3188276

As you can see here, when you're not talking about perp drives the 7200 really lays the wood to the 5400.

I know in my 15" PB. The difference between the 100gb 7200 and 5400 was noticeable.

[rach]

I was going to get the 120GB at first but then i decided to opt for the 160GB instead and I asked Apple to order that for me instead.

I had the middle model MBP CD and was promised a new replacement by Apple and they sent me out a lesser spec machine with only 128 of vram. I asked them when I was ordering for them to add in a 7,200RPM drive and i thought that they had done that but they did not. I only found out recently that i was not using a 7,200rpm drive in this replacement machine that has go back when i receive my new C2D MBP.

It maybe just me but i could not notice a difference between the two drives. On paper though it is clear by tests that the 7,200RPM drive is faster than a standard 5,400RPM drive. I wanted a 7200RPM drive at first because i wanted the fastest RPM drive that was possible even though if i could not notice a difference myself. My feelings on that has changed a bit and i am happy with the PMR drive 5,400RPM drive for now and i will not swap over to a 100GB 7,200RPM when i get my MBP.

Originally Posted by teknishn 

Yeah, I'm just suprised is all. I thought the difference was night and day.

http://forums.macnn.com/69/powerbook...n/#post3188276

As you can see here, when you're not talking about perp drives the 7200 really lays the wood to the 5400.

[zaghahzag]

comparing 7200 drives to any drive but the 160s is not valid per this discussion. we're specifically talking about the new 160 gig drives that use perpendicular recording. if you have an old 5400 drive then it will get spanked.

And also note that you are comparing the fastest 5400 vs the fastest 7200 drives. there's no guarantee that apple will use the fastest 7200, and the 5400 perp recording drives beat a lot of other 7200 drives.

So I agree, if you want the fastest get a 7200 drive. But even then it's going to be snail compared to a SATA raid via an expansion card.

I got the 160 because it will probably be fast enough, and i want the extra space for paralells and stuff. But I think the record should show that the 160 gig 5400 is faster than previous 5400 drives, and it's not completely out of the league vs 7200 drives.

Now when they have a 7200 rpm perpendicular recording drive, that should spank.

zgz

[teknishn]

+1

I can't wait for that new Hitachi 2.5 200gb 7200rpm perpendicular disk. All they said was that it will be available in 1st half 07. My only worry is that it will cost a small fortune.

Originally Posted by zaghahzag 

comparing 7200 drives to any drive but the 160s is not valid per this discussion. we're specifically talking about the new 160 gig drives that use perpendicular recording. if you have an old 5400 drive then it will get spanked.

And also note that you are comparing the fastest 5400 vs the fastest 7200 drives. there's no guarantee that apple will use the fastest 7200, and the 5400 perp recording drives beat a lot of other 7200 drives.

So I agree, if you want the fastest get a 7200 drive. But even then it's going to be snail compared to a SATA raid via an expansion card.

I got the 160 because it will probably be fast enough, and i want the extra space for paralells and stuff. But I think the record should show that the 160 gig 5400 is faster than previous 5400 drives, and it's not completely out of the league vs 7200 drives.

Now when they have a 7200 rpm perpendicular recording drive, that should spank.

zgz

[zaghahzag]

i think the prices for 7200 drives using parallel recording will be what we expect - within 6 months it will probably cost what the top of the line drive now costs ~220$(?)...

but right off the bat it might be really expensive.

does anyone know if there is a technical reason to never switch to parallel recording? Is it more expensive to produce the disks or somehting?

[mduell]

Bulk transfer speed isn't going to be much different between 5400 and 7200RPM drives, especially when the 5400 has a larger overall capacity. The performance difference is going to show up in seek time and small random transfers.

[rach]

It looks like Apple is shipping the 120GB 5,400 perpendicular Hitachi drives in some 15 inch MBP's and the Fujitsu lateral 120GB drives also. So some of you who ordered the 120GB drive thinking that you maybe getting the lateral drive may find yourselves in luck.

Here are some tests results from Mac World testing the C2D models against the CD 15 inch models.
Macworld: First Look: Benchmarks: MacBook Pro gets its Core 2 Duo boost

[zaghahzag]

overall the new core duos show a lot more improvement than i would have expected.

[SierraDragon]

Originally Posted by mduell 

Bulk transfer speed isn't going to be much different between 5400 and 7200RPM drives, especially when the 5400 has a larger overall capacity. The performance difference is going to show up in seek time and small random transfers.

I thought that bulk transfers were exactly what 7200 rpm would be better at. Now I really need to see some empirical data on the C2D 17" 7200 rpm drives vs. 5400!

-Allen Wicks

[mduell]

Originally Posted by SierraDragon 

I thought that bulk transfers were exactly what 7200 rpm would be better at. Now I really need to see some empirical data on the C2D 17" 7200 rpm drives vs. 5400!

Take a look at the benchmarks here: Tom's Hardware Guide Processors: Hard Disk Charts

[Simon]

Originally Posted by SierraDragon 

I thought that bulk transfers were exactly what 7200 rpm would be better at. Now I really need to see some empirical data on the C2D 17" 7200 rpm drives vs. 5400!

The often passed on little theory goes like this: Since the 7200 RPM's platters have a higher speed under the head, the disk's seek times are lower. And since small read/writes are dominated by seek time, they should show the largest benefit.

Whatever.

Actual benchmarks done on a CD rev A MBP revealed that the 7200 was superior mainly when looking at large sustained transfers.




Btw, when it came to small random reads, the 7200 performed actually worse than the 5400.

[teknishn]

Originally Posted by mduell 

Bulk transfer speed isn't going to be much different between 5400 and 7200RPM drives, especially when the 5400 has a larger overall capacity. The performance difference is going to show up in seek time and small random transfers.

Absolutely incorrect. The difference in access time between the 2 is an innate amount. Its the bulk transfer speeds where the 7200 lays it to the 5400 regardless of perpendicular. Perpendicular does speed things up a lot, but if you're moving a lot of data a lot, (like I do), the 7200 is the way to go.

[mduell]

Originally Posted by teknishn 

Absolutely incorrect. The difference in access time between the 2 is an innate amount. Its the bulk transfer speeds where the 7200 lays it to the 5400 regardless of perpendicular. Perpendicular does speed things up a lot, but if you're moving a lot of data a lot, (like I do), the 7200 is the way to go.

The maximum data write speed, average data read speed, and database performance benchmarks at tomshardware (linked above) disagree with you.

I think 7200RPM is always the way to go if you can live with the capacity.

[MattJeff]

why cant they have a 7200 RPM 160 gig or 200 gig?

[jeffm]

Personally, this 5400 limitation is really disappointing. I'm a long-time windows user, but I was totally prepared to make the jump with the core 2 MBP. I still might have if I could swap the darn drive myself, but I've read that's not possible because of a proprietary noise damper (?) on the drive. Unbelievable.

Oh well, maybe next year...

[Simon]

Originally Posted by jeffm 

Personally, this 5400 limitation is really disappointing. I'm a long-time windows user, but I was totally prepared to make the jump with the core 2 MBP. I still might have if I could swap the darn drive myself, but I've read that's not possible because of a proprietary noise damper (?) on the drive. Unbelievable.

All authorized Apple service providers in my area will gladly install a 7200 rpm HD for you and this will not void the warranty at all. If a 7200 rpm drive is that important to you, I'd just have them do it. Compared to the cost of the MBP, the installation fee is negligible. Of course if having a BTO 7200 rpm HD is more important to you than Mac OS X, you'll definitely be much happier with a PC.

[Simon]

Originally Posted by teknishn 

Absolutely incorrect. The difference in access time between the 2 is an innate amount. Its the bulk transfer speeds where the 7200 lays it to the 5400 regardless of perpendicular. Perpendicular does speed things up a lot, but if you're moving a lot of data a lot, (like I do), the 7200 is the way to go.

I concur. The benchmarks I posted above support that as well.

[jeffm]

Originally Posted by Simon 

...Of course if having a BTO 7200 rpm HD is more important to you than Mac OS X, you'll definitely be much happier with a PC.

I just need a system that meets my needs. I'm not willing to sacrifice performance for OS X or Vista or anything else.

Anyway, thanks for the installation tip - that never occurred to me. Too bad the local Apple store just shut down. I'll have to drive 1.5 hours to the nearest one in Charlotte, NC.

Will I have to buy the laptop at the store, or can I get it online and then take it in for the upgrade? Will they keep it for an extended period? - that could be a problem since I have to drive so far.

Thanks for your help

[mduell]

Originally Posted by Simon 

All authorized Apple service providers in my area will gladly install a 7200 rpm HD for you and this will not void the warranty at all. If a 7200 rpm drive is that important to you, I'd just have them do it. Compared to the cost of the MBP, the installation fee is negligible. Of course if having a BTO 7200 rpm HD is more important to you than Mac OS X, you'll definitely be much happier with a PC.

I called around about swapping the drive in a PowerBook, and the AASPs quoted $300-350... that's non-negligible w/r/t a $2000 MBP.

CompUSA did it for $30... but that turned into a 4.5 month hell.

[jeffm]

Wow - did that include the cost of the drive? I certainly hope so...Still very expensive though.

I recently bought a 7200 rpm travelstar w/8gb cache for ~150.

[zaghahzag]

i got a mbp with 160 gig drive. i can say for a fact that compared to load times on a g5 w/ 7200rpm drive, this thing is lights out faster. Compared to my pbg4 with 80 gig 5400rpm drive w/ 16 meg cache, it's lights out faster.

for some things drive speed is crucial, but if you're just loading apps, on a mbp, you're talking about super fast. the machine boots in like 15 seconds.

Of course, i got one with some bad memory, so it's heading back to apple. wah wah.

but to the guy who didn't want to buy a mbp b/c it doesn't have a 7200rpm drive, unless you're doing video or photoshop, don't let that stop you. and if you are, then buy a sata card and get a raid.

[rach]

The MacWorld results that i posted earlier support that also. The standard 2.33ghz machine with a 120GB drive beat the 2.16 ghz core duo in every single test listed and the 2.16 model had the 7,200rpm drive. The 2.16 C2D also out perfomed the 2.16 CD model in those tests also.

I do believe that these 5,400rpm drives run cooler than the 7,200rpm drives inside a MBP. Having used both systems in a MBP i can really tell the difference in terms of heat.

I don't think that i would potentially risk sacrificing that just to go for the 7,200rpm drive.

These PMR drives are really not that much slower than a 7,200rpm at all in tests. Also in some things like booting up times some 5,400rpm PMR drives were even faster.

Simon you have both models of MBP's one with the 7,200rpm drive and with a PMR drive how does the PMR drive compare to you?

Originally Posted by zaghahzag 

i got a mbp with 160 gig drive. i can say for a fact that compared to load times on a g5 w/ 7200rpm drive, this thing is lights out faster. Compared to my pbg4 with 80 gig 5400rpm drive w/ 16 meg cache, it's lights out faster.

for some things drive speed is crucial, but if you're just loading apps, on a mbp, you're talking about super fast. the machine boots in like 15 seconds.

Of course, i got one with some bad memory, so it's heading back to apple. wah wah.

but to the guy who didn't want to buy a mbp b/c it doesn't have a 7200rpm drive, unless you're doing video or photoshop, don't let that stop you. and if you are, then buy a sata card and get a raid.

[Simon]

Originally Posted by jeffm 

I recently bought a 7200 rpm travelstar w/8gb cache for ~150.

My local AASP will install that drive for half of what you payed for the disk. In my book $75 is nothing after I buy a $2k MBP. Of course, YMMV.

So you're close to Charlotte NC, eh? My brother and his family live in Chapel Hill. He usually goes to the Apple Store in Durham, but he's never been to an independent Apple dealer so I can't give you an address. But you can find an AASP in your area here.

An AASP will install the drive in a MBP you ordered on the web. That should be no problem. I'd just call the guy, make sure he's OK with the whole deal and get a quote. Then order the MBP and have it done.

[Simon]

Originally Posted by rach 

The MacWorld results that i posted earlier support that also. The standard 2.33ghz machine with a 120GB drive beat the 2.16 ghz core duo in every single test listed

I can confirm that. My C2D's 5400 HD easily beat my CD's 7200 HD. I would have gotten the 7200 if it would have been an option, but the way I see it now, there's no reason to replace the 5400 with my old 7200.

I do believe that these 5,400rpm drives run cooler than the 7,200rpm drives inside a MBP. Having used both systems in a MBP i can really tell the difference in terms of heat.

I can confirm that as well. There are benchmarks that show certain types of 7200 drives run no hotter than some 5400 drives. But in the case of my C2D MBP the 5400 rpm disk is clearly a lot cooler than the 7200 I had in my CD MBP. Of course the new one is a Hitachi and the old one was a Segate so I'm not saying it's just the rpm, but I'm definitely glad I got a cooler running HD that performs better as well.

Another great thing about the new disk is that it's so quiet. I could here the old 7200 Segate disk really well in a silent room sitting in front of my MBP. The new disk is completely inaudible unless you put your ear right up to the case - a position in which I never use my MBP. In addition, the new disk doesn't make this 'clunk' sound the old one did every once in a while. The clunk itself was no biggie, but the short lag in I/O accompanying it was a pain.

In short, I am not going to swap the 7200 rpm disk into my new C2D MBP because there's simply no advantage. And I will be recommending people go forward with the 5400 drives on the new MBP. Obviously Apple dropped the 7200 rpm disk for a good reason. The only thing that puzzles me is why they left it as a BTO option on the 17". Heat less of an issue maybe?

[ToBeFrank]

"Faster" is a loose term. A 7200RPM drive will always have a better worst case seek time than a 5400RPM drive. Here is why: in the worst case, the head is on a block of data and the next block of data that needs to be read is directly behind the head. This means platter has to make a full rotation to get to the required block of data. Obviously, a faster spinning platter will get there faster than a slower spinning one. Note that I am using the *worst* case to illustrate the point. This is not the same as the *average* seek time. The OS/hardware do all sorts of tricks to minimize the amount of seeking that needs to be done. However, I believe that due to the rotational speed, the average seek time will also be worse on the slower spinning drives, regardless of bit density. In my opinion, all these benchmarks that show max transfer rate are nice, but in normal everyday usage for the average user, they'll be more concerned with the average seek time.

[osiris]

The 5400 feels like a 7200. This is the first time I've ever used a laptop that felt like a desktop.

[SierraDragon]

Anecdotal experiences of 7200 rpm CD drives versus 5400 rpm C2D drives might be irrelevant, since we do not know what other changes Apple made in the evolution to C2D, nor do we know whether or not there are changes to the 7200 rpm drives being installed into 17" MBPs. Nor do we know the apps usage of the individuals commenting.

Personally I am still waiting to see what 17" test results are like with various drives. Then we will have an idea of relative 7200 rpm performance in C2Ds. Also we will be able to ask an Apple store if they will switch a 7200 rpm drive into a 15" for a fee (heat issues may not allow it).

I agree that for normal everyday usage for the average user the 5400 rpm drive is an excellent choice. However for me the discussion is about achieving absolute maximum i/o for folks who need it (me!). Heavy graphics users, etc.

-Allen Wicks

[zaghahzag]

sierradragon,

I was just responding to the guy who said he wanted to wait for a 7200 rpm drive. honestly, for people who really need the speed in a drive, i don't know why you're messing around with laptops. (ok ok i do.. it's because they're mobile.)

but really, in terms of hd speed.. laptop drives gets spanked by their larger cousins and they completely spanked by even the lamest raid setup you can get.

[Simon]

I'm with zaghahzag on this one.

If you depend on I/O severely you should be looking at either a desktop or if you absolutely need a notebook at FW800 or eSATA.

[Toyin]

Barefeats Review

With 120gb of data currently on my Hard drive, it's pretty clear which option was best for me.