? Laptop Hard Drives- Go with USB2 or 5400 RPM internal

  • Thread starter Thread starter Sam
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Sam

Hello everyone,

Just wondering which option makes sense. I wish to do some video
editing.My laptop's hard drive is 60GB 4200 RPM. I find it is slow.
Should I go with an 120 GB external 7200 rpm drive with USB2 enclosure
or upgrade to an 80 GB 5400 rpm internal drive?
TIA
 
Sam said:
Just wondering which option makes sense. I wish to do some video
editing.My laptop's hard drive is 60GB 4200 RPM. I find it is slow.
Should I go with an 120 GB external 7200 rpm drive with USB2
enclosure or upgrade to an 80 GB 5400 rpm internal drive?
Click to expand...

The 120G external would normally be rather better value.

You do need to watch that the housing is well designed
so the drive gets cooled properly tho. I'd personally use
a Samsung, quieter and run cooler than say the Seagates.
 
Sam said:
Hello everyone,

Just wondering which option makes sense. I wish to do some video
editing.My laptop's hard drive is 60GB 4200 RPM. I find it is slow.
Should I go with an 120 GB external 7200 rpm drive with USB2 enclosure
or upgrade to an 80 GB 5400 rpm internal drive?
Click to expand...

Why not upgrade to a 100 GB 7200 rpm internal drive?
 
Previously Sam said:
Hello everyone,
Click to expand...
Just wondering which option makes sense. I wish to do some video
editing.My laptop's hard drive is 60GB 4200 RPM. I find it is slow.
Should I go with an 120 GB external 7200 rpm drive with USB2 enclosure
or upgrade to an 80 GB 5400 rpm internal drive?
Click to expand...

If you get an enclosure, the speeds should be a close match.
The external HDD should however be cheaper and it gives you the
possibility to do backups on it as well.

I would go external. A laptop HDD is definitely not intended for
video editing.

As to enclosure, I would get a Seagate or Samsung IDE disk
and an enclusure and asemble it myself. Points to look for
in enclosures: Good cooling, compatibility and speed.
I have an Agrosy 360 U-P enclosure, which gives reasonable
speed, no compatibility issues with Linux or Windows XP and
reasonable cooling. Might get too warm if you do heavy editing.
In that case you should get something with a fan.

Arno
 
If you get an enclosure, the speeds should be a close match.
The external HDD should however be cheaper and it gives you the
possibility to do backups on it as well.

I would go external. A laptop HDD is definitely not intended for
video editing.

As to enclosure, I would get a Seagate or Samsung IDE disk
and an enclusure and asemble it myself. Points to look for
in enclosures: Good cooling, compatibility and speed.
I have an Agrosy 360 U-P enclosure, which gives reasonable
speed, no compatibility issues with Linux or Windows XP and
reasonable cooling. Might get too warm if you do heavy editing.
In that case you should get something with a fan.

Arno
Click to expand...

Are you suggesting the read/write times for laptop HDDs are
significantly different (slower) that the larger format drives?
Obviously comparing like with like (7200rpm drives with 7200rpm
drives).

It would be my opinion that a USB2 drive would be significantly slower
than an internal drive. The USB interface is a bottleneck.
 
Previously Edward W. Thompson said:
If you get an enclosure, the speeds should be a close match.
The external HDD should however be cheaper and it gives you the
possibility to do backups on it as well.

I would go external. A laptop HDD is definitely not intended for
video editing.

As to enclosure, I would get a Seagate or Samsung IDE disk
and an enclusure and asemble it myself. Points to look for
in enclosures: Good cooling, compatibility and speed.
I have an Agrosy 360 U-P enclosure, which gives reasonable
speed, no compatibility issues with Linux or Windows XP and
reasonable cooling. Might get too warm if you do heavy editing.
In that case you should get something with a fan.

Arno
Click to expand...
[/QUOTE]
Are you suggesting the read/write times for laptop HDDs are
significantly different (slower) that the larger format drives?
Obviously comparing like with like (7200rpm drives with 7200rpm
drives).
Click to expand...

Actually I compared typical with typical, i.e. 7200rpm with
5400rpm as the OP described. But even a 7200rpm HDD is slower
in 2.5" (notebook) than in 3.5", see below for some of the
reasons. There are some server drives in 2.5" that are
targetted at blade servers. They are not suitable for notebook
usage.
It would be my opinion that a USB2 drive would be significantly slower
than an internal drive. The USB interface is a bottleneck.
Click to expand...

USB2 is not the bottleneck. The interface chips are. For example,
I get 26MB/s real read rate from the same HDD in the Agrosy
enclosure that gives me about 40MB/s when connected internally
in a real PC (not a laptop/notebook reduced power design).

On my notebook HDD (5400rpm 40GB Fujitsu) I get something like
25MB/s connected internally. The problem is not only the lower
rpm, it is also that the tracks on a 2.5" disk are shorter than
on a 3.5" disk (i.e. less data gets moved past the disk heads per
revolution) and the seek times are worse. On the plus side the
notebook hdds are quiet, rugged with regard to shock, can take
a lot of start-stop-cycles and consume a fraction of the power
a 3.5" HDD consumes.

Arno
 
Good points people. It makes no difference if I go with a 100 GB or 120
GB. Whichever is on sale. I am suprised to hear that Samsung is cooler
than Seagates.

I already have an enclosure, it's an ADS. It only has a tiny fan which
looks to me that it could be for the power supply only. I was thinking
that maybe I should get a Y adapter where I can buy and attach one of
those underside hard drive coolers to the existing connector of the
enclosure. With this setup, I don't know if I will have enough juice
to power the hard drive, enclosure, and case fan? Or maybe just leave
the enclosure open and blow a fan onto the drive?? But, I hear that
creates a heavy electromagnetic field?
 
Sam said:
Good points people. It makes no difference if I go
with a 100 GB or 120 GB. Whichever is on sale.
Click to expand...
I am suprised to hear that Samsung is cooler than Seagates.
Click to expand...

Been that way for quite a while now.
I already have an enclosure, it's an ADS. It only has a tiny fan
which looks to me that it could be for the power supply only.
Click to expand...

Nope, its for everything. Its tiny so it fits.
I was thinking that maybe I should get a Y adapter where
I can buy and attach one of those underside hard drive
coolers to the existing connector of the enclosure. With
this setup, I don't know if I will have enough juice
to power the hard drive, enclosure, and case fan?
Probably.

Or maybe just leave the enclosure open and blow a fan onto the
drive?? But, I hear that creates a heavy electromagnetic field?
Click to expand...

Nope.
 
::
: > Or maybe just leave the enclosure open and blow a fan onto the
: > drive?? But, I hear that creates a heavy electromagnetic field?
:
: Nope.

Nope, dont leave the enclosure open or nope that running a fan creates an
electromagnetic field?
 
Thanks.

I just ran a speed test using my older Fujitsu 8G, 5400 rpm drive
connected to my USB2 enclosure. That little fan appears to be for the
power supply as no air is getting into the enclosure or at least not
any noticable air.

Testing the transfer rate of the Fujitsu, I get a maximum transfer rate
of 14.6 MB/sec, Average 12.3 MB/sec with 14.8 MB/sec burst rate, Access
time 16.1 ms, CPU usage 14.1 %.

With my laptops Toshiba 60G 4200 rpm drive, I get a maximum transfer
rate of 25 MB.sec, Average 19.4 MB/sec , 51.6 MB/sec burst rate, Access
time 21.3 ms, CPU usage 4.5 %

Should I still go with a 7200 RPM and use this current enclosure?
 
Sam said:
I just ran a speed test using my older Fujitsu 8G, 5400
rpm drive connected to my USB2 enclosure. That little
fan appears to be for the power supply as no air is
getting into the enclosure or at least not any noticable air.
Click to expand...

Dont believe it, a power supply as small as that doesnt need a fan.

Even with a conventional ATX power supply, the air
movement isnt that noticeable and its a much bigger fan.
Testing the transfer rate of the Fujitsu, I get a maximum
transfer rate of 14.6 MB/sec, Average 12.3 MB/sec with
14.8 MB/sec burst rate, Access time 16.1 ms, CPU usage 14.1 %.
Click to expand...

Measured using what ?
With my laptops Toshiba 60G 4200 rpm drive, I get a maximum
transfer rate of 25 MB.sec, Average 19.4 MB/sec , 51.6 MB/sec
burst rate, Access time 21.3 ms, CPU usage 4.5 %
Click to expand...
Should I still go with a 7200 RPM and use this current enclosure?
Click to expand...

Hard to say, if the enclosure is so badly designed that
the fan isnt cooling the hard drive at all, that may not
be very viable with the higher power 7200 RPM drive.
The drive may well get stinking hot and die quite soon.

What you really need is some way of actually seeing the
hard drive SMART temp in that enclosure to see how hot
its getting. That isnt easy to do with a USB enclosure tho.
 
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