Asus T100, with or without HDD?

[MarkizSchnitzel]

Apparently, Croatia is one of the few countries where Asus T100 is available with the special keyboard dock that has a 500GB HDD.

Which is what I was waiting for. But now I remembered.. How much of an impact would a HDD have on a battery life, when used as a netbook obviously?

What I was able to find was the following:
- mobile 2.5" HDDs are supposed to be using 0.5-2.5W (idle-load) (?)
- T100 uses 1.7-12W (load idle)
- T100 has a 31Wh battery
- T100 is measured to last 8.5-11h during normal use (depending on the source)

What am I extrapolating:
- system power usage during normal use is 2.8-3.6W.

What I fear, but don't know:
- if I take that HDD would be using 1.5.2W when used (say, I'm playing music stored on it), that could mean 50+% less battery life worst case!
Obviously I'm hoping that 1.8" drive or whatever would be in the dock actually uses much less power during regular usage (playing local music and videos, moving and copying some files, playing some older games like Baldurs Gate..).

I tried to find review from the same source of the same devices with/without HDD, but was unable to


Can someone help me?

 

[bearxor]

I don't think, if I needed the space, that I would be that concerned with the battery impact made by a HDD. The screen will be the biggest impact on your battery life.

What I would be terrified of, however, is the performance hit, especially from a 1.8" drive.

 

[paperwastage]

i have the 64GB version, plus a 64GB microSDXC in the microSD slo, plus 64GB microSDXC with a tiny usb reader

http://www.amazon.com/elago-Mobile-m.../dp/B002HGFKR8

total = 192GB

how much space do you need?

 

[MarkizSchnitzel]

I don't think, if I needed the space, that I would be that concerned with the battery impact made by a HDD. The screen will be the biggest impact on your battery life.

What I would be terrified of, however, is the performance hit, especially from a 1.8" drive.

Well the screen is obviously the same.
Also, I don't think I would feel much of a performance impact, since I would just be keeping media files there, and some older games.
Right? Or not?

i have the 64GB version, plus a 64GB microSDXC in the microSD slo, plus 64GB microSDXC with a tiny usb reader

http://www.amazon.com/elago-Mobile-m.../dp/B002HGFKR8

total = 192GB

how much space do you need?

Well, it's never too much, when you have it
That being said, If I do go for the model without HDD, how is the read speed from a card, should be sufficient to watch a HD or FHD movies? That's the minimum and the maximum I need it to be.

 

[poofyhairguy]

That being said, If I do go for the model without HDD, how is the read speed from a card, should be sufficient to watch a HD or FHD movies? That's the minimum and the maximum I need it to be.

Yup.

 

[MarkizSchnitzel]

Thank you. Ordered 64GB no HDD + 64 micro SD. Figured that I don't want a loud power hungy component in my ultra-mobile device, especially considering it's by far the loudest component in my dekstop.