Upgrading HD in my laptop

[firebirdude]

I have an Acer Travelmate 4200. It has a 100G 5400RPM hard drive in it now. Was thinking about upgrading to a 7200RPM hard drive. Thoughts on this? How much battery life will I really lose? Is there a significant increase in noise? Or just a little? Should I be worried about an increase in heat?

Also, anything special I should know when searching for the hard drive? Or just pick one out that says its for notebooks?

 

[TheStu]

ok
Sure, go for it if you really are feeling that your current drive is too slow.
Not too much, some, but not too much
No
Yes
Probably not

Is the drive SATA or IDE.
No, that wouldnt be recommended, see above

 

[firebirdude]

haha. Thanks for the "connect the dots" type reply. So no worries about the increase in noise and heat. Gotcha. Will I even notice a difference during gaming? I had a friend who added an external 7200RPM HDD to her laptop and it was honestly like NIGHT and DAY. HUGE improvement. She may have been coming from a 4200RPM HDD though. I donno. I just figured if I could pick up a 7200 one for 100 bucks and sell this one for 50, it might be worth a little boost in performance.

And its IDE. I knew that, just noted that some are listed as hard drives "especially for the Dell 5400" or whatever..... thought maybe there was something I was missing.

PS.... awesome headphones man. Those for sale too?

 

[TheStu]

Generally, any IDE notebook drive that you find online (preferably from a reliable etailor) should work. I dont like giving blanket assurances like "oh sure, any IDE notebook drive will work" simply because there could be a minor/arcane compatibility issue.

The headphones are actually not for sale. I still use them from time to time when I want to listen to things without upsetting my roommate. I do have a PSP for sale

 

[corkyg]

BTW - ALL notebokk HDDs are IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics.)

 

[TheStu]

I thought that SATA and IDE were different things. All drives could be considered ATA (AT Attachment), but that isn't quite the same thing.

Furthermore, if i were to go to Newegg and buy an IDE drive for my laptop, it wouldn't work at all. My laptop uses SATA Hard Drives. And I would be willing to bet that the OPs is as well since most of the industry is transitioning over to them due to their higher bandwidth.

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: TheStu
I thought that SATA and IDE were different things. All drives could be considered ATA (AT Attachment), but that isn't quite the same thing.

All SATA and PATA drives are IDE - IOW, the SATA drive also has Integrated Drive Electronics. Both are also ATA - hence - Serial ATA and Parallel ATA. The only difference is the serial vs. parallel. That results in different connectors and cables.

Of course, there are a lot of drives labeled as "IDE" that should be PATA - but that is only because of the current language deficiency by the masses. When dealing in technology, it pays to be technically accurate. Even Newegg is starting to wise up.

PATA

 

[TheStu]

That is something I never really knew. I mean, I always called them SATA and IDE and that tended to get the point across. Well, then he should look to make sure if it is PATA or SATA. Also, do you pronounce is Say-Tah, or Sah-Tah?

 

[TheCanuck]

I doubt you'll see a noticeable speed increase. Generally 5400rpm seems to be the sweet spot for laptops. You may get maybe a 3 second decrease in boot up time and some apps may load a little faster...but I doubt you'll notice it. A new hard drive will "appear" faster if you do a new OS install.

Here's a review on 2.5" drives:

2.5" Roundup