Which HDD for a gaming laptop?

Master AK

Junior Member
Aug 12, 2013
4
0
0
Hey guys,

I am looking to buy this gaming laptop: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/notebooks/SkyFireIII-14/

I don't need the operating system so with 8gb ram and the 5400rpm, 8mb cache the price comes to £668

Then:- 500gb, 7200rpm, 16mb cache- £681

- 750gb, 7200rpm, 16mb cache- £687

and finally 500gb SSHD, 64mb cache and 5400rpm- £690

My budget for this laptop was £650-£700, so they all within range but I don't particularly want to waste money and would like it to be as cheap as it could possibly be. Which would offer the best price/perf ratio while gaming, if it offers no real difference I'm tempted to just go with the £668 option.
 

taq8ojh

Golden Member
Mar 2, 2013
1,296
1
81
Buy whatever, throw the HDD away, and buy a SSD. Or suffer. Really, there's no other way around this.

For some weird reason even 7200rpm HDDS in notebooks are painfully slow - at least that's my impression. Like a HDD isn't painfully slow already, though.
 

KingFatty

Diamond Member
Dec 29, 2010
3,034
1
81
The link you provided shows a selection for 2nd hard drive.

Why don't you just go with lowest price option when you buy. See if you like that. Then, if it's too slow, you can try other options, like an SSD as the main drive and disk as 2nd drive, or even just go with one hybrid drive that has SSD+disk in one package.

But your question is not answerable because we don't know why you would need a hard drive. It's like asking what kind of car to buy - do you need a truck instead, then buy a truck. So are you going to store tons of files like TV shows and movies? Then get a big hard drive. Do you need a fast quick sporty storage to boot quickly and zip around? Then get a sleek SSD.
 

Master AK

Junior Member
Aug 12, 2013
4
0
0
Hey sorry for the lack of clarity in my initial post. I need a minimum of 500gb of storage (For Steam Games etc), my budget is also £700 tops so I cannot afford a SSD. Would the 7200rpm drive or the SSHD drive offer a reasonable increase in general performance and/or a small increase in performance when it comes to gaming. If the difference is negligible I will probably stick to the 500gb/1TB 5400rpm drive.

Also is there a major difference between 1600mhz RAM and 1333mhz ram when it comes to gaming?
 
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taq8ojh

Golden Member
Mar 2, 2013
1,296
1
81
The price difference between 5400 and 7200rpm is - I think - not that big, but the performance is. By all means, sacrifice capacity for speed. It won't be too great anyway, but why suffer much more than you have to?
I can guarantee you will want to buy a SSD later on and put it in place of a HDD.

In case of memory, there's virtually no difference in price of whatever modules you buy (unless we're getting into 1866+ range). Since we're talking about notebooks where graphic chips usually use system memory (correct me if I am wrong please), the faster the better.
 

Enigmoid

Platinum Member
Sep 27, 2012
2,907
31
91
Minimal difference between 5400 rpm and 7200 rpm. Maybe 20% faster.

Desktop_Performance.png
 

Master AK

Junior Member
Aug 12, 2013
4
0
0
Minimal difference between 5400 rpm and 7200 rpm. Maybe 20% faster.

Desktop_Performance.png

I may go for 120gb SSD and a 500gb 5400rpm HDD, it comes to £735.

I'm interested in the SSHD though as it is quite a bit cheaper than the above option.