Thinkpads Forum

Does anyone have experience with the newly released 320 GB Samsung Spinpoint M6 5400 RPM HD? Tom's Hardware did a review with detailed benchmarks here, but I was wondering how the drive performed in real world situations in a ThinkPad. Though it is a 5400 RPM drive the review mentioned that owing to the latest generation technologies it actually beats several 7200 RPM drives, including the venerable Hitachi Travelstar, 7k200 in some benchmarks (although not the all-important access time test).

I'm considering a new HD in the near-future because I'm finding 100 GB isn't enough to hold my files, and portable storage solutions involve extra things to carry around. The 7k200 is still the fastest drive around, at least judging from the review, but the extra space offered by the the Spinpoint is nice, and it uses a reasonal amount of energy. Any help is appreciated.

I have the 160gb M5 (which I'm guessing is the single-platter version of the 320gb M6), and it performs pretty well compared to my 7k100. I timed startup, and it was actually five seconds faster, though that was probably because the 7k100 was close to being full.