Thinkpads Forum

Does anyone think that they might put a 2.5" SATA hard drive option in the future? At the very end of this Lenovo blog post, http://lenovoblogs.com/insidethebox/?p=138, the author says ""I'd switch over immediately save for one point. Sadly, for me, 64GB is not enough. But of course, time will solve that problem."

So will this be a 2.5" SATA drive or just larger 1.8" SSD drives?

a 1.8" 120GB 5400RPM mini-SATA HDD will be offered soon.   2.5" drives unfortunately won't fit.

Thanks! Guess I'll be waiting for that drive. And perhaps the 120GB mini SATA drive will be cheaper.

erik wrote:a 1.8" 120GB 5400RPM mini-SATA HDD will be offered soon. 2.5" drives unfortunately won't fit.

I'm so glad, hopefully that'll bring up it's usefulness and lower it's price. Thank-god it's 5400RPM though. As to when it'll be available in the UK - that's another matter!

configurations with a 120GB HDD could very well lower the price by $750 or more.   we'll just have to wait and see.

I think they are talking about 128GB SSD but not 120GB disc drive.

Samsung will offer 128GB SSD soon and the price will drop down as well.

also, 128GB SSD is available (unknown brand)

take a look

http://www.memoright.cn/en/showpro.asp?id=236&lb=5

There have been other manufacturers putting out literature showing 128GB SSD drives, but none of them have surfaced as of now.

Andrew

erik wrote:a 1.8" 120GB 5400RPM mini-SATA HDD....snip

That's a Micro-SATA drive and we wouldn't see it until April in the market:

Toshiba squeezes 5,400 rpm from 1.8-in. hard disk drive.

Toshiba Introduces High-Performance 5,400RPM 1.8-Inch HDDs With Micro-SATA Connector.

ryengineer wrote:

erik wrote:a 1.8" 120GB 5400RPM mini-SATA HDD....snip

That's a Micro-SATA drive and we wouldn't see it until April in the market:

Toshiba squeezes 5,400 rpm from 1.8-in. hard disk drive.

yes, micro, not mini.   typo.

the 120GB drive looks like it will be a samsung, not toshiba.

from the HMM: MicroSATA hard disk drive, 120 GB, 8mm, 5,400 rpm, Samsung (FRU 42T1321)

An HD option in the drive bay would be killer. That's one of the biggest deficiencies with the X300.

Hmm, with the current SSD model, is it true that the fan are the only moving parts in the X300? How many fans are there?

arent the 1.8" drives small enough to fit in the 7mm dvd bay...albeit with a new ultrabay hdd adaptor?

In any case, Im thinking 2.5" hdd options wont be a major necessity anymore in any thinkpad. I mean, with flash, size doesnt really correlate with speed, and if they can currently squeeze 12gb onto a microsd card, im sure within the next x3x lifetime, they can fit in the hundreds of gb into a 1.8" drive, with excellent speeds too. So all notebooks can be lighter now!

Is the connector to the SATAII 1.8" hard drives a ZIF (zero insertion force) connector? The pictures for the SDD in the X300 shows different style connectors...Thanks!

ducky2802 wrote:arent the 1.8" drives small enough to fit in the 7mm dvd bay...albeit with a new ultrabay hdd adaptor?

No they are not. It's 1.8" 9mm thick. The new 7mm UltraBay is, well... 7mm thick. a 2.5" drive at 7mm would fit no problem. It's just that all laptop drives are either 12.5mm or 9mm thick.

royhuang wrote:The pictures for the SDD in the X300 shows different style connectors...Thanks!

it uses a micro-SATA connector.

SSD for the ultrabay would be an interesting option.. I assume that since you don't have any moving parts, it should be much easier to take away few mm from the height than it is for the HDD manufacturers.

juhap wrote:SSD for the ultrabay would be an interesting option.. I assume that since you don't have any moving parts, it should be much easier to take away few mm from the height than it is for the HDD manufacturers.

Why would you want it in the UltraBay though? unless you mean 2 of them total but then still why 2? The more storage part or something? A 128GB SSD should be cheaper than 2 64GB ones right?

There are 5mm high 1.8" HDDs that could fit in the DVD bay
(like the 80GB samsung one used in the MacBook Air)

pierro78 wrote:There are 5mm high 1.8" HDDs that could fit in the DVD bay
(like the 80GB samsung one used in the MacBook Air)

Which models are used in the X300, the Macbook Air and the SONY TZ 64GB SSD's?
Which has better specs and is faster?
I am assuming the SONY is slower and with a PATA interface and that the X300 drive is the fastest?

Andrew

aamsel wrote:

pierro78 wrote:There are 5mm high 1.8" HDDs that could fit in the DVD bay
(like the 80GB samsung one used in the MacBook Air)

Which models are used in the X300, the Macbook Air and the SONY TZ 64GB SSD's?
Which has better specs and is faster?
I am assuming the SONY is slower and with a PATA interface and that the X300 drive is the fastest?

Andrew

I think the point is that you could use it for storage, so who cares if it's PATA? There wouldn't be much choice anyway, since the disc drives are too, and with your system running snappily on the main SSD drive I can't see anyone complaining about the extra option of the 5mm HDD storage (If it's not the same price as SSD...)

Personally I can't understand why anyone would buy a [top of the range!] X300 running on HDD, wouldn't it be way slower? It already has the processor inferiority complex. And if it runs at 5400rpm then battery life would suffer, no? And if that then means you can't be properly mobile with it, and/or can't afford the real deal then just get a T60 (when are we gonna see some by the crazy names of T600 et al.?) for half the price...OK I don't mean to tell people what to do

Oh and sorry if I completely missed your point, Andrew...as far as I know the X300 drive is by far the fastest as it's PROPA SATA!

SHoTTa35 wrote:A 128GB SSD should be cheaper than 2 64GB ones right?

Should be by HDD-pricing logic perhaps, but as far as I can tell the opposite is the case with Flash memory, you effectively pay the premium for having it all in one physical space (especially with RAM and USB sticks), and basically for their bleeding edge research costs.

Thinking about it though, perhaps you'd be right with laptop retailers if they grit their teeth and absorb the difference per Gigabyte.