Hard drive Upgrade for T61

[ajwreinhardt]

I need to upgrade my T61's storage capacity from it's measly 80GB. I am also unhappy with its performance presently in Vista, and I can only think that a major part of it is the hard drive I presently have, which is a 5k160.

I am looking to stay under $100, and I figured I was going to try to go with a 7200rpm drive, unless there was a 5400rpm drive that would give better speed per power consumption.

So, my primary three choices I've come up with are the WD Scorpio Black (7200RPM option), the Scorpio Blue (a 5400RPM option), or the Hitachi 7k320. Any thoughts? Thanks

Jake

[ARD]

I had my trepidations on drive upgrades as well.
I upgraded my T60s old and slow Hitachi 5400rpm 80Gig drive for a Hitachi 7k320 7200rpm 320Gig with absolutely NO issues whatsoever.
The Active Protection System works flawlessly as well.
I got it for $70 at Compusa.
When I first installed the new drive, it ran a little hot. But after a few days, it was averaging 35C. The bearings got smoothed out and it ran cooler.
I say go for it.

[Sandstorm83]

I also recommend the 7k320 as I have it running flawlessly in my T61 and there's a definite improvement in Vista. And with 320GB, its hard to beat in terms of notebook storage.

[ninjaronin18]

I would go with the WD Scorpio Blue or Black. I know that performance wise Scorpio Black and the Hitachi 7K2 drive are about par with each other. However, I also read that the Scorpio Black drive is quieter than the Hitachi one. I don't have Vista on my machine, but the 5400 rpm Scorpio Blue runs XP great. I got my WD Scorpio Blue for $80 from ebay. For games, I can't tell the difference in performance between the 5400 rpm WD drive and the 7K2 Hitachi stock drive in terms of performance. I can however say that the WD drive 5400 rpm is significantl quieter than the 7K2 Hitachi stock drive (This is obvious, but I just wanted to reaffirm). Going with either the WD Scorpio Blue or Black is a personal preference.

[ninjaronin18]

When I first installed the new drive, it ran a little hot. But after a few days, it was averaging 35C. The bearings got smoothed out and it ran cooler.
I say go for it.

Just curious, how does that work? Voodoo magic?

[ARD]

No magic. I just let it run all day for a couple of days.

[Sandstorm83]

Just to add, my 7k320 is also running at 35C

[EAkamai]

Aloha! Here's my 2 cents for what it's worth... Sorry if you've already made your decision and i'm late.
As you can see by my hardware listing below, i've replaced the 80 for the 320 Scorpio and added another 320 Scorpio as a multi-bay choice. I believe the main drive is the more expensive WD320, and the multi-bay is the "Blue" Scorpio. They are both 5400RPM. IMHO, you don't need the 7200 RPM drives as i had a chance to try one and i couldn't tell any speed difference and it did run hotter. These 5400RPM NEVER run hot and are very fast & very quiet. I haven't checked for a few months, but back then, i believe i remember seeing the blue drives for only around $75 USD on the Egg. Now that's a deal.

[namja]

What happens if you buy a HD with its own free-fall sensor? Does it interrupt with the ThinkPad's APS?
Can they work together for an even better protection?

Western Digital WD3200BJKT and Seagate ST9500420ASG both have features similar to APS.

[ninjaronin18]

What happens if you buy a HD with its own free-fall sensor? Does it interrupt with the ThinkPad's APS?
Can they work together for an even better protection?

Western Digital WD3200BJKT and Seagate ST9500420ASG both have features similar to APS.

I don't really know. I did put in a 500 gb Western Digital Scorpio Blue in my thinkpad with APS. No unexpected effects have been observed.

[hellosailor]

"Can they work together for an even better protection?"

I don't know if they are working redundantly or aware of each other, but the TPad APS and Seagate's onboard protection in the Momentus drives work just fine together. Which one is doing the protecting? Dunno, am happy just to know that if I swing the laptop, the music stops playing, indicating the data stream from the drive is being cut off, so some protection scheme is working.

Also having used 7200 and 5400 RPM drives internally (both Seagate) I can't say I've seen any practical difference, the T61p seems to have other bottlenecks so go for low power, or onboard encryption, or price, whatever other feature gives you a solid reason.

And don't take my mention of Seagate to be a recommendation--this last drive needed four (4) drives before they shipped one that would format up and image without problems. Not the Seagate that I used to know.