T40 Hard Drive

[Meta03]

I need to replace a broken hard drive in a T40. Other than e-bay, are there other places that sell unused T40 compatible drives?
If you can find one, please post a link.
Thank you.

[Neil]

Any PATA IDE 2.5" hard drive should work. You can buy them at most all on-line computer retailers.

This one is a favorite around here:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822152110

[ZaZ]

If you want a 7200RPM drive, used on ebay is probably your best option.

[lukee]

Any modern 2.5" 5400rpm ATA drive (WD 320GB, Samsung HM160HC, ...) is faster than fastests 2.5" 7200rpm ATA drives such as Hitachi 7K100 or Seagate 7200.1 because newest HDDs have higher platter density. Buy HM160HC or WD3200BEVE - best ATA choices nowadays.

[ZaZ]

While it's true the newer drives will offer better throughput, they will not match the latency of a 7200RPM and it's the latency that makes it seem faster or not more so than the throughput.

[lukee]

I found a benchmark which proves that HM160HC is faster in usual tasks (Windows loading, application startup, general usage, virus scan and file writing) than Hitachi 7K100 drive.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/hardwar ... drive.html.
Modern 5400RPM drive slightly beats the 7K100 when Windows loading, has the same performance as 7K100 during application loading, slightly beats the 7K100 in general usage, HM160HC is winner in virus scan performance and is total winner in file writing. Above that, HM160HC is more silent and cooler than the 7K100 because it is single platter HDD - I can't hear seeking sound in normal working position with this drive. Western Digital WD3200BEVE has similar performance as Samsung HM160HC - only difference is the capacity (320GB vs. 160GB) - WD3200BEVE has two 160GB platters. In another words, there is no reason to use 7200RPMs in T4x series nowadays.

[ZaZ]

I found a benchmark which proves that HM160HC is faster in usual tasks (Windows loading, application startup, general usage, virus scan and file writing) than Hitachi 7K100 drive.

It didn't seem that way to me. If you look at the numbers, the author mainly uses throughput as sole determinant that the Samsung is faster, but that's that's not the whole story. It's the latency or seek time, how fast data can be found and read, in my experience which makes the disk seem faster or slower. The Access Times are clearly better on the Hitachi. This is why SSD are so fast, the near instantaneous seek times. Throughput is important if you're placing a heavy load on the controller, but typical laptop usage does not do this.