Any reason not to go 7200

[sasquatch98]

I'm buying a mbp 1.83 everything stock however I cant decide if I should also go with the stock 5400rpm drive or upgrade to the 7200rpm 100gb drive. I can go to the apple store today and buy the stock one or order the upgraded 7200. Basically is there any reason not to upgrade? Thanks

 

[cwedl]

You may be sacrificing battery life a bit, but the extra speed you will get may be worth it, depending on how much you use it on the battery.

 

[Demon Hunter]

In theory wouldn't it save a little battery life, because of the higher access speed?

 

[khisayruou]

In my experiences, the upgrade has a small effect on battery life and you will get a slight increase in speed. It comes down to the cost of upgrading, if you can afford it, then get the 7200.

 

[andiwm2003]

barefeats.com has a comparison of 5400 vs. 7200 for the pb g4 somewhere.
i think there was no difference in battery life. but read for yourself as i'm not 100% sure.

 

[atari1356]

Go for the 7200 rpm drive if you can afford it... there is very little difference in battery life with faster drives.

Here's a quote from an article where they tested a few laptop hard drives for speed and battery drain:

Summary: Choose The Faster Hard Drive Whenever Possible.

For users faced with the choice between a standard 4200-rpm hard drive and a faster 5400-rpm or even 7200-rpm model, we would recommend picking the faster-turning drive. Although the battery life will be a few minutes less, the performance increase more than outweighs this relatively small downside.

(and yes, the article is a little old, but I would guess that today's 7200 rpm drives are most likely even more energy efficient)