I have a first generation AppleTV w/aTVFlash. It still has the 40GB PATA drive, and I plan on upgrading it to a ~500GB SATA drive as described in this thread.
My question: when considering drive upgrades for the the AppleTV, how important are drive speed and cache size? I know the 40GB drive that's in there now is 4200 rpm and has a 2 MB cache. Considering that the AppleTV is used almost exclusively for media playback, will a 7200 rpm drive with a 16 MB cache give me noticeably better performance than a 5400 rpm drive with an 8 MB cache? I have a spare 2.5" 500GB/5400RPM/8 MB cache drive left over from a laptop upgrade -- will that do? At the same time, there are some great deals to be found on 7200rpm/16MB cache drives, and spending an extra $50 or so for one of those would be fine if the faster drive was a worthwhile upgrade.
Thoughts?
Thanks,
Jeff
My question: when considering drive upgrades for the the AppleTV, how important are drive speed and cache size? I know the 40GB drive that's in there now is 4200 rpm and has a 2 MB cache. Considering that the AppleTV is used almost exclusively for media playback, will a 7200 rpm drive with a 16 MB cache give me noticeably better performance than a 5400 rpm drive with an 8 MB cache? I have a spare 2.5" 500GB/5400RPM/8 MB cache drive left over from a laptop upgrade -- will that do? At the same time, there are some great deals to be found on 7200rpm/16MB cache drives, and spending an extra $50 or so for one of those would be fine if the faster drive was a worthwhile upgrade.
Thoughts?
Thanks,
Jeff