What I think of the new Hitachi 160Gb HD for Macbook

[Sequence]

This is not a review at all, but I think many people are looking for an upgrade for the small 60gb hard drive that came with their macbook. I think that, this is the best upgrade I've made to this machine! I now have Mac OS X 10.4.7, 1 Windows XP Installation on Parallels, 1 Windows XP Installation on Boot Camp, My whole iTunes Music Library ( about 30gb ), tons of apps, games, videos, and so on. With everything mentioned below, I still have a big 80.16Gb left. The drive is very fast also, as fast as my 7k rpm drive on my PC laptop *or almost* and its only a 5400rpm but it uses PMR (Perpendicular Recording) so the speed and access time are a lot improved by this technology.

The reason I have 2 windows xp installation is I use the one with Parallels for applications such as Office / uTorrent / WMV files / etc. I use the one with Boot Camp for games such as Diablo 2 / Age of Empire III / Guild Wars.

Before, I had an external HD that I used to store my music library on it + a few videos... I think it was a pain to plug the drive in each time I had to add music / videos (so it copy the files to the drive). Now I use my external HD for backups (its a WD Passport 80Gb btw).

If you think about upgrading your HD, you should really think about the Hitachi as it's an awesome little piece of technology.

This was my 2 cents,

PL

 

[twoodcc]

thanks for the post. i might end up doing this to my future macbook

 

[xfiftyfour]

Yeah, thanks for this! I'm looking to upgrade my MBs hard drive and I'm really torn between a 120 and the new 160s. I'm hoping to see a price drop here soon in the 160s - or for zipzoomfly to get it back in stock at the $179 price!! Anyone have any idea when that'll be? heh

 

[QCassidy352]

thanks for that. sounds very tempting. Do you happen to know whether a 5400 RPM HD with PMR has the same (slight) negative effects on battery life and heat that a 7200 RPM drive has?

 

[atari1356]

I bought the same Hitachi drive for my PowerBook G4 (well, actually it's the ATA version for the PowerBooks, not the SATA one... but aside from that they're the same). I was forced to get a new drive after my old 80GB Toshiba drive died on me.

I agree, it's a great upgrade - I never had enough space with the 80GB drive, but there's plenty of room now. It's also very quiet, and seems pretty fast.

My only complaint was the difficulty in installing it... but that has nothing to do with the drive itself. Luckily you MacBook owners won't have that problem.

 

[twoodcc]

could you post a link to where you bought it?

 

[Sequence]

I've heard that the Perpendicular R. 5400rpm drives, even if almost the same speed as a 7200rpm drive uses less energy than a regular 5400rpm drive

 

[Sequence]

I bought it on eBay for 269$ + S&H = 289$
They're now on Newegg too (I think...)

 

[twoodcc]

I bought it on eBay for 269$ + S&H = 289$
They're now on Newegg too (I think...)

thanks. i couldn't find them on Newegg or ebay though

 

[Sequence]

I couldn't either, until I tryed the keyword 5k160

 

[Sequence]

Here's one (a bit pricey tho)

http://cgi.ebay.ca/NEW-Hitachi-160G...ryZ42184QQssPageNameZWD1VQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

 

[twoodcc]

I couldn't either, until I tryed the keyword 5k160

well i found one but it wasn't SATA (on ebay)

EDIT: that's the same one i found, but it's not SATA

 

[KingYaba]

Well whenever I get a McBoooK (from another post ) I'll get the 160.

 

[drummerbooker14]

$269 for a 160 GB Hard drive. thats way expensive

 

[WildCowboy]

$269 for a 160 GB Hard drive. thats way expensive

Compared to what? It's the only one on the market...

 

[Bern]

The Hitachi 160GB was released the day after I bought my 120GB HDD for my MacBook I was going to wait initially but 60GB was just not enough for all the software I had to install. I guess when the price starts to drop I can get one then. They're unavailable here in Australia (heck SATA external enclosures aren't even here yet) but when they do get here they'll be considerably expensive anyway.

 

[Sequence]

$269 for a 160 GB Hard drive. thats way expensive

I guess since it has been out for less than a month, is has the highest capacity on the market and uses a new recording technology, you can expect a price premium. Just think of when DVD media were introduced... Or when Blu-ray/HD-DVD will be introduced, it will be expensive.

 

[atari1356]

Compared to what? It's the only one on the market...

Seagate has a 160GB 5400rpm 2.5" drive too... it's a bit more expensive though.

160GB ATA hard drives for PowerBooks and iBooks:
Seagate Momentus ST9160821A 160GB 5400 RPM 8MB Cache ATA-6 Notebook Hard Drive

160.0GB Hitachi/IBM Travelstar 5K160 5400RPM 8MB Data Buffer ATA/7 9.5mm UltraSlim 2.5" NoteBook Drive (newegg had this a couple of weeks ago for $194.99, which is where I got mine... I don't see it on their site now though)

160GB SATA hard drives for MacBooks, MacBook Pros and Intel Mac Mini's:
160GB 2.5" Hitachi Travelstar 5K160 5400RPM SATA Notebook Drive with 8MB Cache

160GB 2.5" Seagate Momentus 5400.3 5400RPM 8MB Cache SATA 5yr Seagate Warranty Notebook HD

 

[WildCowboy]

Seagate has a 160GB 5400rpm 2.5" drive too... it's a bit more expensive though.

Ooh...nice to see the Seagate one arriving in stores. It's still not listed on their own website and I hadn't seen it around yet.