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Will I have power supply or heat issues with this mini setup?

G

gus6464

macrumors regular
Original poster
May 27, 2007
102
0
The time has come to upgrade my mini with a Vertex 4 now that newegg is selling them for cheap and want to replace the stock drive with a 7200rpm 750gb as well. Will be using the dual HD kit from OWC. Here are the 2 drives in question:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145534
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227791

My mini is the 2011 i5 with radeon graphics model. Will running both hard drives cause any issues with heat or power supply since 7200rpm drives can use more power than the stock one?
 
No you shouldn't have issues, but is there a reason why you are replacing the stock drive? If it is just for greater capacity? Video Editing? Seems unless you need the space, the stock drive makes a great data drive.
 
paulrbeers said:
No you shouldn't have issues, but is there a reason why you are replacing the stock drive? If it is just for greater capacity? Video Editing? Seems unless you need the space, the stock drive makes a great data drive.
Click to expand...

The stock drive has 30gb of space left and it is super slow. I was only going to put critical apps in the ssd (diablo 3, starcraft 2, adobe cs5, and ms office) and then the rest on the other drive but the stock 500gb is just so slow. I figured going to a fast 7200rpm would not only speed things up but also give me some more space.
 
gus6464 said:
The stock drive has 30gb of space left and it is super slow. I was only going to put critical apps in the ssd (diablo 3, starcraft 2, adobe cs5, and ms office) and then the rest on the other drive but the stock 500gb is just so slow. I figured going to a fast 7200rpm would not only speed things up but also give me some more space.
Click to expand...

See the thing is, what are you really going to put on your 2nd drive? Music? Movies? Photos? These really won't load any faster or play any better whether on a 5400 or a 7200rpm drive. Heck, we just moved my wife's photos from an SSD to a 5400 rpm laptop drive and she hasn't noticed any real slow down in iPhoto. Space, okay I can get that, but going to 7200rpm just because you think it will improve the speed is rubbish if all you are going to do is the above.

Now Music/Video Editing, parsing thru large data sets, etc. makes sense although I would almost recommend large SSD's for a lot of that as it will be even better.

Here's an older article comparing hard drives. The last two Hitachi drives compare the 7K200 vs the 5K500. It isn't a perfect comparison, but the 7K is a 7200rpm and the 5K is a 5400 (isn't perfect because platter density can increase speed as well):

http://www.storagereview.com/php/be...&devID_0=365&devID_1=355&devID_2=367&devCnt=3

Notice that when it comes to overall sequential reads and writes (which is what a data drive will do the most), both are basically equal. The 7200 wins i I/O and in Seek time and that's important for an OS drive, but not important for a drive that contains mostly large files (i.e. >1MB+)
 
gus6464 said:
Ohh wow thanks for that link I would rather go with that!
Click to expand...

your welcome

paulrbeers said:
See the thing is, what are you really going to put on your 2nd drive? Music? Movies? Photos? These really won't load any faster or play any better whether on a 5400 or a 7200rpm drive. Heck, we just moved my wife's photos from an SSD to a 5400 rpm laptop drive and she hasn't noticed any real slow down in iPhoto. Space, okay I can get that, but going to 7200rpm just because you think it will improve the speed is rubbish if all you are going to do is the above.

Now Music/Video Editing, parsing thru large data sets, etc. makes sense although I would almost recommend large SSD's for a lot of that as it will be even better.

Here's an older article comparing hard drives. The last two Hitachi drives compare the 7K200 vs the 5K500. It isn't a perfect comparison, but the 7K is a 7200rpm and the 5K is a 5400 (isn't perfect because platter density can increase speed as well):

http://www.storagereview.com/php/be...&devID_0=365&devID_1=355&devID_2=367&devCnt=3

Notice that when it comes to overall sequential reads and writes (which is what a data drive will do the most), both are basically equal. The 7200 wins i I/O and in Seek time and that's important for an OS drive, but not important for a drive that contains mostly large files (i.e. >1MB+)
Click to expand...

yeah 5400 vs 7200 rpm as a secondary hdd becomes a small issue when they are not running the osx. if he drops in the 256gb crucial m4 and uses the stock oem 500 gb it is less money (around 30) double the ssd space and some what less storage for the slow drive.
Since may of this i have grabbed 8 or 9 crucial 256gbs and 2 crucial 512gbs all for really good prices. AT 180 for 256gb it is a nice drive. at 399 for 512gb it is also very good.
 
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