Trying to get a little more life out of a Inspiron 1501 laptop. It has
a 5400 RPM HD. I could buy a 7200 RPM HD. Do you need SATA 300 to keep
up with the data from a 7200RPM drive? Or not. Trying to find specs on
whether this Inspiron has a SATA 300 or 150 interface. Or I could get
a solid state HD. Or I could get an ExpressCard SSD and use that as a
2nd drive for ready boost or swap file or just generally to share the
load, IF that is faster than one of the other options. Anybody have
good info on which would give the most speed, or links to comparative
reviews?

Thanks

I don't know whether your laptop is SATA, but you may see performance
improivement from 7200rpm whether it's SATA or not, provide your current
driv eis not SATA, if current is sata relaly obvious you need 7200 sata...
You will mostly see gain on conigious data blocks access, if you're reading
numerous SMALL files higher rpm won't be to noticeable.

As of SSD, use it as a secondary drive on a laptop oin which your life
depends, or even as primary in a Netbook where you don't mind losing data
one unlucky day.
Mainstream SSD's are still too new to rely on to trust data on which my
work, career, & even life depends.
SO it's a good thing in addition but not to replace HDD on a main laptop,
for Netbooks SSD can be the primary & only drive, Netbooks themselves are
still a relatively new class of computers, the market hasn't yet decided
whether completely replace harddisks with SSDs in these little machines.
Being less mature than harddisk for large volumes, although SSD's are rooted
in semiconductor EPROM chips which were here long before eany harddisk was
on th emarket, back to 1960's nobody envisioned them to be high-volume
applications storage, they cost MUCH MORE per Gigabyte than a harddisk.
The largest drives are obviously magnetic harddisk or optical media, not
SSD's - in case that is your priority.

Basiclaly you only get an SSD for a small laptop, netbook, ultraportable
where power savings is critical.
Otherwise you have to use HDD for th etime being.,

SSD as any solid state device offers you lower power consumption, no moving
parts & NOT AFFECTED BY MAGENTIC fields.
SSD's main advantage performance-wise is RANDOM ACCESS as there's little
time dependency whether you access the starting or ending or middle point of
your storage, to give you a simplistic example.
I am sure you're not an engineer or electornics guy, else you would know
exactly what I mean.
However mainstream SSD's ar elsower in sequential access of large contiguous
files, where harddisk can send data bitstream at enromous speeds, especially
10,000rpm SATA drive - no SSD can approach such rates, however like I said
HDD need sto move magnetic head erratically when accessing randmo small
files, especially when highly fragmented.

The truth is a giant 1GB application can have its files spread all over the
harddisk whuch nullfies HDD advanatge over SSD, that is where SSD is
better - accessing numerous small fragmented files.
SSD is a must for ultraportables as harddisk would draw too much power to
rotate plates & move magnetic heads
This is theory.

In practice:

a) Extremely stroing magentic fields can affect seminconductors, but I doubt
you'll ever expoerience such in normal life, i am talking about laboratories
& nuclear/science sites where radiation can damage SSD's but so it damaged
HDD since HDD are intehgrated with electronics (controller) sicne ages ago.
b) SSD's are as vulnerable as HDD except to a different kind of threat -
they have LIMITED number of write/erase/write cycles.
c) SSD's COST MORE PER UNIT OF STORAGE THAN HARDDISK

But there's always "BUT":
If you have a boatload of money then you CAN get an SSD rivaling a harddisk
in most technical specs.
Yes you will get enormous sequential access speed, not just random access.

The problem is cost. The high-end SSD's are made b y INTEL, maybe others
joined, i am sure Japanese as usual will emerge on top because they're handy
with small electornic things & cheapo Chinese labor will do the tricks in
terms of cost, but for as of 3 months ago I was getting reports INTEL makes
such high-end drives. I don't think you or me can afford,

The SSD's in regular Netbooks are from cheaper makers, and rather small.
Show me a 100GB SSD which costs less than the WHOLE laptop, & I'd be utterly
surpised as of today, maybe next year it will be common, not yet

Thanks for all the info. That helps.

On Oct 4, 7:52*am, "STAN STARINSKI" <NoS...@NoSpam.org> wrote:[color=blue]
> I don't know whether your laptop is SATA, but you may see performance[/color]

"STAN STARINSKI" <NoSpam@NoSpam.org> wrote in
news:uWqSNcPRKHA.4020@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl:
[color=blue]
> I don't know whether your laptop is SATA, but you may see performance
> improivement from 7200rpm whether it's SATA or not, provide your
> current driv eis not SATA, if current is sata relaly obvious you[/color]

<SNIPPED RAMBLING CRAP>
[color=blue]
> do the tricks in terms of cost, but for as of 3 months ago I was
> getting reports INTEL makes such high-end drives. I don't think you
> or me can afford,
>
> The SSD's in regular Netbooks are from cheaper makers, and rather
> small. Show me a 100GB SSD which costs less than the WHOLE laptop,[/color]

[url]http://pricewatch.com/browse/hard_removable_drives/ssd_128gb...starting[/url] out
at $260.

I'm guessing an adequate laptop would cost $500.

You should have said larger than 128 Gig.....there's a big price jump
between 128 and 160 Gig....but you didn't.