HD's Desktop vs Laptop.

[Michael_Lambert]

Hey guys,

Just wondering if there is any huge difference between the quality of hard drives designed for Desktops compared to Laptops.

I understand most portable drives are only 5400RPM compared to the 7200RPM but what other difference is there?

Reason i ask is i have a couple of external harddrive units, they are considerably larger and bulky and require external power where i also have a couple external cases i have laptop drives in that don't require external power and are much smaller and portable.. The only down side i can see is yes they tend to get hotter or at least mine do and easy to lose.

[cdifoto]

7200RPM drives for laptops are common now.

I can't think of any major quality differences other than laptop drives possibly being more durable, since they're designed to be moved around a lot.

For permanent storage though I would be and still am using desktop drives because I have yet to see a fan-cooled laptop enclosure. I work off my externals too so they're on all the time. They're also still cheaper for the same amount of storage space.

[TheHoff]

Laptop drives (2.5") are at least as well made as the desktop counterparts (3.5"). You would hope they would be more resistant to shock but I'd at least be happy with the fact that they are equal.

There are *very good* 7200 rpm 2.5" drives now -- specifically WD Scorpio Black. The top size is 320GB but I'm waiting patiently for the 500GB so I can change out the current Scorpio in my Macbook Pro. These drives are every bit as fast as the larger drives; maybe even more so because of the smaller platters and denser data packing.

One note about the external cases for the 2.5" drives. I'm assuming you're looking at the USB models; depending on your USB port (whether it is external, not powered, etc) you may need to connect two USB ports to use the drive. The external 2.5" USB case I have has a USB cable with two ends but I only have to use one.

[Michael_Lambert]

I prefer using the desktop models as well i have a spare desktop unit setup as a storage server just installed Xp on a 40gig drive and then installed 3 more 500gig drives and hooked it up to the network.. Works like charm and i am glad i got to stop using the dam external drives.

I have just been looking to replace the couple of external drives i have now with Laptop units for portability of transferring and backing up in the field.

[TheHoff]

The notebook drives are nice for that; I have a fully powered, portable drive w/ 320 gig in a package smaller than an address book.

[cdifoto]

I too have an external laptop drive for temp storage. It's fine for that task. I wouldn't want it running all the time though since there's no fan to cool it.

[smcclelland]

I keep a small 250gb HP 2.5" portable drive in my bag with my laptop for temp transfer like others and also for keeping copies of photos to transport around in case anyone asks to see my stuff.

Outside of that I keep two WD 500GB 3.5" MyBook's to mirror data off my 500gb data partitions on my desktop and then I copy that same data to a new RAID5 array I built externally. The laptop drives run hot but I find some of the newer 7200rpm 3.5" drives spew a ton more heat (i'm using 1TB WD Black's in the array and with the smart fan at full speed it's quite the amount of heat coming out).

The cache size and seek time is typically smaller on the 2.5" drives as well btw.

[TheHoff]

(i'm using 1TB WD Black's in the array and with the smart fan at full speed it's quite the amount of heat coming out).

Same here; I have two in a 1TB RAID 1 for backup and the enclosure has a fan; I wouldn't want to run one for long transfers without one.

[smcclelland]

Same here; I have two in a 1TB RAID 1 for backup and the enclosure has a fan; I wouldn't want to run one for long transfers without one.

Yeah that's the one thing that pushed me away from the drobo was people said the fan was terrible and with four 1TB WD Black hard-drives running in an enclosure heat was a big concern for me. This mediasonic rules though, I can set the fan speed from the front or just let the device automatically regulate it.

[EiTheL]

I have a drobo, and it only overheated once, and it was due to like... hours upon hours of constant disk activity

Also you don't need to have black hard drives, with the drobo, and RAID, your read/write speed will be fast enough anyway, plus you don't need it to go THAT fast (whatever you are copying it over to limits the transfer speed... so its only worth it if you are copying it to a raid server or something of high transfer speed)

my configuration on my drobo: 2 1TB WD black caviars, 1 500GB Green Power WD, 1 500 GB Hitachi

btw, to answer the OP's post, if you are mobile a lot, get a 2.5, but I would recommend a drobo or a 3.5 inch backup at home always because 2.5 inches that move around a lot tend to die faster de to shock.