Re: [Thinkpad] New Thinkpad -- help with turbo memory &driveselection...

Nope, I had a 7200 go down recently, they did replace it under warranty
----- Original Message -----
From: "Computer Services" <canyonlands@gmail.com>
Cc: <thinkpad@stderr.org>
Sent: Sunday, November 11, 2007 12:32 PM
Subject: Re: [Thinkpad] New Thinkpad -- help with turbo memory
&driveselection...

> My only comment about Newegg "reviews" is that they are usually written
very
> soon after purchase. So they are merely a reaction to first use, and say
> nothing useful about reliability.
>
> I know my opinions or biases are well known, but we have 18 years
repairing
> portable computers, and 15 years repairing Thinkpads... where we have seen
> large numbers of Thinkpads and other laptops used by insurance companies
and
> sales teams.. Something happened to the engineering technology of laptop
> drives when they became larger than 15 GB, and Hitachi has been a high
> failure item since they purchased the IBM Deathstar manufacturing, and
moved
> from 4200 rpm 20 GB drives. I rate them only better than Fujitsu and
> Tri-Gem... but lower in quality and reliability than than Seagate,
Toshiba,
> Western Digital, and Samsung. I like the fact that Seagate posts their
> date on the drive so you know how long the drive is warranteed... and that
> Samsung reportedly now has a five year warranty out. There is a lot of new
> technology for mobile drives, but of course Lenovo will be the last to use
> them.
>
> Still, I have no recent experience with Hitachi failures in the past year,
> so maybe they have corrected their laptop problems. I know Dell and HP are
> still having trouble with their Hitach desktop drives.
>
> Good luck to you. Please keep us posted.
>
>
> On Nov 11, 2007 9:09 AM, Scott Matthews <scott@turnstyle.com> wrote:
>
> > From what I could tell, the 7K200's are well-liked. But there are really
> > two
> > different questions here:
> >
> > 1) whether to take a Lenovo factory upgrade, or to purchase a separate
> > drive.
> >
> > 2) if getting a factory upgrade and/or a separate drive, then which.
> >
> > To me, it was clearly better to get a separate drive -- Lenovo charges a
> > big
> > premium, and it could prove helpful to wind up with a backup drive (it
> > seems
> > to cost almost nothing more to wind up an additional drive).
> >
> > After I decided to get a separate drive, I mostly looked at the options
on
> > NewEgg, and the 7K200's seemed popular:
> > http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145160
> >
> > Personally, I don't need 200GB (I do like the idea of a faster drive
> > though)
> > so I got the 100GB version from ZipZoomFly.
> >
> > Reasonable?
> >
> >
> > > PS, Hitachi hard drives over 80 GB at 7200 rpm have been greater than
> > with
> > > ANY other brand, so please keep us informed on your experience with
> > them.
> > > Why a Hitachi with a 3 yr warranty, over a Seagate with a five year
> > > warranty?
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > On Nov 11, 2007 5:45 AM, Scott Matthews <scott@turnstyle.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > > I ended up passing on Turbo Memory. Most seem to say that it
provides
> > > > modest, if any, boost, and some have had nasty crashes -- the
crashes
> > are
> > > > supposedly addressed by getting an updated driver, and the
performance
> > > > benefits may be improved with later versions of Vista -- so that all
> > just
> > > > didn't seem worth it to me. PLUS you can get some of the benefits of
> > Turbo
> > > > Memory by using an SD card (I may be using the wrong card name
there).
> > > >
> > > > As for RAM and HD, I decided to get Thinkpad minimum factory
defualts,
> > and
> > > > buy the RAM and HD elsewhere. I price shopped a bit, and got 1GB
from
> > > > NewEgg
> > > > for ~$25 and a 100GB Hitachi 7K200 from ZipZoomFly for ~$100 (NewEgg
> > seems
> > > > to have pricey shipping, but I was getting other stuff too --
> > ZipZoomFly
> > > > was
> > > > free shipping).
> > > >
> > > > Getting a new/extra drive costs about the same as upgrading the
> > default
> > > > (in
> > > > some cases, it's less) -- I plan on using the Vista Anytime Upgrade
> > disk
> > > > (supposed to come with the TP) to install Vista on the new drive.
> > > >
> > > > (I don't have the laptop or RAM/HD yet, so hopefully all goes
well...
> > ;)
> > > >
> > > > -Scott
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > Scott Matthews wrote:
> > > > > > Hi all, I'm trying to configure a new Thinkpad, and was hoping
> > some
> > > > here
> > > > > > could help with two questions:
> > > > >
> > > > > I would also love to have the answers to these questions, if
anyone
> > has
> > > > > ideas.
> > > > >
> > > > > > 1) Is Turbo Memory worth having (fwiw, it'll probably be a 2GB
RAM
> > > > > > system) -- some people claim a solid boost in performance,
others
> > say
> > > > little
> > > > > > difference, and some say they get blue screens -- does anybody
> > here
> > > > have
> > > > > > Turbo Memory in a Thinkpad? If so, what do you think?
> > > > > >
> > > > > > 2) The current drive selection is:
> > > > > > 80GB Hard Disk Drive, 5400rpm Serial ATA (2.5")
> > > > > > 120GB Hard Disk Drive, 5400rpm Serial ATA (2.5") [add $26.25]
> > > > > > 100GB Hard Disk Drive, 7200rpm Serial ATA (2.5") [add $60.00]
> > > > > > 160GB Hard Disk Drive, 5400rpm Serial ATA (2.5") [add $60.00]
> > > > > > 160GB Hard Disk Drive, 5400rpm with Disk Encryption [add $97.50]
> > > > > > 160GB Hard Disk Drive, 7200rpm [add $135.00]
> > > > > > 200GB Hard Disk Drive, 7200rpm with Disk Encryption [add
$285.00]
> > > > > >
> > > > > > I like the idea of getting a faster 7200rpm, but there has been
a
> > fair
> > > > > > amount of chatter on the list about trouble with 7200rpm drives.
> > Are
> > > > 7200rpm
> > > > > > drives too failure prone? Do they get much hotter/noisier than
the
> > > > 5400rpm
> > > > > > drives? Lastly, do the reliability/heat/noise differ by drive
> > size?
> > > > (for
> > > > > > example, is 100GB 7200rpm ok whereas 160GB 7200rpm is a common
> > > > > > troublemaker?)
> > > > >
> > > > > _______________________________________________
> > > > > Thinkpad mailing list
> > > > > Thinkpad@stderr.org
> > > > > http://stderr.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/thinkpad
> > > >
> > > > _______________________________________________
> > > > Thinkpad mailing list
> > > > Thinkpad@stderr.org
> > > > http://stderr.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/thinkpad
> > > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > --
> > > ________
> > >
> > > I believe everything happens for a reason.
> > > Usually, the reason is that somebody screwed up.
> > >
> >
> >
>
>
> --
> ________
>
> I believe everything happens for a reason.
> Usually, the reason is that somebody screwed up.
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Received on Sun Nov 11 12:55:52 2007