what is the best hard drive for a Titanium PowerBook?

QUESTION #1. Are 7200 RPM drives too hot for a 800 MHz Titanium PowerBook?

QUESTION #2. If 7200 RPM drives are OK, then what's the best choice?

QUESTION #3. If 7200 RPM drives are not OK, then what's the best choice?

NOTE. Price doesn't matter [as long as < $250].

NOTE. Quality and warranty do matter a lot.

NOTE. I checked the web and I know my choices. I just don't know how the
drives actually perform.

NOTE. Based on stats, it looks like a 100GB 2.5" Seagate Momentus 7200.1
7200RPM is a great choice. Is it?

Please respond only to the above questions and don't suggest to get a used
drive or eBay or such. I plan to buy from a reputable dealer.

Thanks, PaulN

 

I expect it is, but I've paid less and not regretted it. I've used
Hitachi Travelstars in my PB (replacing them only because I ran out of
space) and they've been great. At <http://eshop.macsales.com/> the
100GB 7200rpm Travelstar will run $185, vs. $210 for the Seagate.
Either's probably just fine.

 

You've been spoiled. Remember when a 2GB HD was considered HUGE? ;-)

Gerry < who still has SCSI 2s, 4s, and 9s running >

 

Um. I recall when 32 MB (not GB) was the upper limit of what some
systems supported. My first personal hard disk was a "large" 20 MB one.

 

I couldn't help but chime in, remembering how impressed I was when I forked
out something like $1,200 for a 20 MEGABYTE hard drive for my Macintosh 512.
Wow, a drive that held something like 50 floppies worth of data!

 

While others are reminiscing, I'll try to give you my experience:
Q1: Not in mine.
Q2: I've not had problems with the Travelstar; still running after six
years of hard use.
Q3: IME, the only "drawback" to the 7200 RPM drive is the reduced run
time on battery power.

If you are comfortable with Seagate's warranty, its not a bad choice.

 

it was in 1987 (if I remember correctly) that I bought a Mac II computer
(around $6,000) and a LaserWriter Plus printer (around $7,000). Shortly after
I had the Mac II I installed a Dove accelerator card (aroound $1,500). And
people moan and groan about the prices of Apple hardware today!

 

We thought that nobody outside of a software development team would ever
need more than 5MB.

Then we got a 10MB Profile hard disk (at work, I wasn't making enough to
afford one for home).

It would boot up an Apple//e or Apple/// is less than a second, as long
as you powered up the drive about 30 seconds before you hit the
computer's power switch.

 

The last time I turned on a working 5 MB ProFILE I seem to recall it
taking a good minute or longer to do its self-test (including verifying
every block on the volume). I'd expect a 10 MB one to take twice as
long. Maybe it just seemed like eternity.

I still have one in my basement but I don't know whether it still works.
If not, the chances of reformatting it are now pretty slim, as it needs
an Apple /// with ProFILE controller, formatting software, special
firmware on an EPROM and a ceramic Z8 with "piggyback" EPROM socket in
the ProFILE.

Thank god hard drives have got cheaper and easier to use in the last two
decades!

BTW, the first hard drive I bought was a 60 MB Rodime in 1988. Cost me
about NZ$3200 (something in the order of US$1600 at the time). Recently
got thrown out when I moved to a new flat.

The first hard drive I used was a Nestar 20 MB one attached to our Apple
II network at high school, around 1983. Rather large and noisy beast,
kept in a back room, with a dedicated file server. It was about eight
inches high, eighteen inches wide and three feet deep. I shudder to
think how much it would have originally cost, but our school probably
got it second hand.

 

:> We thought that nobody outside of a software development team would ever
:> need more than 5MB.

You guys all reminisce [smiley]. I am the OP but let me add...

One of my friends in 1985 bought a 5Mb internal HD for his Mac for 10K. This
was his own personal Mac and he spent his own personal monies. He is just a
regular guy, not a gazillioner. Can you beat that?

/PaulN

 

Well, not in absolute terms, but if you scale it down a little... (it
was obviously earlier, so maybe I can claim that the dollars were worth
more )...

I spent about $2000 of my own personal money to get, ummm... I think it
was 2 MB of storage capacity... in floppy drives for my Apple 2e. That
was 2 Shugate double-sided, double-density 8-inch floppy drives (I think
it was 1 MB each drive, but if thats not right, it must have been 500k).
Add a case and power supply big and heavy enough to anchor a fair-sized
boat, plus an interface card, and the total came to right around $2k,
not including any floppy media.

 

Not only that but good programs were 300-400kb so you could get a lot
onto a 5MB HD. OTOH I recall looking for a used Mac in CA in 1985,
nothing available in my price range of <$1000..

RL

 

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