Right hard disk for i7- 720m processor

[jhones99]

Hi every one

i am planning to buy a performance laptop

i use a lot of virtualization so i am mainly looking for speed

i have two options

i7-720m cpu + 500gb 7200rpm hdd

i7-720m cpu + 500gb 5400rpm hdd

the one with 7200rpm costs around 100$ more than 5400rpm disk

does 5400rpm hdd restrict i7 processors performance by large or is it just minimal


also is their any other components other than cpu and harddisk which effects tasks like virtual machines


thanks in advance

 

[manojgj]

check this

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/255853-32-5400-hard-drive-versus-7200-performance

 

[JackNaylorPE]

You decide:

Here's a compariosn between the 7200 rpm and 5400 rpm drives from Seagate:

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7200 is 17 % faster in gaming benchmark for instance. The 5400 rpm drive loses every benchmark by a significant margin except watts.

That price difference though is extreme. Here's the choices on my laptop

320/7200rpm GB SATA-300 (SATA II 3GB/s)
500/5400rpm GB SATA-300 (SATA II 3GB/s) [add $15.00]
500/7200rpm GB SATA-300 (SATA II 3GB/s) [add $40.00]
500/7200rpm GB SATA-300 (SATA II 3GB/s) with G-Force Protection [add $59.00]
640/5400rpm GB SATA-300 (SATA II 3GB/s) [add $60.00]
80GB Intel X25-M G2 SATA II Solid State Drive [add $225.00]
160GB Intel X25-M G2 SATA II Solid State Drive [add $450.00]

Moving from 5400 to 7200 costs $25 in the 500 GB sizehttp://www.pro-star.com/index.cfm?mainpage=serial-price&serial=W870CU&promoteid=90000321&screenid=13118100&cpuid=30123300&hdid=40105526&cdromid=20074665&ramid=80113903&batteryid=10031877

 

[jhones99]

also is their any other components other than cpu and harddisk which effects performance of tasks like virtual machines

 

[sminlal]

> does 5400rpm hdd restrict i7 processors performance by large or is it just minimal

It will make a noticeable difference if you use the faster drive, particularly in a laptop where (I assume) you don't have the option of putting the OS and data (virtual machine) files on separate drives.


> also is their any other components other than cpu and harddisk which effects tasks like virtual machines
It's very important to have enough memory. Add up the memory you're going to assign to each virtual machine that will be running simultaneously and make sure you have that much free after loading windows.