From: Stuart Tedford <stuart.tedford_at_piresearch.co.uk>
Date: Tue, 14 Dec 2004 10:42:42 -0000

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Björn Stenberg
>
> All disks are fast enough. Buy the slowest disk with the
> least cache == the cheapest. Higher spin rate only means
> longer spinup time and more power drain, and a big cache is
> wasted since it's emptied every time we spin down the disk.
>
In my experience using 5400rpm drives (MK6022GAX, MK8062GAX), the spinup
time is much shorter with the these than with the 4200rpm drives. eg,
spinup time reported by RockBox for the MK8062GAX is 2010ms, whereas for my
current 4200rpm MHU2100AT RockBox reports 2600ms.

5400rpm drives do, as you say, use more power, and the spinup time advantage
is meaningless when the drive refuses to spinup at a much higher voltage
than the slower drives. Effectively cutting potential battery life by a
couple of hours.

Incidentally, does anyone know if disabling the onboard drive cache (using
hdparm etc) reduces drive power consumption?

Stu.
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Received on 2004-12-14