Should I pull the trigger?

[MicroBob]

[ QUOTE ]

the 5400 to 7200 is a prety big jump--probably more significant than the difference between 256mb ram and 1gb ram.

[/ QUOTE ]


why do you say this?

total idiot here....I'd like your opinion on what the problem would be with the lesser hard-drive.

is it really a bigger difference than 256 vs 1k in RAM?

[hhughes]

I would also like to know where you saw this on the website...best I could come up with was ~$1200 after the coupon...this was for the 9300

Priced a 6000 with the smaller screen but still 1600x1200 for just under $800...

[LondonBroil]

I'm not the brightest when it comes to this subject, but I believe that when the computer needs to find something saved to the hard drive (something not currently in the RAM), the hard drive spins around and the processor picks out the sections of data that are stored. The difference between a 5400 and a 7200rpm hard drive means that the drive spins 33% faster meaning you get your info quicker. Defragmenting your drive can also speed your computer up by placing data the belongs together near each other.

Am I close?

[just2pimp]

[ QUOTE ]
I'm not the brightest when it comes to this subject, but I believe that when the computer needs to find something saved to the hard drive (something not currently in the RAM), the hard drive spins around and the processor picks out the sections of data that are stored. The difference between a 5400 and a 7200rpm hard drive means that the drive spins 33% faster meaning you get your info quicker. Defragmenting your drive can also speed your computer up by placing data the belongs together near each other.

Am I close?

[/ QUOTE ]

yes everytime a program or whatever needs to access it your hard drive will have to spin to wherever its stored. so the more information you need from the hard drive the more important this is. poker tracker and gt+ will obviously benefit from the higher rpms

[HesseJam]

I don't think it is so important unless you want to do a lot of data queries. Normal use of PT (like importing data every 2 minutes) does not require 7200rpm drives. You might be gaining a second or two on the import. This will be even more valid, once PT gets away from the Access data bases which is in beta testing right now.

Frequently defragging and more ram is more effective.

I have 5000 rpm drive on my 1.2 ghz laptop and it imports 16 tables every 4 minutes just fine. It is somewhat slow if you let PT display the whole database (you set the preferences all blank). This takes about 15 seconds for a 100.000 hand database. With a 7200 rpm it would take 10 secs. But how often do you do that juxtaposed to the regular use?

[MicroBob]

Thanks for your wisdom on this to help educate the total ignormases (ignorami??) such as yours truly.

I don't even see where it says 'rpm' for the hard-drive.

I just see 40GB or 80GB.

[J_B]

[ QUOTE ]
Thanks for your wisdom on this to help educate the total ignormases (ignorami??) such as yours truly.

I don't even see where it says 'rpm' for the hard-drive.

I just see 40GB or 80GB.

[/ QUOTE ]

Most drives are now 5400 rpm unless they say 6200 or higher.

Aas for teh 7200rpm vs. 5400rpm, think of an LP spinning at 33 and how much faster it can play through at 45. Faster speed means faster drive. In most cases larger drive means faster drive too. A 250gb drive at 5400rpm is faster in most applications than a 40gb at 7200rpm (think about this - physical area is the same!)

[MicroBob]

okay....we'll i'll go with the 80gb drive I guess and hope it works out okay.


I am trying to think about this as you suggest....but I don't know what the gb is in the first place.
Does gb mean that it's twice as wide or something.

I can see the difference in rpm and can visualize it spinning as fast as it canny-canny-can to find something.
But I have no idea what the difference between a 40gb and 80gb hard-drive is physically...I just don't know what that means.


But the one I have ordered right now has 40gb and it sounds like for running PT and GT+ this might eventually be an issue and that my chances of it continuing to run smoothly are better if I just splurge for the 80gb (and it looks like my only option is for the 5600rpm).

[SoCalRugger]

[ QUOTE ]
But I have no idea what the difference between a 40gb and 80gb hard-drive is physically...I just don't know what that means.

[/ QUOTE ]

There is no difference in the physical dimensions. But the 80 GB can store twice as much information as the 40 GB. If you're just using it for poker, then 40 GB would probably do the job, but you 80 can't hurt.

[MicroBob]

i had so many slow-down issues on this computer with PT and GT+ (don't know the specs on it amazingly enough) that I'm going to pretty much 'play it safe' and change my order to 80gb (on hold with them now).
I think I only have 512RAM on this one so that could be part of the problem I suppose.
Sometimes it would get really slow after 200 hands...other times it would work fine after 2000 hands. It was weird.
Possibly related to also surfing on mozilla-firefox while playing.


I'm not going to press for the 7200rpm as it seems the consensus here is that I will be okay with the lower rpm which is 'standard' anyway.


Here are the updated specs on my computer:

Inspiron 9300 Intel® Pentium® M Processor 730 (1.60 GHz/2MB Cache/533MHz FSB)

Display 17 inch UltraSharp™ Wide Screen UXGA Display with TrueLife™

Memory 1GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 533MHz 2 Dimm

Video Card 64MB ATIs™ Mobility Radeon™ X300

Hard Drive 40GB Hard Drive (will be changing to 80GB)

Operating System Microsoft® Windows® XP Home Edition

Network Card Integrated 10/100 Network Card and Modem

CD/DVD Drives 8x CD/DVD burner (DVD+/-RW) with double-layer write capability

Wireless Networking Card Intel® PRO/Wireless 2200 Internal Wireless (802.11 b/g, 54Mbps)

Office Productivity Software (Pre-Installed) No productivity suite - Corel WordPerfect word processor only

Security Software No Security Subscription

Primary Battery 9-cell Lithium Ion Primary Battery (80 WHr)

Limited Warranty, Services and Support Options 1Yr Ltd Warranty, 1Yr At-Home Service, and 1Yr Technical Support



Comments - don't know what the quality of the video-card, network-card or wireless networking card are. I think I have the cheaper option on all of the above but don't think I do anything on my computer to make it worthwhile to get the more expensive option.
What they offer is probably good enough for me.

I believe I still have my microsoft-word and excel CD's around. If not then perhaps I can transfer that stuff over via the networking cable. No need to purchase it again.

Same for the Norton security. I'm assuming my subscription can just carry over the other computer or I can network it over...if not then I can just order it again and cancel the other subscription perhaps.

Will also transfer ad-aware over via networking card perhaps?? Or I can just download it again.