Hi, if you can get the internal drive as 7200rpm as well as the external one it will be better, but i would NOT buy it from apple, you should find a music / daw dealer which sells powerbooks with "audio" specs... or buy the HD somewhere else and sell the HD it comes with, apple store is complete ripp off!! BEWARE!!

same for the memory!! i don't know specific powerbook memory, but the ones i know for towers are PQI, Apacer or Kingston ALL good,

but i hope that some real DAW / Comp guru will chime in!! here and give you more detailed info, i think Maintiger has some good experience to purchase Macs in the States for a "bargain"
hopefully he will spot this thread and give you some better advice, otherwise try to address him directly with another thread!

hope it helps.
a.

Thanks Axel, I don't want to buy anything from Apple.com, it's too expensive. But the internal hard drive I was talking about was Seagate Momentus 7200 which costs around $300 (not on apple.com, ofcourse). Any external drive with more than twice the capacity costs about half of that and that's why I asked. Why is it necessary to have a 7200 RPM hard drive if you are going to have only the OS/apps on it?

Make sure the drive is compatible, these guys are the specialist.
http://www.mcetech.com/

I have the 12" version of the PB and am upgrading soon to a 7200rpm drive. 7200 rpm is the way to go if you want to get the most out of your powerbook experience. i have a 7200rpm lacie firewire drive that is great when i'm at home or at the studio but if i'm on the go and want to do some multi-track editing and/or recording i'm cripped by the number of tracks i can do at once.

i think i'm going to get the Hatachi Travelstar 100GB. Why are you going with the Seagate?

Seagate because I heard they were good. Never heard of Hitachi. Are they better hard drives for Powerbooks?

By the way, are you suggesting that I should get a 7200 internal hard drive too?

i'd go with seagate or maxtor, but actually don't know if maxtor makes powerbook drives...?

in my circle of known owners / users Seagates have been the most reliable drives and they are super dead quiet!!!

said that there is probably not a massive difference between WD, Maxtor or Seagate...

really, if you can splash out the money for an 7200rpm internal as well as external, that way you have as mentioned the option of using the powerbook in certain cases without the external drive as well with more power / tracks avialable...

a.

Thanks axel, Before I got any more confused, I just went ahead and bought the Seagate internal drive. (Momentus 7200 ATA). Also, Kingston memory for Powerbook. What do you prefer as an external hard drive? Is it wise to upgrade the RAM and harddrive ourself or should I take it to the Mac store?

I've been usind maxtors now for several years with great results- both internal and external. All 7200 rpm, of course- As far as ram is concerned, don't buy it at the apple store- too expensive- look around for deals

Putting RAM in a Powerbook is easy, all that is need is avery small phillips screwdriver.

Also be aware that a faster internal drive will draw slightly more power (5.7W vs 4.5W) and that will affect battery life.
Not an issue if you are running off of the wall wart.

8)

Thanks to all of u!

Maintiger, I have seen very bad reviews on some of the Maxtor external harddrives. I have used internal Maxtor hard drives with no problems though. What do you think of Lacie external hard drives? They have excellent reviews.

Gdoubleyou, I was aware that 7200 hard drive would affect the battery life, does it also add to more ware and tare? Also, do these hard drives create more noise?

Like with everything else, i guess it the recommendation always depends strongly on your own experience, i have heard only very good things about external maxtors, and internal ones too.

i use seagates and did not had a single problem, so no need for me to change... if i would buy an external drive however, i would probably go for a maxtor, because i like the casing more then that from the seagate external ones, and it's an item to lug around and being thrown in and out of the bag!! the seagte case is plastik, the maxtor one is alloy...

seaget drives are dead, dead SILENT, i can't hear mine in my tower even if i pay highest attention, it's just dead quiet!!

so i guess, round up, that you made a quality choice so far, seagate, kingston. should keep you happy for a long while. mind you it's alway possible to catch THAT bad apple, which i hope will not be the case for you. :D :D :D

good luck and happy recording.

a.

swanmusic wrote: Thanks to all of u!

Maintiger, I have seen very bad reviews on some of the Maxtor external harddrives. I have used internal Maxtor hard drives with no problems though. What do you think of Lacie external hard drives? They have excellent reviews.
?

I've had a lacie drive and it never gave me any problems- however, most of my drives have been internal maxtor and no problem there. I'm currently using a 7200 rpm 250 GB ata maxtor with my laptop. Its an internal type drive that I paired with an external firewire case I got in fry's for $29- so far so good, no problems at all
:D

It will probably cause the motherboard fan to come on more often, don't think it will cause more wear and tear.

I do notice at various times during a session the motherboard fan will engage, even with external drives.

8)

hi maintiger

I'm currently using a 7200 rpm 250 GB ata maxtor with my laptop. Its an internal type drive that I paired with an external firewire case I got in fry's for $29- so far so good, no problems at all

which external enclosure, do you use exactly???

i had so far and all my friends too :-( only trouble with sticking a drive in a standalone enclosure, heat problems firmware probs and the like usually they worked in the beginning and then died off after a few month??? which still remains a miracle to me! i used cannyon and some hughh.. can't remember some chinese stuff...

i have heard that the icy box is ok???

or anyone else any experiences with using third party FIREWIRE enclosures and drives...

either alloy, or with a nice SILENT fan.

cause i am tended to only buy "original" externals in future, but they are over here about double and more of the price of DIYs

thanks

a.

It seems Apple warranty is not valid if you put RAM which is not provided by Apple and that damages the Powerbook. At least that's what the Apple guy told me. I got Kingston memory which is in fact better than what they put in. (They put in some korean memory). Is that true?