5900 rpm vs 7200rpm for blu ray

[4nonymous]

I want to purchase a 2tb hard drive , it will be used for storing and streaiming 1080p blu ray ripped 8gb movies.

Will there be any problem with having a 5900rpm drive? Or will it have to be 7200 as I obviously dont want dodgy/jerky playback.

EG

Seagate Barracuda ST32000542AS 2TB 3.5" SATA II Hard Drive - OEM

vs

Hitachi HDS722020ALA330 2TB 3.5" SATA II Hard Drive - OEM

I assume there is nothing wrong with those drives, reliability wise etc etc ...

[Marf]

Both of those drives can transfer data faster than the bandwidth required for bluray quality video.

[Lord Flathead]

I would always go for the 7200 rpm drive, especially as you are going to be shifting data. If it was just for storage of photos etc which would only be relatively small data moving occasionly, then a 5400 drive would be quieter but slower.

If you are going for a 2TB drive, then I would also consider the bandwidth available to the controller, and personaly I would spend the extra and buy a SATA3 drive which is way faster, even if your MOBO doesn't support it. You can buy SATA3 cards for about £30 from overclockers etc if you wanted to do that at the same time.

The Hitatchi 'Deathstar' drives are decent performance, have a look at Toms Hardware for a comparison

[-DeaDLocK-]

Even USB2 off any half-decent flash drive can transfer data at multiple times faster than the needs of the upper limit of bit rates within the Blu Ray specification.

Therefore, any hard drive would be absolutely fine.

7200rpm models will be faster for bulk transfers to and from the drive, but they are louder, generate more heat, are more expensive and have lower MTBF values (in general). If you can live with the file copy transfer speed of a 5400rpm drive, that would be my choice for data archival or video streaming.

[4nonymous]

I don't really care about the data transfer tbh

Just the streaming capabilities off the hard drive.

[Marf]

4nonymous said:

I don't really care about the data transfer tbh

Just the streaming capabilities off the hard drive.

Same difference, but as said most all HDDs on sale today will do you.

[4nonymous]

Marf said:

4nonymous said:

I don't really care about the data transfer tbh

Just the streaming capabilities off the hard drive.

Same difference, but as said most all HDDs on sale today will do you.

Ah I imagined when people said data transfer they meant copying data from one hard drive to another.

Do get that there will be data transfer when streaming aswell though. But anyway as long as it streams ok

Im thinking about this..

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Hard+Dri...

seems a decent price.

[Marf]

Should do you fine. As an aside I had no idea 2TB of storage could be had so cheaply.

[4nonymous]

Marf said:

Should do you fine. As an aside I had no idea 2TB of storage could be had so cheaply.

I remember when it was £200 for 1tb

Kinda makes it zero excuse for people not backing up now that data storage is so cheap!

[The_Jackal]

I didn't realise people still made or bought 5400rpm drives apart from laptop drives.
Go with the 7200 speed, there is no point in specifically buying a lower speed drive, especially if you are messing with blu ray.

[Xerstead]

The_Jackal said:

I didn't realise people still made or bought 5400rpm drives apart from laptop drives.
Go with the 7200 speed, there is no point in specifically buying a lower speed drive, especially if you are messing with blu ray.

5400rpm drives use less power, generate less heat and can make less noise than the faster drives. This makes them more suited for home-theater pc's. The 5400rpm will be easily be able handle the transfer speeds needed for movies. If it were a main drive for a gaming/work pc I'd get the 7200rpm, but for a media back up either would be fine.

[The_Jackal]

I just assumed that because he wanted to watch ripped bluray movies 8gb in size, he didnt want his system to perform "just enough". Otherwise he may as well watch a DVD rip, the film will be the same.

[Lord Flathead]

Xerstead said:

The_Jackal said:

I didn't realise people still made or bought 5400rpm drives apart from laptop drives.
Go with the 7200 speed, there is no point in specifically buying a lower speed drive, especially if you are messing with blu ray.

5400rpm drives use less power, generate less heat and can make less noise than the faster drives. This makes them more suited for home-theater pc's. The 5400rpm will be easily be able handle the transfer speeds needed for movies. If it were a main drive for a gaming/work pc I'd get the 7200rpm, but for a media back up either would be fine.

Although the OP has stated quite clearly that he is not bothered about transfer rates, when you are ripping the film to the disk, it takes a considerable time if your drive bottlenecks.

When we were building 50TB media servers for our well to do clients, loading 1200 films onto disc arrays takes for ever! Agree with the noise and heat aspect, but our servers were not mounted in the cinema areas so that was not an issue.

Do bear in mind that ripping a Bluray which is around 35gig will take a lot longer on a 5400 rpm disk (up to 10 minutes longer per disk) when compared with a 7200. It is not the streaming that is the issue - always the ripping.

[4nonymous]

I won't be doing any ripping or anything on the disk.

Someone else will be merely transferring data onto the disc with the media all ready to watch. SO a simply plug and watch for me...

Hence my only concern being whether streaming 1080p stuff off it will be ok

Reserved the Seagate one and yiming is good as im off to Manchester tomorrow so can collect it from Aria

Edited by 4nonymous on Sunday 21st March 23:34

[-DeaDLocK-]

4nonymous said:

Hence my only concern being whether streaming 1080p stuff off it will be ok.

An absolute yes. Enjoy!

[HellDiver]

I can stream 1080p off a WD Scorpio Blue 320GB drive in an external USB2 box. I think a Seagate 2TB will be fine.