What is the point of faster hard drive?

[DomzWRX]

I understand loading levels and accessing information quick, but in gaming, how does the hard drive affect play?? I'm trying to decide if I need to sacrifice space for the speed of the 7200rpm hard drive. Also, still trying to figure out if the 5400 rpm is actually even any slower than 7200rpm when getting up into the 350gb HDs, or dual 250gb(for example) vs. an 250gb(7200).

Any ideas, opinions, or facts are welcomed and appreciated.

[OregonCoastGamer]

Apparently a 350GB 5400 RPM is > or = a 7200 RPM HD. Not sure myself why the price for a 7200 RPM would be greater, but in a laptop I guess the said speed of the hard drive does not actually represent its real time performance.

[talldan]

Bigger numbers (7200 RPM) = more mula: Lower numbers (5400 RPM) = less mula. Simple equation of value. :D

I think both are about equal, its just how fast they spin around obviously right?

Apparently a 350GB 5400 RPM is > or = a 7200 RPM HD. Not sure myself why the price for a 7200 RPM would be greater, but in a laptop I guess the said speed of the hard drive does not actually represent its real time performance.

[Anewbus]

I understand loading levels and accessing information quick, but in gaming, how does the hard drive affect play?? I'm trying to decide if I need to sacrifice space for the speed of the 7200rpm hard drive. Also, still trying to figure out if the 5400 rpm is actually even any slower than 7200rpm when getting up into the 350gb HDs, or dual 250gb(for example) vs. an 250gb(7200).

Any ideas, opinions, or facts are welcomed and appreciated.

Well, during play at least in some games, file transfer can be hot and heavy (literally).:eek: FPS games are a good example. Just think of all the rendering alone that goes on every time you walk forward or jump around or switch veiws, etc. Sure the 7200rpm drives spin faster, but that does not always denote better transfer speeds and loading and such. (Just like a higher price doesn't automatically mean the item is better than the one next to it for $10 less or something).
In the world of lappies its all about heat and battery at some point. The 7200 drives run a fair amount hotter than the 5400 drives and when you get up in the amounr of space there's a turn where there is nearly no difference between them where speed and performance are concerned. Like the example above 350GB 5400 vs 250 GB 7200 are very near equal in performance, but the 7200 will run much hotter and shorten battery life quicker. So at those sizes why pay more for less space and more heat and shorter battery when you can have the same performance more space less heat and longer battery?

You can find more on this at Notebook review in the hardware forum.

[xpcdude]

Here's my HDtune benchmark for my 320/7200 HDD .
Try it on a regular HDD and see what you get and you`ll understand why 7200 RPM drives are better :)