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Ok, seeing as how Im in this board daily, I notice the same questions being asked over and over and over ad nauseum. While there is a sticky FAQ in this forum, its for a specific model and I think this board deserves a general notebook FAQ. If I missed something (question or link) feel free to PM me about it and Ill add it in (if your question and answer is quite long, Id prefer you PMd it to me). Mind you these questions are in no particular order or organization. Ill probably mention several Dells, but thats only because Im most familiar with their line-up since I have to work on them every day and all (Been a field tech for the past year)
Please, do NOT post questions in this thread. I try to update the information, but I normally don't check any of the replies. If you have a question that isn't answered here, feel free to make a new thread or PM me with your question.
Q: Can I upgrade the graphics on my Laptop?
A: The short answer is no. The more correct (and subsequently more long-winded) answer is, only in specific circumstances. Say you have model X from company Y. First off the first criterion you have to meet is the Laptops graphics must be on a daughter card. If the graphics are soldered onto the motherboard you cant upgrade. So say you do have a Video daughter card. Does your laptop currently have the highest option for graphics that your model ever came with? If you answered yes, then no, you cant upgrade. Ok, so now we have a Laptop with a Video daughter card that doesnt have the highest level of option that was ever available for that model. Under this circumstance and ONLY this circumstance can you upgrade. Currently major notebook manufacturers design Laptop Video cards SPECIFICALLY for that model. In certain extreme cases your Laptops BIOS will only recognize certain models of video cards. So for example, an Inspiron 8xxx series or Latitude C8xx series notebook (theyre the same, just different BIOS) the most youre gonna upgrade to is the Mobility 9000 Radeon from Ati. And to get that card to run in a Latitude, youll have to use Omega drivers since that card was never offered in a latitude.
Granted, Ati and nVidia both have announced a modular system for their PCI Express graphics cards in mobile applications, but as yet few manufacturers have chosen to use the technology. It might be some time before we see modular graphics cards incorporated into Laptop designs.
Q: Im new to Laptops, what are my options?
A: Whoops, I got another long-winded answer to this one. Seems every week someone is asking this question. Funny thing about Notebooks is there seems to be two distinct sub-segments in the market. Those two being, Ultra-portable, and the High performance Desktop replacement market. Mind you these arent the only types you can find, there are PLENTY of models that fall in between these two extremes.
Ultra portables are considered to be under 5 pounds and have smaller screen sizes (under 15). Because of their light weight and diminutive size they are quite easy to carry around. These laptops normally do not have anything more than Intel graphics but can carry just about any speed Intel Pentium M CPU as well as Wi-Fi. Some models are so small they cannot have an on-board optical drive, however the manufacturers of these systems do give the user options for external drives either with a media slice or USB drive. Youll also find Ultraportables to have the longest battery life (6-7 hours) since they have the smallest screens and in some instances use those ultra tiny notebook hard drives found in MP3 players. Youll mostly see Intel CPUs and the occasional Transmeta Crusoe in these notebooks.
Some Examples of Ultraportable notebooks are:
Dell Latitude X1
Dell Inspiron 700m
IBM Thinkpad X-series
Fujitsu P1120
Sony VAIO VGN-T140P/L
Desktop Replacement (DTR) notebooks are the grand-daddy, throw out your desktop, cuz this badboy is all you need segment of Laptops. These Laptops can weigh upwards of 10-15 pounds. Have screen sizes 15 or larger (Dell has announced a 19 Widescreen notebook in the future). These laptops also have the highest performance often using Desktop CPUs and near desktop class graphics cards. They have the shortest battery life, often only able to run on battery long enough to get from outlet to outlet (think Strong Bad's Lappy 486). These are really intended more as an easy to carry desktop PC rather than a Laptop PC as they run hot enough to probably cause men reproductive problems. Some models feature options like RAID and/or dual optical drives for disk to disk copying.
Another type of DTR worth mentioning is ones equipped with Pentium M CPUs. These notebooks are lighter than their Desktop CPU counterparts in addition to getting twice the battery life. The Inspiron XPS Gen 2 and Inspiron 9300 are examples of this class.
Some Examples of DTR Notebooks:
Dell Inspiron XPS series
Alienware Area 51m
Sager 9880
As in all things there's the mid-range. These notebooks offer the best balance between portability and performance. They'll have good battery life and have plenty of performance for most any Desktop app. They're not on the extreme end for certain, but they are really nice when you're willing to sacrifice a bit of gaming performance for better portability.
Some Examples of our Middleground:
Thinkpad R series
Dell Latitude D610
Now I've COMPLETELY over-simplified things here. There's every type of Laptop in between full-on DTR and Ultraportable segment. And this portion of the FAQ is freakin long enough as it is.
Q: What is centrino?
A: Centrino is Intels mobile technology suite designed specifically for notebooks. It consists of three parts, the Pentium M Processor, accompaning Intel Chipset, and Intel Pro wireless. According to Intel a notebook with the Centrino sticker will give you the best battery life and portability. Dont let that disappoint you though, many non-centrino Laptops carry the Pentium M and Intel chipset but just use a different Wi-Fi card.
Q: How can you say the Pentium M has good performance when its clockspeed is so slow?
A: AMD was first to show us that sheer CPU clock frequency was not the sole measure of a CPUs actual performance. Yes the fastest Pentium M is only 2Ghz, but in head to head benchmarks the Pentium M often performs as good, if not better than a CPU that has 1Ghz more clock speed.
Q: What is Turion?
A:Turion is AMD's answer to Centrino and the Pentium M. Performance is generally on par (we're talking within 10% of each other) with that of the Pentium M when coupled with the same or equivalent video chipset. Power consumption is still something that AMD needs to work on so don't be expecting 4+ hours of run-time on batteries. Turion notebooks are going to be less expensive on the whole compared to Centrino systems. However, it appears that most of the OEMs out there are keeping these processors in budget notebooks with integrated graphics. The Exception being the Acer Ferrari
Q: What can I upgrade on my laptop if I cant upgrade graphics?
A: You can upgrade these items with little or no trouble (generally speaking). CPU, Memory, Hard Drive, and Optical Drive. For the latter two, sometimes the manufacturer of your notebook might use a special housing for the HDD or Optical, in which case you just have to remove the original drive from this housing and install your replacement. On the newer Inspirons, Dell just has a tiny bracket on the back of the drive secured with two screws, otherwise any Notebook drive will work in the machine. Some notebooks also have a MiniPCI slot where you can add in an internal Wi-Fi card (my Inspiron 8200 sports a Cisco Aironet 350 Wireless card) or upgrade the existing Wi-Fi to the latest standard. Upgrade parts for Laptops have gotten much easier to find in recent years.
NOTE: I recently attempted to upgrade the fixed optical drive in my Latitude C840 notebook with an AOpen DVD-RW drive. The Laptop would not boot from either the Optical drive or the HDD when the DVD-RW was installed in the Fixed optical bay. Luckily I had a Modular CD-ROM drive (which I had bought off eBay for this purpose anyway) to butcher and turn the new DVD-RW into a modular drive. The drive works fine in both the modular bay on the notebook, and in my docking station. I don't know if its an AOpen thing, or a Dell thing, but beware when upgrading Laptop Optical drives that your machine may not like the drive you purchase.
Q: I need a replacement part for my Laptop, wheres the best place to look?
A: Ive found eBay the best place to find gently used Laptop parts at a good price. Ive found some online retailers dealing sole-ly in replacement Laptop parts, but they charge double what you can find the same part for on eBay. Most of the time the parts are working pulls from Laptops that, for instance had a broken screen. On more popular Notebooks you can find enough parts on eBay to build an entire notebook (Dells seem to have the biggest selection of replacement parts) The best advice I can give you is look for the working pulls and stay away from the as-is or untested items. And stick to sellers that guarantee against DOA.
One other little tidbit of note from buying on eBay. I had a customer with an Inspiron 8100 with a bad IDE controller (wouldn't detect Optical or Hard Drives). I managed to find him a new Motherboard for the laptop complete with CPU, RAM, Video card, and DC Power board together for under $200. Seems alot of sellers do that to save work on having to auction each component individually.
Q: I want to build my own Laptop, where do I get parts?
A: Hate to burst your bubble, but the closest youre going to get to building a Laptop is buying a white box notebook. Essentially this notebook is complete, but lacks memory, CPU, HDD, Optical Drive, and Wi-Fi. You add in those components yourself. The ODMs actually intended resellers to add-in these components to meet the needs of their customers, but some have been selling the White-box notebooks direct to customers whom then later on install the missing pieces. Laptops unfortunately carry a lot of specialized hardware specific to each manufacturer and model unlike a Desktop PC which adheres to standard architecture. It is unlikely that anyone is going to come up with a completely modular notebook since enthusiasts account for so little of the customer base.
Again if I missed something or you wish to add to this FAQ, please let me know and I'll add it in. I haven't had a whole lot of time to dig up links or names of certain vendors, but please feel free to mention them.
Xonik's [H]ard|Forum Notebook [H]ard|Drive buying guide
Quick glossary of terms:
4K, 5K, 7K: Refers to the spindle speed of the disk, 4K = 4200 RPM, 5K = 5400 RPM, 7K = 7200 RPM and 10K = 10000 RPM
2 MB, 8 MB, 16 MB: Refers to the onboard cache available to assist in increasing general read/write performance.
PATA: a variant of the desktop 'IDE' interface, which adds 4 pins (for a total of 44 pins) that supply all the power needed by the drive. Available on just about any system.
SATA: the new serial HDD interface, 7 pin cable, found on only the newest laptops.
General considerations:
Notebook hard drives are currently found in the 2.5" form factor. 3.5" drives are suited for desktop and enterprise computers, while 1.8" and smaller drives are for embedded and/or mobile applications.
Spindle speed is the prime factor in determining notebook hard drive performance. Cache sizes are also a small factor; see here for more information on the effect of cache in desktop hard drives.
Generally, notebook hard drive noise increases with an increase in spindle speed, but keep in mind that the actual noise output is significantly less than the desktop drive of equivalent spindle speed. Check out http://www.silentpcreview.com for a wealth of knowledge regarding noise performance of notebook hard drives.
Many hard drive manufacturers have begun to produce enterprise hard drives in the 2.5" form factor. These drives take advantage of smaller components which improve performance and reduce power consumption and space requirements. However, they are not suitable for a notebook computer because of special interfaces and/or relatively high power consumption. Examples of these drives include the following:
* Seagate Savvio 10K.1
* Fujitsu MAV series of hard drives
* Hitachi TravelStar E series and EnduraStar J and N series of hard drives
With regards to warranties, be aware that notebook hard drive policies often differ from desktop drive warranties. Here is a quick comparison of the policies of the various manufacturers:
Fujitsu - 3 years - Applies to all mobile drives except Enhanced Duty and Extreme Temp models.
Hitachi - 3 years - Applies to all TravelStar 2.5" drives.
Samsung - 3 years - Check with the reseller for specific terms and conditions.
warranty on all of its internal drives, including its Momentus notebook hard drives.
A word on power consumption:
According to Quietest drives available, has 8 MB of onboard cache, high performance for a 4200 RPM drive, 3-year warranty.
Cons: Slow performance compared to 5400 and 7200 RPM notebook drives.
Honorable mentions: Samsung SpinPoint MP0402H (PATA), Seagate Momentus 5400.2 (PATA/SATA) -- both have significantly faster performance due to 5400 RPM spindle speeds, yet still operate very quietly.
Performance: Hitachi TravelStar 7K60, 7K PATA 40/60 GB
Pros: Fastest notebook drive available, low power consumption (comparable to most 5400 RPM notebook drives), nice 3-year warranty.
Cons: ~2x the cost per gigabyte of 5400 RPM notebook drives, slightly louder than most 5400 RPM drives, limited maximum capacity of 60 GB.
Honorable mentions: Hitachi TravelStar 5K100 (PATA/SATA), Seagate Momentus 5400.2 (PATA/SATA), Western Digital Scorpio WD800VE (PATA) -- trades slower performance for greater capacity and less noise at an attractive price per GB.
***Note: Hitachi also manufactures the E7K60, which is a very similar drive, but is designed and tested for the confines of a blade server. Naturally, it lacks the 7K60's power saving features, making it unsuitable for a battery-powered environment.
All-Around: Hitachi TravelStar 5K100, 5K PATA/SATA 20/40/60/80/100 GB
Pros: Storage capacity up to 100 GB, well-rounded performance, 8 MB cache, mature design, nice 3-year warranty.
Cons: Less responsive in applications than its 7200 RPM cousin, slightly louder than other 5400 RPM notebook drives.
Honorable mentions: Seagate Momentus 5400.2 (PATA/SATA), Western Digital Scorpio WD800VE (PATA), Samsung SpinPoint MP0402H (PATA).
Budget: Western Digital Scorpio WD400VE, 5K PATA 40 GB
Western Digital's first jump into the notebook market has yielded a drive with solid performance, quiet operation, and a great 3-year warranty. Best of all, the drive currently delivers the best price in the 40 GB capacity bracket.
Honorable Mention: Samsung SpinPoint MP0402H (PATA) -- nearly identically priced, this drive delivers roughly comparable performance and the same 3 year warranty, but it also runs arguably quieter than the WD Scorpio.
The Emachines M6805 FAQ can be found here.
FAQ for Emachines M6805
Please, do NOT post questions in this thread. I try to update the information, but I normally don't check any of the replies. If you have a question that isn't answered here, feel free to make a new thread or PM me with your question.
Q: Can I upgrade the graphics on my Laptop?
A: The short answer is no. The more correct (and subsequently more long-winded) answer is, only in specific circumstances. Say you have model X from company Y. First off the first criterion you have to meet is the Laptops graphics must be on a daughter card. If the graphics are soldered onto the motherboard you cant upgrade. So say you do have a Video daughter card. Does your laptop currently have the highest option for graphics that your model ever came with? If you answered yes, then no, you cant upgrade. Ok, so now we have a Laptop with a Video daughter card that doesnt have the highest level of option that was ever available for that model. Under this circumstance and ONLY this circumstance can you upgrade. Currently major notebook manufacturers design Laptop Video cards SPECIFICALLY for that model. In certain extreme cases your Laptops BIOS will only recognize certain models of video cards. So for example, an Inspiron 8xxx series or Latitude C8xx series notebook (theyre the same, just different BIOS) the most youre gonna upgrade to is the Mobility 9000 Radeon from Ati. And to get that card to run in a Latitude, youll have to use Omega drivers since that card was never offered in a latitude.
Granted, Ati and nVidia both have announced a modular system for their PCI Express graphics cards in mobile applications, but as yet few manufacturers have chosen to use the technology. It might be some time before we see modular graphics cards incorporated into Laptop designs.
Q: Im new to Laptops, what are my options?
A: Whoops, I got another long-winded answer to this one. Seems every week someone is asking this question. Funny thing about Notebooks is there seems to be two distinct sub-segments in the market. Those two being, Ultra-portable, and the High performance Desktop replacement market. Mind you these arent the only types you can find, there are PLENTY of models that fall in between these two extremes.
Ultra portables are considered to be under 5 pounds and have smaller screen sizes (under 15). Because of their light weight and diminutive size they are quite easy to carry around. These laptops normally do not have anything more than Intel graphics but can carry just about any speed Intel Pentium M CPU as well as Wi-Fi. Some models are so small they cannot have an on-board optical drive, however the manufacturers of these systems do give the user options for external drives either with a media slice or USB drive. Youll also find Ultraportables to have the longest battery life (6-7 hours) since they have the smallest screens and in some instances use those ultra tiny notebook hard drives found in MP3 players. Youll mostly see Intel CPUs and the occasional Transmeta Crusoe in these notebooks.
Some Examples of Ultraportable notebooks are:
Dell Latitude X1
Dell Inspiron 700m
IBM Thinkpad X-series
Fujitsu P1120
Sony VAIO VGN-T140P/L
Desktop Replacement (DTR) notebooks are the grand-daddy, throw out your desktop, cuz this badboy is all you need segment of Laptops. These Laptops can weigh upwards of 10-15 pounds. Have screen sizes 15 or larger (Dell has announced a 19 Widescreen notebook in the future). These laptops also have the highest performance often using Desktop CPUs and near desktop class graphics cards. They have the shortest battery life, often only able to run on battery long enough to get from outlet to outlet (think Strong Bad's Lappy 486). These are really intended more as an easy to carry desktop PC rather than a Laptop PC as they run hot enough to probably cause men reproductive problems. Some models feature options like RAID and/or dual optical drives for disk to disk copying.
Another type of DTR worth mentioning is ones equipped with Pentium M CPUs. These notebooks are lighter than their Desktop CPU counterparts in addition to getting twice the battery life. The Inspiron XPS Gen 2 and Inspiron 9300 are examples of this class.
Some Examples of DTR Notebooks:
Dell Inspiron XPS series
Alienware Area 51m
Sager 9880
As in all things there's the mid-range. These notebooks offer the best balance between portability and performance. They'll have good battery life and have plenty of performance for most any Desktop app. They're not on the extreme end for certain, but they are really nice when you're willing to sacrifice a bit of gaming performance for better portability.
Some Examples of our Middleground:
Thinkpad R series
Dell Latitude D610
Now I've COMPLETELY over-simplified things here. There's every type of Laptop in between full-on DTR and Ultraportable segment. And this portion of the FAQ is freakin long enough as it is.
Q: What is centrino?
A: Centrino is Intels mobile technology suite designed specifically for notebooks. It consists of three parts, the Pentium M Processor, accompaning Intel Chipset, and Intel Pro wireless. According to Intel a notebook with the Centrino sticker will give you the best battery life and portability. Dont let that disappoint you though, many non-centrino Laptops carry the Pentium M and Intel chipset but just use a different Wi-Fi card.
Q: How can you say the Pentium M has good performance when its clockspeed is so slow?
A: AMD was first to show us that sheer CPU clock frequency was not the sole measure of a CPUs actual performance. Yes the fastest Pentium M is only 2Ghz, but in head to head benchmarks the Pentium M often performs as good, if not better than a CPU that has 1Ghz more clock speed.
Q: What is Turion?
A:Turion is AMD's answer to Centrino and the Pentium M. Performance is generally on par (we're talking within 10% of each other) with that of the Pentium M when coupled with the same or equivalent video chipset. Power consumption is still something that AMD needs to work on so don't be expecting 4+ hours of run-time on batteries. Turion notebooks are going to be less expensive on the whole compared to Centrino systems. However, it appears that most of the OEMs out there are keeping these processors in budget notebooks with integrated graphics. The Exception being the Acer Ferrari
Q: What can I upgrade on my laptop if I cant upgrade graphics?
A: You can upgrade these items with little or no trouble (generally speaking). CPU, Memory, Hard Drive, and Optical Drive. For the latter two, sometimes the manufacturer of your notebook might use a special housing for the HDD or Optical, in which case you just have to remove the original drive from this housing and install your replacement. On the newer Inspirons, Dell just has a tiny bracket on the back of the drive secured with two screws, otherwise any Notebook drive will work in the machine. Some notebooks also have a MiniPCI slot where you can add in an internal Wi-Fi card (my Inspiron 8200 sports a Cisco Aironet 350 Wireless card) or upgrade the existing Wi-Fi to the latest standard. Upgrade parts for Laptops have gotten much easier to find in recent years.
NOTE: I recently attempted to upgrade the fixed optical drive in my Latitude C840 notebook with an AOpen DVD-RW drive. The Laptop would not boot from either the Optical drive or the HDD when the DVD-RW was installed in the Fixed optical bay. Luckily I had a Modular CD-ROM drive (which I had bought off eBay for this purpose anyway) to butcher and turn the new DVD-RW into a modular drive. The drive works fine in both the modular bay on the notebook, and in my docking station. I don't know if its an AOpen thing, or a Dell thing, but beware when upgrading Laptop Optical drives that your machine may not like the drive you purchase.
Q: I need a replacement part for my Laptop, wheres the best place to look?
A: Ive found eBay the best place to find gently used Laptop parts at a good price. Ive found some online retailers dealing sole-ly in replacement Laptop parts, but they charge double what you can find the same part for on eBay. Most of the time the parts are working pulls from Laptops that, for instance had a broken screen. On more popular Notebooks you can find enough parts on eBay to build an entire notebook (Dells seem to have the biggest selection of replacement parts) The best advice I can give you is look for the working pulls and stay away from the as-is or untested items. And stick to sellers that guarantee against DOA.
One other little tidbit of note from buying on eBay. I had a customer with an Inspiron 8100 with a bad IDE controller (wouldn't detect Optical or Hard Drives). I managed to find him a new Motherboard for the laptop complete with CPU, RAM, Video card, and DC Power board together for under $200. Seems alot of sellers do that to save work on having to auction each component individually.
Q: I want to build my own Laptop, where do I get parts?
A: Hate to burst your bubble, but the closest youre going to get to building a Laptop is buying a white box notebook. Essentially this notebook is complete, but lacks memory, CPU, HDD, Optical Drive, and Wi-Fi. You add in those components yourself. The ODMs actually intended resellers to add-in these components to meet the needs of their customers, but some have been selling the White-box notebooks direct to customers whom then later on install the missing pieces. Laptops unfortunately carry a lot of specialized hardware specific to each manufacturer and model unlike a Desktop PC which adheres to standard architecture. It is unlikely that anyone is going to come up with a completely modular notebook since enthusiasts account for so little of the customer base.
Again if I missed something or you wish to add to this FAQ, please let me know and I'll add it in. I haven't had a whole lot of time to dig up links or names of certain vendors, but please feel free to mention them.
Xonik's [H]ard|Forum Notebook [H]ard|Drive buying guide
Quick glossary of terms:
4K, 5K, 7K: Refers to the spindle speed of the disk, 4K = 4200 RPM, 5K = 5400 RPM, 7K = 7200 RPM and 10K = 10000 RPM
2 MB, 8 MB, 16 MB: Refers to the onboard cache available to assist in increasing general read/write performance.
PATA: a variant of the desktop 'IDE' interface, which adds 4 pins (for a total of 44 pins) that supply all the power needed by the drive. Available on just about any system.
SATA: the new serial HDD interface, 7 pin cable, found on only the newest laptops.
General considerations:
Notebook hard drives are currently found in the 2.5" form factor. 3.5" drives are suited for desktop and enterprise computers, while 1.8" and smaller drives are for embedded and/or mobile applications.
Spindle speed is the prime factor in determining notebook hard drive performance. Cache sizes are also a small factor; see here for more information on the effect of cache in desktop hard drives.
Generally, notebook hard drive noise increases with an increase in spindle speed, but keep in mind that the actual noise output is significantly less than the desktop drive of equivalent spindle speed. Check out http://www.silentpcreview.com for a wealth of knowledge regarding noise performance of notebook hard drives.
Many hard drive manufacturers have begun to produce enterprise hard drives in the 2.5" form factor. These drives take advantage of smaller components which improve performance and reduce power consumption and space requirements. However, they are not suitable for a notebook computer because of special interfaces and/or relatively high power consumption. Examples of these drives include the following:
* Seagate Savvio 10K.1
* Fujitsu MAV series of hard drives
* Hitachi TravelStar E series and EnduraStar J and N series of hard drives
With regards to warranties, be aware that notebook hard drive policies often differ from desktop drive warranties. Here is a quick comparison of the policies of the various manufacturers:
Fujitsu - 3 years - Applies to all mobile drives except Enhanced Duty and Extreme Temp models.
Hitachi - 3 years - Applies to all TravelStar 2.5" drives.
Samsung - 3 years - Check with the reseller for specific terms and conditions.
warranty on all of its internal drives, including its Momentus notebook hard drives.
A word on power consumption:
According to Quietest drives available, has 8 MB of onboard cache, high performance for a 4200 RPM drive, 3-year warranty.
Cons: Slow performance compared to 5400 and 7200 RPM notebook drives.
Honorable mentions: Samsung SpinPoint MP0402H (PATA), Seagate Momentus 5400.2 (PATA/SATA) -- both have significantly faster performance due to 5400 RPM spindle speeds, yet still operate very quietly.
Performance: Hitachi TravelStar 7K60, 7K PATA 40/60 GB
Pros: Fastest notebook drive available, low power consumption (comparable to most 5400 RPM notebook drives), nice 3-year warranty.
Cons: ~2x the cost per gigabyte of 5400 RPM notebook drives, slightly louder than most 5400 RPM drives, limited maximum capacity of 60 GB.
Honorable mentions: Hitachi TravelStar 5K100 (PATA/SATA), Seagate Momentus 5400.2 (PATA/SATA), Western Digital Scorpio WD800VE (PATA) -- trades slower performance for greater capacity and less noise at an attractive price per GB.
***Note: Hitachi also manufactures the E7K60, which is a very similar drive, but is designed and tested for the confines of a blade server. Naturally, it lacks the 7K60's power saving features, making it unsuitable for a battery-powered environment.
All-Around: Hitachi TravelStar 5K100, 5K PATA/SATA 20/40/60/80/100 GB
Pros: Storage capacity up to 100 GB, well-rounded performance, 8 MB cache, mature design, nice 3-year warranty.
Cons: Less responsive in applications than its 7200 RPM cousin, slightly louder than other 5400 RPM notebook drives.
Honorable mentions: Seagate Momentus 5400.2 (PATA/SATA), Western Digital Scorpio WD800VE (PATA), Samsung SpinPoint MP0402H (PATA).
Budget: Western Digital Scorpio WD400VE, 5K PATA 40 GB
Western Digital's first jump into the notebook market has yielded a drive with solid performance, quiet operation, and a great 3-year warranty. Best of all, the drive currently delivers the best price in the 40 GB capacity bracket.
Honorable Mention: Samsung SpinPoint MP0402H (PATA) -- nearly identically priced, this drive delivers roughly comparable performance and the same 3 year warranty, but it also runs arguably quieter than the WD Scorpio.
The Emachines M6805 FAQ can be found here.
FAQ for Emachines M6805
