What's the big difference between these two drives?

4K80

80GN

They're both 4200rpm, 80GB laptop disks that seem very similar. I'm thinking of getting one to replace the flaky Toshiba 80GB drive I'm using in my Mark II now, and was curious to know what kind of a difference between these drives might make any kind of difference.

Well, I did a little searching, and according to ZipZoomFly, the only differences I can find are these:

- The 80GN uses an FDB (Fluid Dynamic Bearing) motor, and so should be quieter than the 4K80.
- The 4K80 has a higher operational shock rating - 250Gs/2ms vs. the 200Gs/2ms of the 80GN.

I personally transport my empeg in a nice solid Pelican 1400. If I were going to upgrade, and these were my choices, I'd go with the 80GN.

If you were going to upgrade, and you weren't limited to those choices, would you go with something else?

The shock rating business is only important to me if it makes any difference to how the drive will hold up with normal use in the dock in the car. I don't know that the quietness of the drive is a huge point for me, but if everything else is comparable I'd go with the quieter, even if a few bucks more. If the difference in operation shock rating is anything more than negligible (and I'm not an expert, so I don't know if it is) than I'd probably go with the 4K80.

If you were going to upgrade, and you weren't limited to those choices, would you go with something else?

No, I'd probably stick with the Travelstars, since that's what the empeg shipped with. That's what I did for my ReplayTV - came with Maxtor; upgraded with Maxtor.

Just after my first post I realized that operational shock isn't really the rating you'd be looking for if you're worried about dropping it, since one would assume it would be powered down if you were carrying it around.

What is wrong with the Toshiba drive? I have two of those 80's in one Mk2a and two of the Hitachi 80's (FDB I think) . The empeg with the Toshibas is used daily, once I replaced with the new longer cables I have had no problems. I have also not noticed much difference between the Toshibas and Hitachi drives.

Actually, you know what? I must have gotten confused and mixed it up with another drive in my head.

The drive I'm having problems with IS a travelstar. The Toshiba drive must be in one of the back-up players I'm not using.

Anyhoo..the problems I'm having has to do with the drive pretending it's not there a lot of the time. It used to be infrequent, and at the time I thought it had to do with the temperature (during winter) in my car. It seems to be happening much more frequently now, and it obviously isn't because the temperature has warmed up to about room temp. I get the "no hard disk" error, and it will take several tries restarting the player to work.

I've checked the cable, and it seems to be snug on both ends. The drive doesn't user a jumper being the only drive in the player, so it's not that a jumper is loose. I just wonder if the drive is maybe just not good.

Maybe I'll beat on it some more and see if it stops giving me lip.

Nearly always this problem is due to the mainboard IDE header coming loose from it's solder pads.

... or an intermittent power failure due to improper cable crimping....

... or incipient CS4231A failure (rare)...

Most times I have seen drive failure, the drive simply fails to start spinning ("Click of Death") or the disk spins up and the heads fail to pull in ("Spinning Silence"). For a drive to become "intermittent" is unlikely - it either works, or it doesn't.

I think he should (as you say) dismantle, look at the headers on the board, and carefully check the crimping on the drive cable.