Why 5,400 rpm??

[Junkmalee]

Why do almost all, even high end laptops or ultra books only have 5,400 RPM hardrives and not 7,200 RPM hard drives ..would 7,200 be a faster and better choice for better performance? I just don't get it

 

[manofchalk]

Power savings for a longer batter life.

 

[ryanrich83]

5400 RPM drives are cheaper and require less power to run, thus giving better battery life. 7200 RPM give better performance, but worse battery life, and generate more heat, which is always a bad thing in laptops.

SSDs solve both of those issues though.

 

[Traciatim]

SSDs solve both of those issues though.

Although SSDs don't solve capacity problems in reasonable budgets. Which is where hybrid drives or SSD cache comes in.

So many options.

 

[Junkmalee]

I get all of your points and yess cache drives are a plus..but regardless of battery consumption a least have more 7,200 hard drives in ultra and laptops I know it's not a big difference from 54 to 72 but when your paying $1500 for and i7 mobile with only 2 cores and low frequency compared to desktops and you see a 5,400 hard drive its frustrating

 

[manofchalk]

Yet I am also sure you would be annoyed if you bought a $1500 laptop with a horrible battery life (Surface Pro for example).
Far as I know all but one of the Ivy mobile i7's (dont know about Haswell) are quad cores.

You can always put your own drive in and then use an enclosure to turn the previous HDD into an external.

 

[jaguarskx]

Or if you are configuring it directly from the manufacturer's website, you can configure the laptop you intend to order with a 7200RPM drive.