You can put a 120GB HDD in your PS3!

[Dave]

Playstation 3 HDD Replacement Mini-Guide

We here at GR, never content to leave well enough alone, have replaced our puny Playstation 3 HDD with a monster 120 GB HDD. We also wrote this mini-guide on just how to do it for those of you who may be a tad afraid to try it.

You will need:

1 NOTEBOOK 2.5MM HDD SATA ANY SIZE (We recommend staying with the same RPM as the PS3’s original HDD, 5400RPM. You can upgrade to 7200RPM, of course, but we cannot promise that it will not have ill-effects on your machine.)
1 MINI PHILLIPS HEAD SCREWDRIVER
1 MINI FLATHEAD SCREWDRIVER
1 SOLID PLACE TO WORK
...

...
To answer your question before you ask, the only thing that gets erased is game saves. Your network ID info, your console settings, and even the 1.10 update all remain in place when you do this HDD swap. Neat eh?

There you have it folks, easy as pie. Of course, if you choose to perform this modification, GamersReports accepts no responsibility if you break or otherwise harm your console. As always, if you are not sure you can perform the mod without damaging your hardware, do not do it at all.

http://www.gamersreports.com/article/43/

[JTK]

Wow!

Imagine how amazing it would be if you could put one of those uber fast Raptors in there!

[phloyd]

Originally Posted by JTK

Wow!

Imagine how amazing it would be if you could put one of those uber fast Raptors in there!

I would be concerned about the heat if you replace the drive with one that has a higher spin speed. Sounds like this box is pretty warm already.

Still if you are aware of this and have plenty of air flow it should be ok

[dobyblue]

Or a nice Western Digital 160GB Scorpio (2.5" 5400RPM)
http://www.westerndigital.com/en/pro...sp?DriveID=264

[dialog_gvf]

This brings up possible heresy:

The 20GB PS/3 is a better choice?

(1) I'd toss the drive for something much bigger
(2) Gigabit ethernet rocks and I'm not much of a fan of WiFi
(3) Any RFI (like from WiFi) might have some effect on BD playback

So, maybe saving $100 and buying five movies is a better way to go?

It's also nicely contrarion, so you might have a better chance of getting one of the poor siblings.

Gary

[WriteSimply]

If I get one, I'd upgrade to 5" SATA drives. It'll look odd but at least I could have 360GB.


fuad

[dialog_gvf]

Originally Posted by WriteSimply

If I get one, I'd upgrade to 5" SATA drives. It'll look odd but at least I could have 360GB.

Is there a known limit? You can get up to 750GB SATA drives easily nowdays.

Gary

[dobyblue]

The limit, without damaging the console, is a 2.5" drive, which I think are currently at 160GB from Seagate and Western Digital.

[WriteSimply]

Originally Posted by dobyblue

The limit, without damaging the console, is a 2.5" drive, which I think are currently at 160GB from Seagate and Western Digital.

Somebody rigged wires into the PS3 for an installation of a 5" SATA drive. Like I said, messy but it worked. I'm trying to find a link.
EDIT: I meant the 3.5".


Over here at IGN, they reported that WatchImpress experimented with different 2.5" SATAs. The finding is that higher speed does not improve the speed of the games played. The higher cache on the HDD however helped a lot.


fuad

[Dave]

Originally Posted by dialog_gvf

This brings up possible heresy:

The 20GB PS/3 is a better choice?

(1) I'd toss the drive for something much bigger
(2) Gigabit ethernet rocks and I'm not much of a fan of WiFi
(3) Any RFI (like from WiFi) might have some effect on BD playback

So, maybe saving $100 and buying five movies is a better way to go?

It's also nicely contrarion, so you might have a better chance of getting one of the poor siblings.

Gary

LOL true

[Blackraven]

So....is it wise to upgrade to a Seagate Momentus 7200.1 100 GB HDD?

Right now, this is what I can see.

Pros:
-More space (from 20 or 60 GB to 100 GB)
-7200 RPM speed (faster than the 5400 RPM ones) gives you around 5% speed increase (a small increase but it's better than none at all)

Cons:
-Increasing the RPM means higher power consumption & higher risk of heating.
-2.5 inch drives are expensive (as they carry a higher price premium over their 3.5 inch counterparts)
-Also, louder noise due to a faster-spinning drive?
-Performance boost not that high enough over the 60 GB Momentus 5400.2 HDD
-Cache of both drives are @ 8 MB. Spindle speed relatively remains the same.
-Fitting a 3.5 inch may be an option for speed, value and capacity BUT not if you want to put the drive inside the unit. Bulky to carry around if HDD is hanging.

I guess still don't know if this would ever be a good option or not. I could probably wait for the 7200.2 Momentus 160 GB (which has 16 MB cache).

I just hope though that after December this year, the latter builds would have better cooling (than the first-gen ones).

[dobyblue]

The WD 160GB 2.5" also has an 8MB cache with the same speed (5400) as is recommended.

[Blackraven]

Originally Posted by dobyblue

The WD 160GB 2.5" also has an 8MB cache with the same speed (5400) as is recommended.

Hmm... you have point. But unfortunately, I'm not keen on Western Digital (except for their Raptor X 10K RPM drives)

Definitely Seagate for me. Or if they find a way to put Solid State Drives in that thing.

Rumor has it that first-gen out-of-the-lab SSDs (from Samsung) are automatically faster than current HDD tech.

If the connection can be done via Serial ATA interface, then it looks like SSDs will kick @$$ (even if these are expensive at first)

[dobyblue]

I would be most happy with either WD or Seagate. I have a WD 320GB and a WD 200GB in my home PC and have had great performance from both of them. They are EIDE though as I bought my P4 in Dec 2001 (with Rambus RAM$$$$$)
I would love to upgrade to a new motherboard, but then Blu-ray came along and now I have to save up for a new television and still haven't bought my subwoofer yet, which is $2,000. (Paradigm Servo 15 v2)
Seagate's Momentus 5400.3 fits the 5400rpm, 8MB cache and 2.5" SATA as well.
http://www.seagate.com/cda/products/...81,736,00.html
It looks like quite the drive too.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/sto...tus-54003.html

[ProvenFlipper]

I ordered a Toshiba 100gb drive with 16mb. As soon as I get my PS3 that baby is getting popped in.