Large Platter

5 Jun, 2004 in art pottery by admin

Large Platter

How Large, How Fast? Choosing the Right Hard Drive Size and Rpm

There are two important considerations when looking at hard drive specifications for your computer notebook: hard drive size and hard drive RPM.

Hard Drive Size

Hard drive size simply refers to the data storage capacity of a hard disk drive. Desktop computer hard drives offer sizes of up to 500 gigabytes (GB), while notebook computer hard dives offer sizes of up to 160 GB. Notebook computer hard drives are more expensive than desktop computer hard drives with more than twice the capacity of the notebook hard drive. This is due to the engineering difficulties inherent in making high-capacity hard drives for the smaller notebook computers form-factor.

A notebook computer's hard drive size indicates how much data a notebook computer can store. If you are interested in storing large amounts of movies, pictures, or music, you want to go with a larger hard drive to avoid running out of space.

A hard drive's size has very little to do with its performance, unless the drive is almost full. The Windows NTFS File System requires a minimum of 10% of the hard drive to be free space for optimum performance, and it frequently requests as much as 15%. This means that, on a 40 GB drive, Windows prefers that you use a maximum of 34-36 GB, leaving 4-6 GB of space unused. On a 160 GB drive, Windows prefers that you use a maximum of 136-144 GB, leaving a massive 16-24 GB unused. If you start to go over these Windows storage limits, you may notice your computer's performance taking drastic hits.

Hard Drive RPM

Hard drive RPM is a hard drive's rotational speed, measured in revolutions per minute (RPM). Desktop hard drives now have speeds as high as 15,000 RPM. Notebook hard drives, on the other hand, currently have an RPM ceiling of 7200 RPM.

A hard drive's RPM indicates how fast the drive's spindle will move or how fast the hard drive platters will spin. The higher the spin rate is, the shorter the seek time and latency will be. This translates to quicker data access and transfer.

How Large and How Fast

The greater the free space and the higher the RPM, the better your notebook computer's performance will be, so go for a slightly-more-than-comfortable size and the highest RPM for your notebook computer's hard drive. A large hard drive gives you the option to expand in the future, and you can never go wrong with a notebook computer that can give you fast access to your stored data.

It is even more crucial that you go with the top-of-the-line hard drive size and RPM for your notebook computer if you are fond of computer games, you have a lot of multimedia files, or you want to be able to easily upgrade your programs. These games, content and programs take up a lot of space. A high RPM hard drive can also cut down on game load times, giving you more time enjoying your games and less time staring at loading screens.

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About the Author

I'm baking a cake in a metal 13x9 cake pan. I don't really want to leave it in that..any ideas?

I'm not a baker or a chef and don't really know what to do with it. I was thinking of (trying) to take it out of the pan and put it in a large serving platter and then frosting it.. is that tacky?

Nope, that doesn't sound tacky at all...I've done that many times!

A quick tip in how to make it easier to get the cake out the pan: Spray the pan with Baker's Secret before adding the cake batter. Baker's Secret is an aerosol spray, much like Pam, but it also contains flour, which helps the cake come right out the pan when baked. You can find Baker's Secret right next to the Pam in your grocery store. Also, do you have a 13"x9" cake cooling rack? If so, put that over the cake once it's baked and turn the cake upside down and it will fall nicely onto the rack to cool. If you don't have a cooling rack, no problem. You can invert your cake onto a rectangle serving tray or, as others have mentioned, a piece of foil-covered heavy cardboard. A nice way to dress up the cardboard is to buy a rectangle cake doily to place on the cardboard before you invert the cake onto the board. (To invert = to turn upside down) Cake doilies can usually be found at cake supply stores or even at dollar stores like Dollar Tree. Actually, you may very well be able to find a nice serving platter the size you need there as well.

If you need to cover the cake to transport it, just poke a few toothpicks on each corner and mid-way around the sides and also a couple in the middle of the cake, then wrap cover it carefully with plastic wrap. Voila! Instant cake cover!

Good luck!

Large platter with Tim See pottery