MBP - faster harddrive or processor?

Question

Will a Macbook Pro 15 with a 7200rpm drive, but onlg a 2.0 Ghz prcessor,
outperform a newer MBP with a 2.33Ghz processor, but only a 5400rpm hard drive? They dont have the 7200rpm option anymore.

I want to use it for Audio apps, virtual instruments, w MIDI in control,
and multi track recording.. and graphics stuff too but for just for fun.

Answer 1

For the apps your are going to use the macbook pro for I would go for the upgraded processor. If you have enough ram, the computer is not going to need the harddrive very often to use it for virtual memory. The 7200 rpm will likely result in a small decrease to your battery life and unless you want the best possible to get boot up times and file transfer times and times with harddrive intensive applications, your not likely going to need the 7200 rpm. For the apps your using specifically music and such, from my experience the longer wait times are going to be on the encoding and mix down of the music tracks which relies heavily on the processor. This is the same for graphics stuff which also relies on memory heavily as well if your planning on using Photoshop that is and depending what you do. Another thing I'd like to point out is if you are computer savy and are good at following directions there are many sites that you will find through google.com that show you how to upgrade the harddrive if you want to later on. This actually is cheaper than buying the harddrive upgrade apple sells; to buy a seperate harddrive from a retailer such as www.newegg.com (I highly recommend this company) and installing it yourself. This is the same deal for the memory as well. However the processor I believe is socketed which means you can take it out, but this is an even more difficult task to do and certainly is not without risk of damaging your macbook pro if something goes wrong. So basically I'd say to go with the faster processor and the slower harddrive in your situation. If money is not an option though, I'd get the fastest processor you can get and highest amount of memory and then install a faster harddrive later.

Answer 2

I would stick with the 5400 rpm HD and faster processor. In doing that you will have 2 advantages:

1) Battery charge will last longer
2) Faster processor

And I would put the money you save towards more memory (2GB total)

Answer 3

Hi. Most programs actually operate in RAM. If this is adequate then the Mac will not have any significant difference between disk rotation speed.