Picking up a new internal HD for gaming

What's the best RPM for a hard drive these days?

As far as I know, although my tech knowledge is a bit out of date, the highest RPM hard drives are the 10,000 RPM VelociRaptors by Western Digital. Standard desktop drives run at 7,200 RPM, and standard laptop drives are 5,400 RPM. You can buy 7,200 RPM drives in a laptop formfactor but they use more power and generate more heat.

If you want pure speed, your best bet is to go for a high quality SSD (solid state drive). Those are orders of magnitude faster than any physical drive, but they are more expensive and not as big. In a "deluxe" system you would typically use one or more SSDs (or WD Raptors) for your boot drive and high capacity 7,200 RPM drives as mass storage.

edited 11th Apr '12 12:07:08 PM by Fighteer

Those 10000 RPM Velociraptors are probably the best and most stable HD Ds you'll get. At least until reliable SS Ds come out at a lower price than now.

Velociraptors are still stupidly overpriced for a dying technology. Best bet is just to get a decent, well-reviewed SATA-III drive in 7200rpm format, and wait till the SSD drives aren't overpriced in one of the most criminal acts of gouging in the last thirty years of computing.

I have also heard of the speed of SSD. As far as ones that spin, I'm not sure, since I don't quite know what my rig uses.

If you don't know, and you didn't purchase an over-the-top deluxe model, then your desktop PC uses 7,200 RPM drives and your laptop uses 5,400 RPM drives. It's that simple. Any variation from those is going to be a boutique or custom system.