For some time, I have wanted to replace my original notebook hard drive. Although my system is fairly well-equipped (1.5 GHz Pentium-M processor with 1 GB of RAM), I was growing frustrated with my system’s performance. It was taking me around 10 minutes to boot into Windows XP, and certain disk intensive programs were too slow for my taste. I decided (through observation and measurement) that the bottlenecks in my system were not due to the processor and memory and therefore must be due to the slow (4k RPM) hard drive. I had previously planned on at least reformatting the drive, but I wanted to get a faster drive at some point.

So, when my laptop drive started to fail, I took the opportunity to immediately find the biggest and fastest 2.5" notebook drive I could to replace it. I settled on a well-rated 7200 RPM, 60GB drive. After I installed it and started to load software, I immediately started to see a difference versus the old drive- but not what I expected. I forgot that my notebook is a system.

One of the words that we use to describe computers is 'systems'. I use that word at times without thinking about what it means. One definition is: "A group of interacting, interrelated, or interdependent elements forming a complex whole." When I added a hard drive that spun at almost twice the speed of the previous drive, I did not consider what the consequences to the system would be.

In the case of my notebook, I observed the following effects:
• The notebook operation is louder due to the increased spin speed of the disk
• The notebook temperature is noticeably hotter. The case is consistently hot around the hard drive bay and the processor. In addition, the very loud fan on the machine is constantly on.
• My battery life decreased dramatically due to the fan being on constantly and the hard drive spinning faster.
• It now takes only 7 minutes to boot completely into Windows XP.

I am still not sure that the drive is any faster that the last, though. Re-installing the OS and loading all of the software added variables that can't be discounted.

My system is still in good shape overall, though. I am lucky that my system had a built-in buffer to handle the change I made. Although my fan runs more now than before in order to offset increased heat, my system still functions well. The equilibrium point of the system has changed; instead of my fan running 10% of the time, it runs 70% , but the overall performance of the system has not been dramatically affected.

Because a system is an inter-related grouping of elements, changes to any one part of the system will cause changes- some positive, some negative. Well-designed systems have 'buffers' in key areas that prevent minor changes from negatively affecting the overall system. Poorly designed systems do not handle changes and cause the system to be negatively impacted. This is as true of computer systems as it is of other types of systems.