When I wrote "getting too loud", I meant getting louder over the years, not when the drive is new.
Consumer-grade drives that spin faster than 5400 rpm have been available since the late 1990s. That suggests to me that there's some reason other than cost why they still make 5400-rpm drives. (Maybe reliability rather than noise.)
From what I've read, the reliability is approximately the same. The real advantage of 5400 rpm drives is in heat and power. These are are valid concerns if you're running a data center but moot points in a desktop computer.
It does give the hybrid drive they're hawking a leg up in the comparison chart if they compare it to a 5400 rpm drive instead of a 7200 rpm...
