Poll & Opinion: Go Fusion or Non-Fusion

How noticeable is the speed using the fusion? I order a 1TB fusion but im thinking im not really in need of it.

I have never used an SSD so I cant compare with HDD. My current computer is about 3 years old and its a slug.

I use photoshop a lot and I am looking forward to trying some different video editing programs. This was the main reason I went fusion. But mixed reviews on here.

Someone please justify the extra dosh I spent on fusion.... Is it worth the extra?

jmgregory1 said:

...Apple is giving the majority of users 1.1tb of storage space that, for the most part, runs at the speed of an ssd...

Click to expand...

Correction: it runs at the speed of SSD for 0.1TB out of 1.1TB, which is just under 10% - NOT "for the most part".

WizardHunt said:

So you got it to work as a true Fusion Drive on your 2008 iMac? Great. That means I could do that as well down the road. What size SSD did you use? Did you notice any slow down since you don't have a thunderbolt port on your 2008 iMac? Also did you set it up like the Fusion Drive on the 2012 iMacs, being that they boot from the SSD drive and all apps goes to the SSD first etc...

Lastly was it hard to do? What problems did you run into when doing this?

Click to expand...

I fused a 240GB OCZ Agility 3 internal SSD with a 2TB FW800 external HDD. I followed a tutorial put out by Macworld, who cited a blogger named jollyjinx:

http://www.macworld.com/article/2014011/how-to-make-your-own-fusion-drive.html

And actually, it is faster than my old arrangement of OS/apps on the internal SSD and Users folders on external HDD.

I had no problems at all during the creating and subsequent cloning, with the exception of losing my recovery partition. That may be one of the results of "rolling your own" so to speak, as I created the FD with Terminal commands, while a Mac with native FD can do this from Disk Utility. No matter, as I have a cloned SSD, a TM backup and a USB ML install key.

What I did do was to create the FD, load a fresh install of ML and then booted to make sure the FD worked. I then I cloned over my old boot drive with CCC, and then cloned over my User folder after that. As I've launched various apps, I have been able to see how the OS has migrated things from the SSD to the HDD and vice versa. Even though the FD shows up as 1 disk in the Finder, it shows up as 2 disks in iStat Menus so you can watch each disk's activity.

I've had no problems yet and it has been over a week.

whitel4 said:

How noticeable is the speed using the fusion? I order a 1TB fusion but im thinking im not really in need of it.

I have never used an SSD so I cant compare with HDD. My current computer is about 3 years old and its a slug.

I use photoshop a lot and I am looking forward to trying some different video editing programs. This was the main reason I went fusion. But mixed reviews on here.

Someone please justify the extra dosh I spent on fusion.... Is it worth the extra?

Click to expand...

Yes, it's worth the extra cost. In regular day to day operation, the Fusion drive is about 4-10X faster than a 72000 RPM hard drive. Read speeds from the fusion top out at over 330 MB/s, whereas the read speeds from a legacy hard drive top out at barely 80 MB/s.

What's it mean in real usage? It means your computer boots in about 15 seconds vs. a minute. Large apps like Aperture, Photoshop, Lightroom, start up almost instantly vs. waiting anywhere from 20-30 seconds for start up to happen. All in all the machine is quicker.

To put it to you another way. An SSD will have more of a direct tangible benefit you will feel in using the computer than any other single upgrade that you can do (faster cpu, more ram, etc).

As to the "longterm" reliability of the technology, the SSD used in the Fusion drive is the very proven Samsung 830. As to "could it break", well sure it could, just like a regular hard drive. That's why you use Time Machine and have Apple Care.

I've had my new 27 BTO with the 3TB fusion drive for a month now and I'm glad I did. The intelligent way it organises you're most frequently used apps and files takes a couple of weeks to show up, but when it it sorts things out, the speed difference is very evident. My previous 27 was also a maxed out BTO with a 1TB HDD, and it was fast, but the new one really is way faster. I'd recommend the fusion system to all with one warning. If you plan join boot camping the 3TB is a no go at present. Not an issue for me as I don't use windows.

vladfein said:

Correction: it runs at the speed of SSD for 0.1TB out of 1.1TB, which is just under 10% - NOT "for the most part".

Click to expand...

You can't actually look at it that way. Do you use 100% of the files on your drive regularly? Of course not. If you are like most users the overwhelming majority of your files (especially media files) sit there unused for months or even years. The files that you actually use all the time (OS and application files for example) get migrated to the SSD and end up staying there, and you see the speed benefit, all the time.

There are two scenarios where the Fusion drive starts to under-perform a pure SSD.

1. User has over 100GB of frequently used applications.
2. User is regularly working with very large files in excess of 50GB.

In those cases the user is best served by a pure SSD solution.

vladfein said:

Correction: it runs at the speed of SSD for 0.1TB out of 1.1TB, which is just under 10% - NOT "for the most part".

Click to expand...

Not entirely true. While the SSD makes up 10% of the total array in capacity, the applications, packages, files and caches down to the BLOCK level that you use most often are migrated onto the SSD, and the rest is kept on the HDD. Plus, it keeps a 4GB "buffer" on the SSD, so when installing apps or transferring files, you get SSD speed. Then in the background it migrates them to the HDD.

In a typical self-managed arrangement, most users will put their OS, Applications and Library on their SSD and all their files, databases, etc. on the HDD. This makes no sense if you only use 10% of your applications regularly. You are sucking up all that SSD space for things you don't even use. So a FD will keep the things you use a lot on the SSD, and move the things you don't to the HDD, again at the block level. If you DO decide to launch something you haven't run in a while, you are right, it launches at HDD speed - the first time. With subsequent launches it speeds up as it gets moved to the SSD.

Another example - you have a 400GB Aperture library. You have the option to 1.) Run it "managed" and keep it on the HDD, 2.) run it "managed" and keep it all on your SSD (if you have one that is big enough), 3.) run it as "referenced" and keep the Library on your SSD but masters on your HDD and continually move projects back and forth to keep as much on the SSD for speed but the rest on the HDD for space, or 4.) stick it all on a FD and let the OS move what you use the most automatically. #4 sounds like the solution for me. (this is what ultimately got me to consider making my own FD to begin with).

----------

jmpage2 said:

Yes, it's worth the extra cost. In regular day to day operation, the Fusion drive is about 4-10X faster than a 72000 RPM hard drive.

Click to expand...

That's a freakin' fast HDD! You may want to fix the typo so a grammar Nazi doesn't call you on it...

Fusion drive rules!

vladfein said:

Correction: it runs at the speed of SSD for 0.1TB out of 1.1TB, which is just under 10% - NOT "for the most part".

Click to expand...

What? For often accessed data, it's running off the ssd at ssd speeds. Yes, if you only access data once from a vast collection that has been stored on the hdd, it will run at hdd speed. But that is NOT an example of what a vast majority of people will do.

Do you have a Fusion Drive, by chance? I'm curious to hear your personal use case...

I went for fusion drive (1TB) for my new 27" iMac as i feel that’s what makes the 2012 iMac "special" as compared to the older models. I have read quite a few reviews on the new fusion drive and i kinda liked what i read so thought i gave it a try.

Val K said:

I don't think that fusiondrive is for dummies and plain hdd for prosumer.

Do I need FD? Yes, because i know enough about computers to understand what FD is.

Click to expand...

Er, I didn't mention prosumers. You're confused. I mentioned Techie types who like to play around with their computers. I'd hardly call somebody using Photoshop a special needs user (unless they are working with humongous files). Fusion Drive should work a treat for you.

Your final quote simply makes no sense. The whole point of Fusion is that it does everything for you and not have to know what's going on.

Just look at most of the Non Fusion responses on this thread alone. They are all either special needs users, Techie types or are worried because it's new.

smoking monkey said:

Fusion = For people who just want a computer and will never do anything out of the ordinary with it. This is definitely the majority.

Non Fusion = Techie/geeky types or special needs users who like to open their imac and install their own SSD or do other things like multiple partitions and dual boot systems etc. They are definitely the minority.


Neither group is wrong. But I think when people argue one way or the other they need to be really clear about what type of user they are otherwise it can come across as really bad advice.

Personally I think if you need to ask -- "Do I need Fusion?" -- it means yes, you probably do, because it basically means you don't know enough about computers to do the other options properly.

I need it. It's great. But I'm certainly an average user.

Click to expand...

Fusion = tech and non tech people who want a more automated life so they can concentrate on things of more joy and priority. I used to manage two hard drives (OS and Storage) for 5 years. Jumped at Fusion and it was daunting at first to keep all my things inside of the OS instead of referencing them to my storage drive but after one day of usage I find it much more freeing of the mind. I don't see any cons in doing this. Any hard drive can fail fused or not.

Edit: If I want to do a fresh install of the OS it is only too easy to drag my itunes library (1 folder), movies folder (1 again), pictures (1), documents (1) from a time machine backup straight through USB3, TB or GBit Ethernet to my freshly created OS. 5-10 minutes of copying vs daily management of 2-10 minutes sorting

smoking monkey said:

Er, I didn't mention prosumers. You're confused. I mentioned Techie types who like to play around with their computers. I'd hardly call somebody using Photoshop a special needs user (unless they are working with humongous files). Fusion Drive should work a treat for you.

Your final quote simply makes no sense. The whole point of Fusion is that it does everything for you and not have to know what's going on.

Just look at most of the Non Fusion responses on this thread alone. They are all either special needs users, Techie types or are worried because it's new.

Click to expand...

If you like to play around with your computer and you buy an iMac, then you're not "techie": you're someone who made a silly 2,5K$ mistake due to a huge amount of confusion .
My final quote makes a lot of sense: i know what FD is, i know that i will not be worried about it and so i need it. It's plain and simple, this is the reason why a lot of people buy apple products: it just works, so you can focus on other things.
We can talk about its high price or that a 128gb ssd could be not enough for some special needs user, but your categorization about FD users and non-users is a little bit out of place. Maybe we are talking about a CONFusion Drive!
Oh, anyway, a prosumer is not a photoshop amateur.

vladfein said:

Correction: it runs at the speed of SSD for 0.1TB out of 1.1TB, which is just under 10% - NOT "for the most part".

Click to expand...

That is oversimplified, as the most used programmes/apps/files are automagically moved to the SSD part, so it may only represent 10% of the storage, but it will have a considerably larger impact on your daily usage. And this is why I went with the 1TB Fusion (because the 3TB doesn't Boot Camp yet).

WizardHunt said:

Plain and Simple Fusion will make your computer faster. At least until it's filled up!

Click to expand...

Correction... until it's filled up with application and OS files that you need frequent access to.

I think most people completely misunderstand how much of their "files" are actually used on a regular basis.

The most likely thing to happen is that if you have monstrous catalogs for things like Lightroom, those will eventually be migrated to the HD... so Lightroom will launch almost instantly (still on the SSD) but the catalog could take an extra few seconds to load up from the mechanical HD.

Even if you put, say, 500GB of video clips on the HD, you aren't going to notice it "slowing down" since you don't access them regularly.

Frankly, internal storage is never enough if you've got a lot of stuff. There's a Synology DS1511+ with 10 drive bays sitting in my basement. It is packing 12TB of storage currently. That's where all of my "media" files go, so I don't need a huge hard drive in the Mac, just big enough for ripping and video editing work.

If you're worried about running out of space you need to go external storage at some point.

The drive will change it's storage profile as time goes on, but having the OS boot up in 10 seconds is worth the upgrade to me.

If there are any worries, order AppleCare with your iMac and feel confident for the next few years in your decision...

WizardHunt said:

83% for Fusion

17% for Non-Fusion

Almost what I expected but really thought it would be a more 30/70 ratio.

Oh well Keep Voting and we will see at the end.

Click to expand...

I doubt there's a single Fusion owner that regrets their decision to pay for it.

Non Fusion...

I wanted more flexibility in my disk partitions and BootCamp setup so I ordered a GoFlex Thunderbolt adapter and an 240GB SSD to get the boot performance I wanted.

I'm happy enough to shift my own files around that I don't use much.

dearlaserworks said:

I doubt there's a single Fusion owner that regrets their decision to pay for it.

Click to expand...

I personally think that the performance advantage of Fusion is too great to pass up... if you are getting a version with a HDD installed.

I ordered the 768GB SSD version... so I didn't vote. If I was not willing to get the SSD... then I would have ordered the Fusion drive.

/Jim

WizardHunt said:

If I could have afforded it, I would have got the 768 SSD version as well. But the 128GB is not big enough. So I opted for the HD 3 TB version and will add a external SSD either a 240GB or 480 GB to give me some growing room.

Click to expand...

Personally... even if I was getting an external TB SSD... I would have still spent the extra on the FD... unless I was 100% sure that I was only going to use the internal drive for non-performance data such as my iTunes library (music and video). Of course, that would have also assumed that I could afford it.

If you look at hybrid drives from the HDD manufactures... they offer reasonable performance increases even with 6GB and 16GB SSDs. I do not think they are great... but still better than a HDD.

/Jim