Personal SSD Experience I AM A SOLD SKEPTIC
I have a lengthy self taught background in PC but fairly new to MAC. I noticed my MBP has slowed a deal since I first bought it over a year ago. I started looking at the new machines with the i7 processors. Not to fix this but because the new processors came out and thought an overall faster machine would be cool. I'm a techno junky. I always like the shiny new stuff.
Let me step back a moment. In my job I wear several hats. I work in a small office for a large company. Up until recently our office had no tech support from IT. So over the years I have had to learn to keep the hardware, software, network wiring, server and switches running. I've built and repaired PCs. My job is actually more of general manager, accountant, bookkeeper, web designer, etc.
So with my multiple jobs I generally have a lot going on with my machine. For years I struggled with PCs, keeping them running. I finally switched to a Mac and I am SOOOO happy. I actually experienced my first near crash with the Mac last week. I had parallels running with several programs running in XP Pro, 2 term server sessions from within OSX and several other programs running in OSX. The system almost stopped responding. There was more going on at once than I've ever had and the laptop had not been restarted in days. Getting it shut down without just hitting the power button took some time. So I started looking into more powerful machines after this.
After some reading and research I went for a 120GB OWC Mercury Extreme Pro with the external case for another $10. I put the SSD in the external case. Cloned my drive per instructions from youtube to the external SSD. Rebooted and held the alt key and booted from the external drive. Ran flawlesly so again used a you tube video to swap the OEM drive for the SSD drive. The kit I bought from OWC included all the tools needed. The whole process was so simple and easy I could not get over it!
I did some testing when the SSD was in the external USB case. Even in the USB case the drive was faster than the OEM 7200RPM drive. Once I got it in the laptop I was absolutely astounded at how quickly programs opened and how snappy the OS was.
About filling up the drive. I have about 114GB after format. After cloning I had about 10GB free and the drive is performing as stated above. I have nothing to complain about. I will probably move some stuff off to a server so I have a little breathing room.
Something else to keep in mind. I am not a tech, I am not trained. I learn by trial and error and doing. So my cloned drive was probably crapped up with mistakes I've made and software I've tinkered with or trialed. Even to spite myself the SSD drive smokes the OEM 7200rpm drive.
This was the most painless process for the amount of gain I've ever experienced. I plan to add one of these to my wifes laptop at some point and unless something bad happens or money prohibits I won't ever use a standard drive again.
I can't speak of the intel drives. After my experience here I probably won't bother trying an Intel drive. OWC was great to deal with. They were very professional and I am assured of Mac compatibility.
Oh I did not mention noise and heat. When I had the laptop apart there was a good deal of dust so I removed the fans for cleaning and also cleaned the metal heat sinks which are covered by the fans. My office is very quiet. So quiet I could hear the drive and fans running. I barely hear the fans, the drive not at all and the entire laptop is incredibly quiet.
I HIGHLY recommend that anyone looking to upgrade their laptop or purchase new consider the OWC SSD drives. If I needed lots of cheap space then I might consider another brand but I would be concerned about performance and ease of installation.