13" MBP 2010 vs 2011...they seem to be same speed?

[dmk1974]

Yesterday, while figuring out which laptop to sell, I was comparing my wife's 2010 MBP 13" 2.4 GHz C2D to my 2011 MBP 13" 2.3 GHz i5. They both also were upgraded with SSD drives.

Side by side, I swear they are just about the same speed (boot up, launching apps like all from iLife, MS Office, Safari, Chrome, Mail, etc). From what I had read benchmark-wise, I would have expected my 2011 to blow her 2010 away. But is it fair to conclude that the SSD drive has more to do with general speed of the computer than the processor? I didn't tax them with rendering or other processor intensive programs yet I guess ...maybe that's where I'd notice a difference?

 

[directeuphorium]

THe bottleneck in speed has been the hard drive for the last couple of years. the computer can only access information as quickly as the harddrive can spit it out.

SSD are starting to get cheaper now. But most users still have 5400RPM, or 7200RPM drives.

You shouldn't notice much of a speed difference between the two laptops with SSD drives. Though the i5 should run cooler and be able to handle more demanding multi-tasking.

Also, If you renender video you'll notice a difference in the time it takes to complete the task.

As for which one to sell. the older one...take that SSD out of it and put the old HD in it first though. Most people buying won't care or know the difference. They'll just see macbook pro 13.

 

[dmk1974]

THe bottleneck in speed has been the hard drive for the last couple of years. the computer can only access information as quickly as the harddrive can spit it out.

SSD are starting to get cheaper now. But most users still have 5400RPM, or 7200RPM drives.

You shouldn't notice much of a speed difference between the two laptops with SSD drives. Though the i5 should run cooler and be able to handle more demanding multi-tasking.

Also, If you renender video you'll notice a difference in the time it takes to complete the task.

Thanks for the feedback. Yeah, I was figuring that it's the SSD that make these things fly. We had just bought a 2010 13" MBA 1.86 C2D which I would have thought would have been a lot slower than both of the MBP's, but in reality, I don't notice much difference with that one either even though it only has 2GB RAM and slowest processor of the three. I'm sure though with the MBA that if a lot of apps are open, the RAM will then become the limiting factor on that one.

 

[snaky69]

I didn't tax them with rendering or other processor intensive programs yet I guess ...maybe that's where I'd notice a difference?

I though it would've been obvious, but yes, exactly.

The bottleneck for general snappiness and feel of a computer these days is the hard drive, which holds the rest back. Which explains why both computers with a similar SSD would perform nearly the same on the day to day, tooling-around-the-internet days.

For hardcore number crunching: CAD, rendering, ripping, converting, large calculations in engineering/scientific programs, once the data is loaded into RAM, the newer processor will whoop the crap out of the older C2D.

 

[colticus]

Try doing the comparison with a CPU intensive task. Such as; rendering HD video.
Then you will notice a major difference between the two. My 2011 13" can render a file in half the time that my 2010 13" requires.

 

[OSMac]

Try doing the comparison with a CPU intensive task. Such as; rendering HD video.
Then you will notice a major difference between the two. My 2011 13" can render a file in half the time that my 2010 13" requires.

How does the fan noise compare, just web surfing, and when rendering or working on videos?