2015 MBP. 1TB performance over 500GB?

[sneak3]

Quick and dirty question to the wise ones around:

I normally use 200 GB of my storage drive plus OS. Therefore I'm thinking I should not upgrade the ssd to 1 TB and instead go with the processor bump from 2.5 to 2.8.
However some people said even though I won't be using even half of the 500 GB, getting the 1 TB would still bring performance improvements to the macbook.

How true is that? Is there really a difference in speed between 500 GB and 1TB? And in my case, due to low storage use, wouldnt the proc bump make it snappier overall?

 

[ZapNZs]

In my personal opinion, I think the 512 may be the best way to go.

The difference between the 256 GB model and the 1 TB model is small, with the 1 TB having an advantage in write speeds most pronounced with larger files (1500 MB/s vs. 1200 MB/s, which is pretty minimal in terms of real-world performance implications in most cases!!), so the difference between the 512 and 1 TB are presumably even smaller.

If the SSD is going to only be around 50% full, I highly doubt you will see capacity-related performance degradation.

IIRC the 512 vs. 1 TB is like a $400 upgrade, isn't it? For that money, you can purchase a 512 GB SanDisk Extreme Pro MLC SSD, a Thunderbolt 2 dock, and an eSATA enclosure!

http://blog.macsales.com/30971-owc-tests-show-1tb-ssd-in-2015-15-rmbp-outperforms-256gb-model

 

[leman]

How true is that? Is there really a difference in speed between 500 GB and 1TB?

Yes. The reason is that the SSD controller distributes the writes over multiple storage chips, it kind of works like a RAID0 setup. So more storage chips = more speed.

And in my case, due to low storage use, wouldnt the proc bump make it snappier overall?

No. You will only notice the CPU difference in performance-constrained numerical workflows, if at all.

 

[Samuelsan2001]

Quick and dirty question to the wise ones around:

I normally use 200 GB of my storage drive plus OS. Therefore I'm thinking I should not upgrade the ssd to 1 TB and instead go with the processor bump from 2.5 to 2.8.
However some people said even though I won't be using even half of the 500 GB, getting the 1 TB would still bring performance improvements to the macbook.

How true is that? Is there really a difference in speed between 500 GB and 1TB? And in my case, due to low storage use, wouldnt the proc bump make it snappier overall?

I wouldn't bother with either upgrade if I was you unless you see a need for far more storage in the future. The differences between the 512gb and 1TB ssds are minimal speed wise they both max out black magic speed tests at 2gb/s.

Without knowing what you use the computer for its impossible to advise which machine to get with regards to CPU. Hell I'm not even sure if you are talking about the 15 inch or the 13 inch machine without looking up the exact specs. If you are looking at the 15 inch the GPU is the only upgrade you should be looking at.

 

[sneak3]

No. You will only notice the CPU difference in performance-constrained numerical workflows, if at all.

I wouldn't bother with either upgrade if I was you unless you see a need for far more storage in the future. The differences between the 512gb and 1TB ssds are minimal speed wise they both max out black magic speed tests at 2gb/s.

Without knowing what you use the computer for its impossible to advise which machine to get with regards to CPU. Hell I'm not even sure if you are talking about the 15 inch or the 13 inch machine without looking up the exact specs. If you are looking at the 15 inch the GPU is the only upgrade you should be looking at.

I'm going with the 15" without GPU. So it is the i7.
I'll be using it for photoshop painting, so the better the cpu the smoother are the brushes, and big brushes will lag less. Not sure if those 1.2 Ghz extra would be noticeable in that case thoguh. Most benchmarks I've seen the 2.8 scores 8-10% above.

Also the Iris Pro in the 2.8 ghz has a higher max frequency at 1300 mhz instead of 1200 in the 2.5. Since it will never t have dGPU that might make a case for the bump too?

 

[Samuelsan2001]

I'm going with the 15" without GPU. So it is the i7.
I'll be using it for photoshop painting, so the better the cpu the smoother are the brushes, and big brushes will lag less. Not sure if those 1.2 Ghz extra would be noticeable in that case thoguh. Most benchmarks I've seen the 2.8 scores 8-10% above.

Also the Iris Pro in the 2.8 ghz has a higher max frequency at 1300 mhz instead of 1200 in the 2.5. Since it will never t have dGPU that might make a case for the bump too?

Aha so you are looking at the old model then, I must advise you that the CPU's in that machine are haswell so some 3 generations out of date. It won't make too much difference, the touch bar models are on skylake but without the edram in the IRIS pro that the cpu can leverage so the performance should be very similar. It does however mean that the ssds speeds are different between the 512gb and the 1TB ssd however they are all so blisteringly fast you won't notice.

To be honest the processor differences don't mean too much the 15 inch machines all use quad core hyperthreaded i7's, I just want you to be aware of the age of the components in that machine.

(a quick note that i7 means very little in and of itself that can mean anything from a low power dual core 15w right up to a quad core 45w part as found in the 15 inch MBP)

for your stated use any of apples current 15 inch machines should be overkill and run smooth as butter.

hope that helps.

 

[Fishrrman]

Unless you have about $400 to toss away, I'm going to speculate that you wouldn't notice any -perceivable- difference between the 500gb drive vis-a-vis the 1tb drive in day-to-day usage.

But hey… it's your money, right?

 

[sneak3]

Yeah i think I wont go for the 1TB then but still on the fence about the 2.5 vs 2.8

 

[logicstudiouser]

Just keep in mind, if you go with the 512GB and you want to upgrade to the 1tb Apple SSD in the future, it will cost over $1000 to get the part through an Apple Authorized Provider. If you are keeping this mac for the long term and can imagine needing more storage, do the SSD upgrade while you can before purchase.

 

[sneak3]

Just keep in mind, if you go with the 512GB and you want to upgrade to the 1tb Apple SSD in the future, it will cost over $1000 to get the part through an Apple Authorized Provider. If you are keeping this mac for the long term and can imagine needing more storage, do the SSD upgrade while you can before purchase.

Mmm yeah good point. At the same time if I don't need the extra space now, I'm losing in gpu and cpu performance by not upgrading the processor, which will hit me in the future as well

 

[Sanpete]

I don't think most people have any very good reason to have more than 500 GB internal storage. Keep what you're working on internal, keep the rest external.

A 10% increase in speed might be worth it if you're maxing out the processor speed, which can happen with Photoshop.

 

[jerryk]

I don't think most people have any very good reason to have more than 500 GB internal storage. Keep what you're working on internal, keep the rest external.

A 10% increase in speed might be worth it if you're maxing out the processor speed, which can happen with Photoshop.

I agree. I went through the same decision process when I got my 2015 15". I ended up going with the 512 GB and do not regret it.

I have a lot data than would fit in 512 GB, but most of the time I only need as small subset. So I put the reminder on my NAS, where it is a in a redundant RAID array and is cloud backed up automatically.

Usually when I rund df I see close to 40% free.

 

[sneak3]

I agree. I went through the same decision process when I got my 2015 15". I ended up going with the 512 GB and do not regret it.

I have a lot data than would fit in 512 GB, but most of the time I only need as small subset. So I put the reminder on my NAS, where it is a in a redundant RAID array and is cloud backed up automatically.

Usually when I rund df I see close to 40% free.

Which CPU did you go with?

 

[logicstudiouser]

Mmm yeah good point. At the same time if I don't need the extra space now, I'm losing in gpu and cpu performance by not upgrading the processor, which will hit me in the future as well

Maybe then stick with 512gb. The bottom line is that it is upgradable in the future, unlike the CPU.
If you are planning on storing any iTunes media, you could get a microSD card and adapter to run flush with the computer. Adding up to an additional 256gb of storage on the go
Something like this: https://www.amazon.com/Transcend-JetDrive-Storage-Expansion-TS256GJDL360/dp/B00WGARJGU/
This way, you have more free storage on your SSD for your adobe work and any other tasks where that speed can be better utilized.

 

[sneak3]

Yep, SSD upgrade is definitely not worth it in my case and it's out

 

[jerryk]

Which CPU did you go with?

2.5 GHz. I have a dGPU unit. It seems to hadle pretty much everything I throw at it well. Even my Machine Learning 30 minutes runs do not seem to cause and sort of issue, except running the fans hard. Only wish it had a NVIDIA GPU so I could push operations off to that.