Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

2016 Macbook Pro Looks like it has soldered on SSD's (13" non-touchbar isn't soldered)

How Big of an Issue is a Solder on Solid State Drive to you?

  • It's so big that I'm not ordering, Canceling my Order, or Returning my order once its arrived.

    Votes: 14 31.1%

  • I don't mind re-buying a new Logic board/SSD Upgrade/Ram upgrade when one of these parts fail.

    Votes: 5 11.1%

  • It doesn't bother me now, but I might regret loosing the ability to upgrade/fix parts in the future.

    Votes: 23 51.1%

  • I'm Buying the 13" Non-Touchbar model since the SSD is not Soldered & it can be Changed/Upgraded

    Votes: 3 6.7%
  • Total voters
    45
B

buster84

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Oct 7, 2013
428
156
if anyone has the new MacBook pros and doesn't mind opening it up, can you report back if the ram or ssd's are soldered on?

I remember this topic being asked a lot over the summer, I'm just curious what direction Apple took in regards to soldering in the stuff that used to be user replaceable.

Edit: 10/31/2016 (The 13" Non-Touchbar model do not have soldered on SSD's)

I'm glad that im not buying a new macbook pro. Solder on ram was already a problem, but soldered SSD's is the biggest *&^% you that apple could have done to its customers.

If your SSD goes bad, you must buy a new logic board, new ram, and new SSD.
If your ram goes bad, you must buy a new logic board, and new SSD, and new ram.
If your logic board goes bad, you must buy a new logic board, new ssd, and new ram.
If your out of warranty, your SOL because it could cost just as much to repair it as it would be to replace it.

Then the other Big Unknown is whether or not apple will allow you to trade in your broken logic board with an upgraded SSD/Ram and get credit for that SSD/Ram allowing you to re-buy the same size SSD/Ram if something goes wrong with 1 of the 3 possible parts that would cripple your computer. Knowing apple they will straight up tell you to re-buy the SSD/RAM upgrade because the SSD/RAM thats on your broken logic board is useless unless its professionally removed and manually installed on other logic boards.

My guess as to why this is happening is because of the m.2 drives that are out. They are becoming really fast (3500mbps now, EVO 960) and users have found a way to stick them in 2015 models and below and Tim cook decided to stop this from happening. Blocks all 3rd party sales, and blocks adapter usage. This also gives apple a monopoly to be able to overcharge users for SSD space. Apple SSD prices are extremely high compared to the regular ssd market.

Not only did apple screw up by increasing the prices, but a solder on SSD will be the last straw for alot of people and i truly wouldn't be surprised to see a good amount of new orders get returned solely because of this issue. They are literally turning the macbook pro into an iphone with no user adjust ability options. They really should re-name the computer because a non-up-gradable computer is not a PRO computer but instead an IPAD with a keyboard.

img_4266-jpg.669361
 
Last edited:
The Mercurian said:
Its the second story on the front page:
https://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/28/new-macbook-pro-removable-ssd/

SSD removable RAM not.

Of course - just because the SSD is removable - doesn't mean you can do it withint the warranty. Not sure what the story is there
Click to expand...

Ahh thanks for the update. I wasn't sure what computers made it out to the stores or not yet. At least the ssd isn't soldered, those things break more than ram and having to replace a logic board over an SSD failure is a huge waste of $$ plus it being able to upgrade space sucks just as bad.
 
  • Like
Reactions: The Mercurian
NON touch MBP is confirmed to not have soldered ssd. Look forward to upgrade drives from OWC and possibly other vendors.
 
blackberrycubed said:
NON touch MBP is confirmed to not have soldered ssd. Look forward to upgrade drives from OWC and possibly other vendors.
Click to expand...

Maybe an option, maybe not. The current OWC drives are a shadow of the performance of the 2015 OEM drive (0.5 GB/sec vs. 1.5 GB/sec). The only real way to "upgrade" and maintain full performance is to get an SSD module someone pulled from a computer, or was ordered by an authorized repair shop.
 
jerryk said:
Maybe an option, maybe not. The current OWC drives are a shadow of the performance of the 2015 OEM drive (0.5 GB/sec vs. 1.5 GB/sec). The only real way to "upgrade" and maintain full performance is to get an SSD module someone pulled from a computer, or was ordered by an authorized repair shop.
Click to expand...

The earlier 2012-2015 models can use apple to m.2 adapters, I wonder if the 2016 has the room to fit such an adapter and use the new evo 960 or evo 960 pro which match oem apple ssd speeds.
 
buster84 said:
The earlier 2012-2015 models can use apple to m.2 adapters, I wonder if the 2016 has the room to fit such an adapter and use the new evo 960 or evo 960 pro which match oem apple ssd speeds.
Click to expand...

As I understand it the speed slowdown is not the SSD module. It is the adapter. Going from 3.0 GB/sec to 0.5 GB/sec would be even harder to take.

And then there is the $700 for the 1TB module.
 
buster84 said:
Added a poll, this news is truly sad and im at the point where i don't even recognize the Apple that Steve Jobs created. Right now i feel like Tim Cook is turning it into a money hungry/greedy over reaching monopoly.
Click to expand...

Why do you say that? The original Macintosh had torx screws holding it together, no user-serviceable parts inside it (and a big label warning you to keep out).

Steve Jobs would probably love the closed box nature of modern laptops
 
buster84 said:
Added a poll, this news is truly sad and im at the point where i don't even recognize the Apple that Steve Jobs created. Right now i feel like Tim Cook is turning it into a money hungry/greedy over reaching monopoly.
Click to expand...
Steve loved to have people not mess with the inside of things. Why do you think MacBooks started each year since 2009 to loose more serviceparts and move onto 1-in-all design for logic board?

Remember...

First out went the user replaceable battery (2009)
Second out was the user serviceable RAM & other chips (2012)
Third out is the SSD (2016)

See the pattern?
 
buster84 said:
Added a poll, this news is truly sad and im at the point where i don't even recognize the Apple that Steve Jobs created. Right now i feel like Tim Cook is turning it into a money hungry/greedy over reaching monopoly.
Click to expand...
The first Macintosh was designed so you needed a special "mac cracker" tool to open it up. Steve was a big advocate in keeping the consumer out of the computer.

I agree that Apple under Cook is much different then when Jobs ran the show, but sealing up computers and making it hard to upgrade was in Jobs wheelhouse long before Cook was part of Apple.
 
  • Like
Reactions: jerryk and The Mercurian
maflynn said:
The first Macintosh was designed so you needed a special "mac cracker" tool to open it up. Steve was a big advocate in keeping the consumer out of the computer.

I agree that Apple under Cook is much different then when Jobs ran the show, but sealing up computers and making it hard to upgrade was in Jobs wheelhouse long before Cook was part of Apple.
Click to expand...

So true. When my 2009 Mac Mini died (logic board failed) after a few months the guys at the Apple Store inspected it for a few minutes looking for pry marks. They said if you opened it up the warranty was void.

And the original Mac was a sealed unit and you could only reach the reset button on the motherboard by having an official "programmer button" installed. It was chuck of plastic that let you push the reset button on the motherboard from the outside. $50 on a $2495 computer in 1984 dollars. Probably around $12,000 now.
 
jav6454 said:
Steve loved to have people not mess with the inside of things. Why do you think MacBooks started each year since 2009 to loose more serviceparts and move onto 1-in-all design for logic board?

Remember...

First out went the user replaceable battery (2009)
Second out was the user serviceable RAM & other chips (2012)
Third out is the SSD (2016)

See the pattern?
Click to expand...

What could possibly be the reason behind this? (1). To get customers to upgrade more often. (2). To get customers to order the maxed out versions of the MBP rather than the base model.
 
Last edited:
To be fair, technology moves slow and IO is hella fast for external storage. As long as you're getting 16GB of RAM, you'll be fine in the long run. There's an Apple tax involved, but to the average consumer who will never open their laptop, things have never been better.
[doublepost=1478197863][/doublepost]
baypharm said:
What could possibly the reason behind this? (1). To get customers to upgrade more often. (2). To get customers to order the maxed out versions of the MBP rather than the base model.
Click to expand...
No. No. The real answer is to improve the efficiency of Applecare and the Genius bar. Apple offers trade-in credit when a repair requires complete logic board replacement. It's not as expensive to replace your logic board anymore. This is basically the iDevice model of Applecare repair. There's something about that method that Apple finds lucrative, either in terms of customer experience and/or cost-benefit. We don't know why they want to shift Applecare in that direction, but that's what they are doing.
 
baypharm said:
What could possibly be the reason behind this? (1). To get customers to upgrade more often. (2). To get customers to order the maxed out versions of the MBP rather than the base model.
Click to expand...

Part of it will be to drive profits.

Part of it is that if you allow customers to replace components then you are relying on idiots to upgrade parts without damaging other stuff

You would have loads of people coming back saying "my X doesn't work after I stuck incompatible RAM in" etc

How much complaining and whinging would you hear when apple say "your warrenty is void because you didn't reassemble your laptop after replacing your hd and cracked this connector". You either allow people to upgrade and basically tell them they are on their own warrenty wise or you discourage it.

You can't make the smallest devices if you allow customers to remove and replace things like the battery, ram, processor and hd. You also are limited in what you can put in there.
 
Last edited:
With the non-touch bar version having a removable drive, I would think the 13" and 15" touch bar versions will have a similar design just to maintain consistency across the supply chains. It also adds a level of serviceability to the "Pro" line that customers might prefer/expect. Having the logic board die on a MacBook means you are rebuilding the system from scratch or from a back up. Having an Apple tech simply swap your SSD to a new board is a far better level of service and limits a persons down time. Just a thought...
 
speedbumpnv said:
With the non-touch bar version having a removable drive, I would think the 13" and 15" touch bar versions will have a similar design just to maintain consistency across the supply chains. It also adds a level of serviceability to the "Pro" line that customers might prefer/expect. Having the logic board die on a MacBook means you are rebuilding the system from scratch or from a back up. Having an Apple tech simply swap your SSD to a new board is a far better level of service and limits a persons down time. Just a thought...
Click to expand...

This! I totally forgot that if you loose your board and you failed to use time machine you are pretty much screwed. Outside of manually removing the drive by de-soldering and re-soldering to a new board there is no way to get the data off the drive when you have a broken logic board. I guess anyone with these laptops better have daily time machine backups!
 
Just a correction : you can't just take any new m.2 drive and stick it in an older MBP. You first have to check if the motherboard and firmware is NVME compatible. If the firmware doesn't support NVME then the drive won't boot.
 
SoyCapitanSoyCapitan said:
Just a correction : you can't just take any new m.2 drive and stick it in an older MBP. You first have to check if the motherboard and firmware is NVME compatible. If the firmware doesn't support NVME then the drive won't boot.
Click to expand...

ACHI drives will boot like SM951's, and samsung is creating an faster SM961 drives and as long as you get it the drive as ACHI it'll work.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back