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512gb ssd?

adamvk

adamvk

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Oct 29, 2008
1,308
0
Phoenix, AZ
What do you think the possibility that Apple will offer a 512GB SSD on the new Macbook Air be? And do you think it would be quite expensive? I'm considering a Macbook Air but the HD capacity is holding me back. Also, how much faster does the SSD make the Macbook Air vs the Macbook Pro normal HDD? Right now I have 8GB of ram in my Macbook Pro, if I switched to 4GB in a Macbook Air would there be a dramatic decrease in performance?
 
adamvk said:
What do you think the possibility that Apple will offer a 512GB SSD on the new Macbook Air be? And do you think it would be quite expensive? I'm considering a Macbook Air but the HD capacity is holding me back. Also, how much faster does the SSD make the Macbook Air vs the Macbook Pro normal HDD? Right now I have 8GB of ram in my Macbook Pro, if I switched to 4GB in a Macbook Air would there be a dramatic decrease in performance?
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No idea on whether or not they will offer it. My experience is that the SSD in general offers a pretty dramatic difference in overall performance and usability.
 
Right now, OWC offers a drop in 480GB SATA for $1000. Apple's would probably be in that realm. As for the drop from 8GB to 4GB. All depends on what you do. The SSD makes things quite a bit better when you have page outs compared to page outs on a mechanical drive, but it still isn't as fast as physical RAM. I don't keep as many Virtual Machine's open as I used to on my MBP to make up for the lack of RAM. Otherwise I haven't noticed much of an issue with having less RAM going from my MBP to my MBA (I do also miss the other two cores, but you have to make concessions when you are talking about a 2.5lb laptop)
 
TheRealDamager said:
No idea on whether or not they will offer it. My experience is that the SSD in general offers a pretty dramatic difference in overall performance and usability.
Click to expand...

paulrbeers said:
Right now, OWC offers a drop in 480GB SATA for $1000. Apple's would probably be in that realm. As for the drop from 8GB to 4GB. All depends on what you do. The SSD makes things quite a bit better when you have page outs compared to page outs on a mechanical drive, but it still isn't as fast as physical RAM. I don't keep as many Virtual Machine's open as I used to on my MBP to make up for the lack of RAM. Otherwise I haven't noticed much of an issue with having less RAM going from my MBP to my MBA (I do also miss the other two cores, but you have to make concessions when you are talking about a 2.5lb laptop)
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Ok, good to know, thanks. So it would probably be $1000ish for the hard drive. So if apple offered it I'm guessing that would probably push the price of it North of 2k...if it's that much I'll probably just stick with my MBP. Maybe I should just think of dumping my 150GB photo library onto an external.

As for the ram issue, I do a LOT of multitasking, so it might be a problem then. I usually have several tabs open, iTunes open, and often either Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, or Lightroom.
 
It's pretty common that Apple doubles their stats with every refresh and keeps the same price. So base will probably 128GB and will go up to 512GB for the current 256GB price. As for ram...they are a little slower to up that. I don't think they will go up to 8GB right away, but they will probably just have 4GB standard across the board.

OWC tends to set their prices against Apple...so once the 512GB Flash goes down in price, theirs will too, so it will benefit 2011 owners that just want more storage.
 
512GB SSD is huge!!

I'm working with a 256GB hardrive.

It's not hard to move files on to an external hard drive.
 
It sounds like you're doing quite a fair amount of media work that requires CPU horsepower as well as copious amounts of drive space. With this, I would say that the MBA isn't primetime for power users just yet.

Unfortunately, the reason why SSD prices haven't fallen is that they're on an upgrade schedule like graphics adapters. New chipsets constantly come out as well as new manufacturing processes. So unless someone just tells Sandforce to stop producing better chipsets as well as memory manufacturers to stop making chips on smaller fab processes I don't think we'll see a dramatic drop in prices anytime soon.

A 512GB SSD is... so to speak, insanely large for an SSD. You might see them in enterprise applications. No average consumer needs a 512GB SSD, so you see more common sizes of 64GB-128GB being used. Newegg has consumer grade 512GB SSDs... for about $900.

Who knows though, maybe we'll get a Macbook Air Pro soon that has the option for one.
 
I think it may be more economical to offer that SSD/HDD hybrid some members were proposing some time back. SSD for the operating system and critical programs, HDD for everything else. Having 512gb SSD would push its price way beyond what normal people are capable of affording or willing to pay.

It might be a BTO option, but I doubt it will be a stock MBA staple.

I believe another issue is that for most part, typical everyday consumers are still clueless as to just what their laptop specs mean, much less what in the world SSD is. To them, storage space is storage space, and I know quite a few friends who were initially shocked askance when they saw the MBA had just 64gb SSD, and started boasting about how their own laptops sported 750gb to 1 tb of space. It took me quite a while to explain to them the difference (both in performance and price). :)
 
paulrbeers said:
The SSD makes things quite a bit better when you have page outs compared to page outs on a mechanical drive, but it still isn't as fast as physical RAM.
Click to expand...

It all depends on what type of tasks you're doing. My MBA is much faster when it comes to opening apps, turning on/off the machine compared to the mini in my sig even though it has a slower cpu and only 4 vs. 8 GB of ram. However, I'm sure the mini is faster when doing a video encoding or other cpu intensive tasks.
 
256GB or 512GB SSD?

I've been reading forums everywhere and I just can't decide what to get in a 15" MacBook Pro. I know the 512GB is crazy expensive, and I want the convenience of buying the SSD from Apple. Yes, I know it's expensive.

I am a photographer and have very large RAW files stored on my hard drive. I recently purchased an external LaCie drive but haven't really figured out how to use it other than for backup. I wanted to dump my older RAW files to my external, keep them there, then delete the files off my computer, however, with its backup I'm afraid it will backup without those files.

My question is in reference to a couple posts above, saying 512GB is more than anyone would need. I currently have a 2011 iMac that I can hopefully sell (and use the 15" MBP with 27" thunderbolt display), and I have already used 230GB of its 500GB total. If I buy a 256GB SSD and transfer all my data over, will I be almost maxed out? Or is this different because its an SSD?

If I sound lost, I am, but I thought I'd ask. Oh, and I need the MacBook immediately for 2 classes I'm taking in 1 week. So that's why I don't want to wait. I need to transfer my data and software over to the MacBook ASAP.

--

Okay so after a bit of reading, looks like we may be getting new MacBooks soon. Yeah I'm a silly newbie. :) In which case, maybe I will try to borrow someone's laptop for my classes if I need to and just buy the new one. I don't want to be featured in that commercial where everything is updated right after you buy it ("sh**!! I just bought this!!!)

Thanks!
 
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I'm sure Apple is waiting patiently while flash memory is depreciating every few months. Look at crucial, samsung, ocz, owc, sandisk, corsair, and other vendors. The prices are dropping from $2 per GB to $1.XX. Crucial is probably one of the cheapest SSD sellers that are less than $1 per GB and the performance is pretty great in terms of read speeds, write on the other hand is decent.
 
How does choice of i5 vs i7 affect battery life

How does choice of i5 vs i7 affect battery life?

My wife has a MBA 2011 11" with i7 1.8Ghz and the battery life is poor. I still have (among other Macs) a 2010 2.13 Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo MPA 13"

I don't need a screaming fast MBA, thats what I have my MBP 15" for. Battery life and portability is more important for me for a new MBA. So will the 2012 i5 model yield more battery life than the i7 model?
 
$500 upgrade option is cheaper than an equivalent from OWC ($794.99 for 6G speeds).

You could get a 4GB, 1.8 Ghz, 512GB machine for $1,999.99...though I can't imagine why you wouldn't pony up the $200 to boost the stats...

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Jaro65 said:
This is an MBP-level price. But frankly, other than GPU, so are the specs.
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Well, ignoring quad-core processing and Gfx speeds, if you opted for the 512GB SSD, 8GB RAM, and the high-res anti-glare screen on a MBP you'd spend $2,999.99. All relative I guess.
 
I cancelled my 256 maxed out 13" to contemplate the 512 ssd

Is this upgrade cost effective? From a resale perspective in 2 years will these hold a respectable value?

Not certain if the 512 is worth it money wise. I can get by with the 256 being frugal with my data but running a vm environment I would rather not if I dont have to continue to.

Thoughts and input is appreciated.
 
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