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unagimiyagi

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jun 9, 2009
905
229
Hi,

I'm on a 2014 mbp 15". I'm seeing read/write speeds around 750 MB/s for the SSD.
The new SDD in the 2016 model on paper is way faster at 3GB/sec.

Will I notice the speed of the new SSD? Will it make the computer feel snappier? I do multi-task a lot with browser windows, Xcode, Android studio, web development, R and scikit learn. I also use a VM running windows at times.

I do not do video editing nor much photo editing.

At what point, measured in MB/sec, will I see diminishing returns in terms of perceived snappiness of the computer?
750? 1000? 2000?
 
Between my Crucial SSD in my Desktop (hackintosh) with El Capitan at 500MB/s and the 256GB SSD in my 2015 MBA with 1.5GB/s, I dont see or feel any difference in, f.e. how fast Apps open.

It doesnt feel any snappier.
 
The "snappiness" SSDs brought to market wasn't achieved by higher read/write speeds.
The "SSD effect" as I like to call it is about the reduced latency compared to spinning hard drives.

So if you won't be loading huge databases, directories or other large amounts of data, there won't be any noticeable difference.
 
I just got the 256GB 13" Touchbar model and had a 2014 13" rMBP with 128GB flash storage.

Using benchmark tools the new drive is three or four times faster (more in some tests). But in just day to day usage I can tell only a slight difference. Photos opens a little faster, but not "oh wow I'm so thrilled I bought this Mac" faster.

I think maybe if you were opening and editing or copying 30GB video files, there would be a noticeable difference, but just day to day web browsing, reading emails, creating some documents, opening Photos and iTunes and using both... there is some difference but not anything earth shattering.
 
I doubt it, most of the time. I have a 2015 15" with a 1.5 GB/sec SSD and an older macBook with a 0.5 GB/sec SSD. The only time I really notice the difference is when I am doing a task that involves longer sequential read and writes like rendering a video. Most day to day stuff like mail, MS Office, coding, compiling, etc is about the same, since a lot of time the gating factor is not disk drive transfer rate.
 
I definitely notice exactly what the benchmarks show. Boot up time, app opening.
Every little bit helps.
 
So we're saying anything above around 700 Mb/sec should be virtually imperceptible for most usage?
That's my observation as well....but why does Apple keep putting 3GB/sec SSDs? Why not use a cheaper one?
 
Because Apple used to appeal to the creative industry.
Handling 4k video edits or high resolution image work hugely profits from SSD performance.
 
So we're saying anything above around 700 Mb/sec should be virtually imperceptible for most usage?
That's my observation as well....but why does Apple keep putting 3GB/sec SSDs? Why not use a cheaper one?
I'd go even further. I'd say you can barely tell the difference over even 400Mbs is normal usage. As someone else mentioned, I think much of the perceived difference is due to the far better seek times flash storage has.
 
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