I have a Macbook Pro late 2011 and want to purchase a Macbook Air 2020. The newer Macbooks have internal hard drives that cannot be removed. In my 2011, I've replaced the internal HD at least twice. Is it an issue for anyone that the internal HD cannot be removed/replaced? How does the unremovable one hold out?
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Macbook air new purchase
- Thread starter oceangirl10
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Did your 2011 MBP have mechanical HDs (that is, spinning magnetic platters)? If so, the SSD in recent MBAs should be more robust. SSDs don't have any moving parts and are much less sensitive to physical shocks. This means you don't have to worry about, say, a motor wearing out, a read/write head coming into contact with a platter, or your backpack falling off a chair.
One thing you can do to help extend a SSD's longevity is to keep an eye on how close to full capacity you keep the disk. Each memory cell in a SSD incurs some wear (I'm describing this in non-tech terms) each time it is erased or written to. So if your SSD is close to being full, look for files you can move to another form of storage. Doing so creates space and helps the SSD spread activities that involve a lot of writing and erasing, such as downloading OS and software updates, backing up iOS devices, streaming video, and managing frequently edited documents, across a greater number of memory cells.
Reading stored data, on the other hand, doesn't affect SSD memory cells very much.
Finally, here's one real world example of SSD lifespan: there is a 2015 MBP in my household that is still going strong with its original SSD. The machine gets daily, extensive usage. We're hoping it lasts until an Apple Silicon MBP with a decent variety of ports is released (fingers crossed!).
I have a 2011 MBP that I replaced the drive with a SSD in 2013. Recently check the health of the SSD and it had over 90% of its life remaining. I don’t think you will have to worry about SSD life.
You may be quietly confident. Accepting it's possible for anything to fail prematurely, SSDs have proven to be extremely reliable, as numerous forum members could testify. In 2014 I bought a 1TB Samsung SSD to replace the HDD in a Lenovo computer I bought at the same time. The Lenovo was hammered as my desktop machine for five years until replaced by an iMac in 2019, at which time I salvaged the SSD to become my TimeMachine drive. It's still going strong, of course, and I don't doubt it will outlast me.
The real question is why you felt the need to replace your 2011's hard drive twice in the last 10 years. Was it because a) you ran out of space, or b) the hard drive failed.
If it's the latter then there's no need to worry. As has been said already modern SSDs are very robust and reliable, and chances of one failing are much lower than for a mechanical hard drive. If it's the former than you might have to spend some extra money and purchase a MacBook Air with the largest storage capacity available in order to prevent that from happening. Or use external storage. Or declutter your files and folders on a regular basis, because let's face it: a lot of people are digital hoarders and never declutter their drives.
If it's the latter then there's no need to worry. As has been said already modern SSDs are very robust and reliable, and chances of one failing are much lower than for a mechanical hard drive. If it's the former than you might have to spend some extra money and purchase a MacBook Air with the largest storage capacity available in order to prevent that from happening. Or use external storage. Or declutter your files and folders on a regular basis, because let's face it: a lot of people are digital hoarders and never declutter their drives.
