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Macbook Pro - SSD and 9600m discrete option worth it?

J

Jsimon9633

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 26, 2007
209
0
I am looking into buying a new Macbook Pro.

I want the 15 inch one.

my issue lies in wether to pay extra for the SSD built in and to get or not get the one with the 9600m discrete card

I am going to be using this for dreamweaver and a little ps,

can i somewhat easily upgrade to the SSD later?
 
I highly recommend getting the discrete card because you won't be able to add one in later. OpenCL in Snow Leopard will be able to take advantage of the card for a lot of tasks.

As for the SSD, do NOT buy one through apple. Apple uses last-gen SSD's, you're much better off upgrading it yourself(which is extremely easy btw). Check youtube for tutorials.

If you really need an SSD now, get an OCZ or Intel-X25, they seem to have the best benchmarks. If you don't need one right now I suggest waiting for a few months, prices have been steadily dropping and should be a lot more reasonable by the end of the year.
 
it would be cheaper if you buy the SSD separately and install it yourself, as for the 9600M it depends if your planning to be gaming a lot.
 
Oh yes. Upgrading the SSD is very easy to do afterwards.

I don't find the discrete graphics help a bit. I'd always have them turned off anyway to save battery.
 
mmm what about the battery life? alleged 8 hours?

what about real tests I would imagine its not even close to that
 
The 15inch can get about 7 hours doing simple things like word processing, and internet browsing. As for the discrete graphics, the 9600m is not much faster than the 9400m in terms of open CL at all, the cards are very close, and chances are you wont notice a difference. Comparing the two for gaming performance or graphic design and what not the 9600m GT wins hands down. So if your looking to do any of that than the MBP with 9600M GT is the best option for you. And as iterated above, don"t buy an SSD from apple, buy one yourself and install it. This way you can get an external enclosure and throw your stock HDD that comes with the macbook in it to use as an external drive.
 
JamesGorman said:
The 15inch can get about 7 hours doing simple things like word processing, and internet browsing. As for the discrete graphics, the 9600m is not much faster than the 9400m in terms of open CL at all, the cards are very close, and chances are you wont notice a difference. Comparing the two for gaming performance or graphic design and what not the 9600m GT wins hands down. So if your looking to do any of that than the MBP with 9600M GT is the best option for you. And as iterated above, don"t buy an SSD from apple, buy one yourself and install it. This way you can get an external enclosure and throw your stock HDD that comes with the macbook in it to use as an external drive.
Click to expand...

Any recommends on where or which SSD to get? or should i wait til snow leopard is close and buy it then?
 
Go for discrete if you can afford it. With it on the system gets about 6000 in 3DMark, which is more than enough for most games. You can always kick it down to 9400 for better battery life (I'm getting about 6 hours on the 9400 with music, internet and word processing).

As for SSD, until Apple lowers the prices and, more importantly, gets the speed up to 3 vs. 1.5, avoid it. You can always upgrade later (while it's not the easiest thing to do in the world, the drive is replaceable).
 
Jsimon9633 said:
Any recommends on where or which SSD to get? or should i wait til snow leopard is close and buy it then?
Click to expand...



Personally, I would get the OCZ Vertex, OCZ Summit, Intel X25M, or Corsair 256. These are all higher-end drives. You do NOT want any drive with a current or past JMicron controller, as they suffer from drive stuttering and extremely slow random write speeds. All other controllers listed here are good.

This list is not complete, but It is almost assuredly accurate as I've triple checked sources. And for anyone wondering, I am going to maintain an updated website with this information presented in a much better layout. Will post in this forum when ready..



===================== GOOD SSDs =====================

Using New Samsung S3C29RBB01 controller

  • [*]Corsair P256
    [*] OCZ Summit
    [*] Samsung PB22-J (OEM)
    [*] SuperTalent Masterdrive SX


Using Indilinx Barefoot IDX110M00 controller

  • [*] OCZ Vertex
    [*] OCZ Vertex EX (SLC)
    [*] OCZ Agility
    [*] SuperTalent Ultradrive ME (MLC)
    [*] SuperTalent Ultradrive LE (SLC)
    [*] G.Skill Falcon
    [*] Patriot Torqx
    [*] RunCore Pro IV
    [*] Solidata K5 (SLC)
    [*] Solidata K6 (MLC)

Using Intel v1 controller

  • [*]Intel X25M
    [*] Kingston SSDNow M (rebadge)
    [*] PQI X25M (rebadge)



===================== Mediocre* SSDs =====================
Using Samsung S3C49RBX01 controller
  • Many Samsung OEM drives for Apple/Dell/etc
  • Corsair S64/S128


===================== Bad SSDs =====================
Using dual JMicron JMF602B controller

  • [*]OCZ Apex
    [*] G.Skill Titan
    [*] Patriot Warp v3
    [*] Solidata X1 (SLC)
    [*] Solidata X2 (MLC)
    [*] SuperTalent MasterDrive RX

Using JMicron JMF601/602/602B controller

  • [*]Corsair M64
    [*] OCZ Core
    [*] OCZ Core v2
    [*] OCZ Solid
    [*] Patriot Warp
    [*] Patriot Warp v2
    [*] PQI S525/518
    [*] RunCore Pro III
    [*] Solidata K1 (SLC)
    [*] Solidata K2 (MLC)
    [*] SuperTalent MasterDrive MX
    [*] SuperTalent MasterDrive OX
    [*] SuperTalent MasterDrive PX (SLC)
    [*] Transcend SSD25S-M (MLC)
    [*] Transcend SSD25S-S (SLC)



*early-gen Samsung controller, much better than dual-JMicron, but a lot slower than Indilinx/Intel/New Samsung S3C29RBB01
 
Jsimon9633 said:
Any recommends on where or which SSD to get? or should i wait til snow leopard is close and buy it then?
Click to expand...

As apple has cut the sata speed to 1.5gbps in the new macbook pros right now, id wait a bit to get an SSD. Hopefully apple will release a firmware update or it will be fixed with SL and be put back up to the 3.0Gbps interface. The reason you want to wait for this is because most SSD's, the good ones anyway, will be much faster than 1.5Gbps and until apple fixes this issues, there is no point spending upwards of 500 dollars to get something that can't perform to it's fullest abilities. As for which SSD you should get when the time comes, you can navigate over too www.newegg.com or www.newegg.ca depending on if your in canada or the states, and look at some SSD's on there. They have many different brands and sizes to suit your needs. Intel is the best, but they don't have huge capacities right now, and they are quite pricey. If you wait they will come down in price. But you can look around on there, and see some customers reviews and make a decision for yourself.
 
1tb ssd drive why are apple so slow in bringing this out??

Hi every one i'm new to the forums but i have been searching for a 1tb ssd drive and i have found this article from egadget stating this asus laptop with 1 tb ssd ?? why won't apple introduce macbook pros with 1tb ssd please check this out and i would apreciate if someone knows different
http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/02/asus-slaps-1tb-ssd-within-lamborghini-vx5-laptop/ :)
 
macairhead said:
Hi every one i'm new to the forums but i have been searching for a 1tb ssd drive and i have found this article from egadget stating this asus laptop with 1 tb ssd ?? why won't apple introduce macbook pros with 1tb ssd please check this out and i would apreciate if someone knows different
http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/02/asus-slaps-1tb-ssd-within-lamborghini-vx5-laptop/ :)
Click to expand...

Obviously the cost would be far more than the vast majority of MB Pro users would pay, not to mention it is stupid to buy an SSD from Apple as they are nowhere near the best on the market in terms of performance and cost.
 
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