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New 256GB Mac Mini and 512GB MacBook Pro Have Slower SSD Speeds Than Previous Models
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Then please test us the SSD speed lol. You are a few clicks away from giving us what we want to know. If the speed is 2-3000MB/s then we are safe.
Place your bets, folks! i'm going to guess the speed stays the same based on cost cutting Apple did on their Studio Max. They gimped the front USB C ports to max out at 800 MB/sec by only using 1 PCie lane instead of 2, whereas everyone else uses 2. That probably saved them $.20 per machine, for a $2000 machine. So with the same logic, they probably use only 2 PCie lanes instead of 4, which limits the speed to 1500MB/sec,
Interesting, thanks for chipping in. I trust you much more than him, given it is unlikely Apple would use two different types of 512GB SSDs across the mini M2 Pro and MBP M2 PRo.
For sure you need 1TB (to get 4 NANDs, thus 4x1500 = 6000MB/s)
It is unknown how much the SoC improves the performance if at all.
There is another way to get 6000MB/sec for cheaper. I am doing this right now on my studio max. Use 2 ports of the TB4. Put a 2TB drive in an external enclosure, I used P31 NVme. Run them RAID 0. 4 TB @ 6000 MB/sec, price: $300 for the drives, $200 for the enclosures. $500 for 4TB @ 6000MB/sec.
Yes but think of all those pennies Tim is saving, looking at his daily “we saved 5 cents” graph…
The 256gb version is understandable. But 512gb mbp also being slow is messed up.
Anybody here who worked selling stuff, even in a small shop, knows that prices are never about how much the product costs.
Think about software or services: it costs literally zero to unlock most features. Are they stealing?
Well, considering this is an entry-level product that dropped its price, even that 30% extra for a really dumb 512 SSD seems kinda fair. Most people won't notice, it's still pretty fast...
But it's surely pretty disappointing that they've done this to a minor update, potentially lowering even more the performance of a slightly updated CPU.
Take this as the equivalent of other companies increasing prices. They moved the Mini to a lower category to sell more. It fits the spirit of their Mac for everyone.
Think about software or services: it costs literally zero to unlock most features. Are they stealing?
Well, considering this is an entry-level product that dropped its price, even that 30% extra for a really dumb 512 SSD seems kinda fair. Most people won't notice, it's still pretty fast...
But it's surely pretty disappointing that they've done this to a minor update, potentially lowering even more the performance of a slightly updated CPU.
Take this as the equivalent of other companies increasing prices. They moved the Mini to a lower category to sell more. It fits the spirit of their Mac for everyone.
Apple, when the MacBook AIR M3 comes out, will be able to say that it has a 50% faster SSD than the previous model (MacBook Air M2)
I'd say a great gimmick...marketing, you lower the performance of a model so you can say you're going faster than the M2...by simply remounting the SSD from the M1.
Top marketing.
I'd say a great gimmick...marketing, you lower the performance of a model so you can say you're going faster than the M2...by simply remounting the SSD from the M1.
Top marketing.
Actually, thinking about this, yesterday, I moved three VMs off an M1 Pro and on to a base M2 Pro - it was about 100GB in total and the operation took about the same on both machines. The read/write speeds are largely the same on these SSDs aren't they?
Max Tech on YouTube has clearly shown that running Photoshop or similar larger programs with multiple Chrome Tabs open, while running a single video editor like DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut Pro, or Adobe Premiere on a 4K project, will take up all available Mac RAM and then start using the SSD disk as swap memory if the RAM is too little (like 8GB or 16GB RAM models.) So yes, it has been shown that slower SSD drive speeds equal slower swap memory, which affects the overall Mac system application speed and performance. For a Pro oriented system, like the Mac Mini M2 Pro is advertised as, it should never have the slower 3,000 MB/s SSD drive configuration in it. The 512GB M2 Pro Mac Mini has only 2 256GB NAND SSD drive chips, instead of having 4 256GB NAND SSD drive chips in it like the 1TB Mac Mini M2 Pro has, which results in the 6,000 MB/s SSD drive speed in the 1TB SSD Mac Mini M2 Pro model. Now the regular M2 Mac Mini (not M2 Pro) may only be using less PCI channels as some suggest, so that might limit the larger SSD models (512GB, 1TB, and 2TB) on the Mac Mini M2 (non-Pro) models to a 3,000 MB/s speed, but the 256GB base model Mac Mini M2 definitely only has one 256GB SSD drive chip in it, limiting it to a maximum of 1,500 MB/s SSD drive speed (for both read and write.)
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So, as a rule of the thumb: buy the the device with twice the minimal storage.
If you were using an intermediate storage like a TB3 SSD, then that is the bottlebeck (2-3000MB/s)
If you did a direct transfer between the M1 Pro and M2 Pro, then the M2 Pro is the bottlebeck.
It does not, literally the entire industry is sitting on too many NANDs that they have been forced to drop prices for a few quarters now.
The real reason is likely Apple doing an inventory min-maxing, by not sourcing 128GB NAND modules at all they save cost by getting 256GB modules in bulk. They made a conscious and unforced decision to therefore let the base models drop in SSD performance by not filling up the available solder joints that are already sitting there on the board.
A great video comparing the Mac Mini M2 and the Mac Mini M2 Pro base models in stock at stores, with benchmarks for the 256GB and 51GB SSD disk issue and other info:
Summary of what we know so far:
Get the 1TB Mac Mini M2 Pro to get 6000 MB/s SSD drive read/write speed, instead of the 3000 MB/s SSD drive read/write speed on the 512GB Mac Mini M2 Pro model (due to 2 SSD nand chips being used vs. 4 SSD nand chips on the 1TB Mac Mini M2 Pro model). The base 256GB Mac Mini M2 (non-Pro) only gets a 1,500 MB/s SSD drive read/write speed, per the above video's benchmarks, and other people reporting the same issue, which is due to Apple using only 1 256GB nand SSD chip in the Mac Mini M2 256GB model.
Summary of what we know so far:
Get the 1TB Mac Mini M2 Pro to get 6000 MB/s SSD drive read/write speed, instead of the 3000 MB/s SSD drive read/write speed on the 512GB Mac Mini M2 Pro model (due to 2 SSD nand chips being used vs. 4 SSD nand chips on the 1TB Mac Mini M2 Pro model). The base 256GB Mac Mini M2 (non-Pro) only gets a 1,500 MB/s SSD drive read/write speed, per the above video's benchmarks, and other people reporting the same issue, which is due to Apple using only 1 256GB nand SSD chip in the Mac Mini M2 256GB model.
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I made a table detailing what we have gathered so far. The 2 models with (?) are unconfirmed but likely to be the case.
This is most helpful for people. Thanks for keeping us updated on what you find out! The SSD nand speed issue appears to not only affect the M2 and M2 Pro Mac Mini models, but also both the 14" and 16" MacBook M2 Pro 512GB models as well!
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Can you specify the source of the information?
Matt Talks Tech posted a video on YT yesterday, comparing 14-inch and 16-inch 2023 MBP with the same configuration:
- M2 Pro with 12c CPU/19c GPU (not the "base" 10c CPU/16c GPU that is only available in the entry-level MBP 14-inch)
- 16GB "RAM"
- 512GB SSD
Both of them where reaching the 6GB/s
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