More and more stuff like this ... I'm beginning to seriously wonder if the Apple Tax is worth it now.
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New 256GB Mac Mini and 512GB MacBook Pro Have Slower SSD Speeds Than Previous Models
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Understood. And what issue are you having with it and the SSD?Windows x64 Virtualization
Underhand reduction of quality, it's not difficult to work out what I meant. There's always something that's gone backwards, or is reduced quality
So there’s no impact to your workflow or any application with the SSD performance?
When most people can’t tell a difference between a good 500MB/s SATA SSD and 7000MB/s NVME SSDs, I have to wonder why people get excited by the difference in performance from a 1500MB/s SSD and a 3000MB/s SSD and a 6000MB/s SSD.
Is there any application you have that’s negatively impacted by this change? Genuinely curious.
SSD speeds aren't part of the advertised specs. I'd be more outraged if it were. With that said, even with consumer drives, this was an issue. I remember buying a 128 GB drive because I couldn't afford a 256 or 512 GB drive back then, and it's still commonplace in modern SSDs.
I think the question most people should ask is: is this performance difference going to matter for my workflow? How much do I need? Does this provide margin? Is the slowest speed insufficient? If it matters, then sure, complain, but I suspect 99.999% of users won't be impacted and won't notice either.
The one thing that very few people have addressed is how supply chain has changed. NAND density increases over time, so its no surprise that the smallest drives can sometimes be slower.
I think I may be fine with 3000 in the 512 GB M2 Pro, 3000 to 6000 to me is hardly noticeable from my experience with my windows NVME drives.. Are there any other benefits of having 6000 other than for file transfers? I don’t think I will be transferring many files to the SSD on the mac..
For me:
HDD to SATA SSD (600) was a huge difference, noticed the speeds.
SATA SSD (600) to gen 3 NVME (3500) is noticeable but not as much as the HDD to SSD.
Gen 3 NVME (3500) to Gen 4 NVME (7000) is not really noticeable to me, maybe like a smidge faster..
I guess I’ll need to take these two weeks to research some more and think if I should keep the 512.
For me:
HDD to SATA SSD (600) was a huge difference, noticed the speeds.
SATA SSD (600) to gen 3 NVME (3500) is noticeable but not as much as the HDD to SSD.
Gen 3 NVME (3500) to Gen 4 NVME (7000) is not really noticeable to me, maybe like a smidge faster..
I guess I’ll need to take these two weeks to research some more and think if I should keep the 512.
"Routinely" for a buyer just using their Apple web sales site for normal standard buyers?
I'm fortunate I bought the Mac mini M2 512GB on a slim budget and not the basic 256GB. It's a great performance for the bucks.
The price difference for the additional storage is obvious on Apple's site, the performance difference for SSD write speeds are not. Why?
Again, in what application do you see a performance difference?
Does HP, Dell, Lenovo spec each model’s SSD performance, too?
I didn't use anything else than Apple since 2010, don't care of the other producers, but the question why this is is NOT informed before purchase, it's misleading IMO. You think you only buy a larger storage capacity, but in reality it's another degraded SSD performance and what could be expected from the older M1 or Intel, bad marketing and a loss of trust from my side.
They don’t give what I would call serious benchmarks on anything else; why would they do so with the SSD? Honestly, Apple’s benchmarks they run in the SOTU speeches are pure fluff. What do you propose for the SSD?
Can you imagine the mess if they had to switch SSD suppliers (say someone went out of business or hiked prices) and how they’d have to manage inventory and determine who had what performance? It’s another headache that isn’t required. I don’t think this is practical. I think it’s normal to simply wait, get benchmarks, and make up your own mind for how you wish to spend money.
This is far from unheard of. Again, for the past decade SSD performance has changed based on capacity, in a given model’s lineup.
And I still note that nobody can produce an application that has differing performance due to this NAND ‘issue’.
I’ll even start everyone off: There’s an edge case where if you copy 43GB (I think it was 43.5GB) of stuff from another storage media (another SSD via Thunderbolt 4, perhaps?) you’ll overwhelm the write cache on the 256GB SSD model, and the 512GB and other models will prove to be faster. This is such a contrived scenario for most that I hesitate to even bring it up, but in the interests of transparency, this is the first and only negative report I’ve ever seen on a difference in performance.
I wouldn’t spend more due to that. Would you?
I'd say this is worse than that. The G4 "Yikes" was a direct upgrade to the G3 model it replaced — and even cheaper. There was nothing about it that was worse than the model it replaced. Sure, it didn't have the architecture of the new Sawtooth models, but those were tiered $800 more.
Video editing is impacted. This guy details his experience with the slower 256GB SSD and found it unusable:
Please can you point to the part where he said it’s unusable AND it’s due to the ssd, and there were no other changes between the machines?
My recollection is he outright said there was a different OS on there, and he had no benchmark other than feelings in his recollection of the differences between the two experiences.
I think we both know that’s not a serious review. It’s a commentary, sure, but not a review. That’s why I said I wanted to see Anandtech or Ars Technical or Toms Hardware doing a more serious review of the differences, with facts and real data.
My recollection is he outright said there was a different OS on there, and he had no benchmark other than feelings in his recollection of the differences between the two experiences.
I think we both know that’s not a serious review. It’s a commentary, sure, but not a review. That’s why I said I wanted to see Anandtech or Ars Technical or Toms Hardware doing a more serious review of the differences, with facts and real data.
Yea, I'm not going to transcribe the whole video, but at 6:05 when he describes that while editing video on it:
Yes, and then he says the problems with that: different OS being one. It’s a commentary, and my recollection is later he says he needs to go back and retest side by side to get consistent results.
You disregard my simple question for a simple consumer like myself, why is the M2 SSD speed not shown on Apple's spec sheet? The basic M2 is not better than the M1 unless you buy the 512GB, the 256GB is half SSD speed.
Apple isn't special. SSD speeds in PC's is also just as fast. I put a $89 1TB PCIe 4.0 SSD in a new Dell desktop -- 7000MBps read and 6000MBps write. For $84, not $400. And when it fills up, I can take it out and put in a 2TB or a 4TB. SSD storage is dirt cheap right now, which begs the question why Apple is being cheap on using only one NAND when there is so much inventory?