Possible SSD upgrade to PCIe: Another reason to wait for the refresh

[jmhart]

It looks like the upcoming Mac Pro is not the only machine getting the PCIe SSD treatment, the just announced Air has it as well and it's obviously SMOKIN' FAST!

It only stands to reason that the rest of the products that use a proprietary SSD form factor will get this killer new feature in their refresh as well...including the both sizes of iMacs!

The only model that may not would be the Mac Mini as I believe it uses a standard 2.5" SATA SSD.

It was already a good idea to wait for the refresh, but this seals the deal!

*Queue the influx of contradictory responses from purchasers of the 2012 model.*

 

[MeatRocket]

It only stands to reason that.....
*Queue the influx of contradictory responses from purchasers of the 2012 model.*

I haven't bought anything yet, as I'm still researching & weighing the pros & cons. However, I doubt you should break your arm patting yourself on the back just yet. A "wait and see" approach might be the best advice.

 

[Sam Spade]

We don't even know that there will be a refresh this year, much less that PCIe will be part of it.

 

[MeatRocket]

Another thing you might consider as well:

The Mac Pro is being designed with PCIe flash BUT it also has Thunderbolt 2, which means it can extend PCIe speeds outside of its chassis.

The MacBook Air has PCIe flash, but NO Thunderbolt 2. It can't sustain that throughput outside of its chassis, but the MBA isn't really designed for more storage, it's designed for portability, so having that PCIe speed limited to a small internal drive is ok.

An iMac is intended to access data on medium larger than typical flash on a sustained basis (quite the opposite of the design intent of the MBA). It would either be by an extra internal drive (which can't match the speed of flash anyway) or by external devices (which without Thunderbolt 2 can't sustain PCIe throughput). So to go internal PCIe flash, it would only follow to allow external connectivity by a bus capable of keeping up. So IF we see PCIe flash on an iMac this year, then perhaps it would have TB2 interfaces as well?
(That's some FAR speculatin')

 

[jmhart]

...So IF we see PCIe flash on an iMac this year, then perhaps it would have TB2 interfaces as well?
(That's some FAR speculatin')

I completely forgot about TB2, but I'd wager you're right. That's very likely why the Air was the only machine that was announced as it's the least likely to be used with TB devices. I'd imagine they'll delay the Macbook Pro refresh until they can include TB2, along with the iMac, and *maybe* the mini. That could also be why they issued a very slight refresh to the Sandy Bridge based Retina Macbook Pro back in Feb, to tide everyone over so they could push the Ivy Bridge refresh out to the fall so they could include TB2.

The prevailing theory seems to be that Apple is most interested in TB2 because it can drive a 4K display, leading everyone to believe a 4K Cinema display is coming. It's hard to imagine they'd leave the iMac built-in display at 2K yet delay a refresh for TB2 allowing for your 2nd display to be 4K--especially considering the enhancements to multiple display handling in Mavericks.

My next random guess is that they'll either relegate the iMac to non-pro applications and leave the display at 2K and not bother with TB2, or we'll get TB2 and at least the option of a 4K built-in display.

Educated guessing is fun.