rMBP (or any SSD) improvements?

[Panini]

I'd like to know what exactly an SSD has to offer over a hard disk. I am definitely getting one, but I'd just like to know what I can look forward to (what to test when it arrives).

I also have one question - I have seen chromebooks wake almost instantaneously (they wake before you open the lid even 1/4 of the way so you rarely even see the screen power on since it's outside of your viewing range) and my friend claims it is due to the SSD. Does the rMBP come out from sleep this fast? Or is the Chromebook only able to do this due to its very light OS?

I know it has faster read/write speeds, but what exactly does this mean to everyday users?

So far I have:

-Faster file copying
-Faster application opening
-Faster boot time
-Faster wake from sleep

 

[pepatrick]

I'd like to know what exactly an SSD has to offer over a hard disk. I am definitely getting one, but I'd just like to know what I can look forward to (what to test when it arrives).

I also have one question - I have seen chromebooks wake almost instantaneously (they wake before you open the lid even 1/4 of the way so you rarely even see the screen power on since it's outside of your viewing range) and my friend claims it is due to the SSD. Does the rMBP come out from sleep this fast? Or is the Chromebook only able to do this due to its very light OS?

I know it has faster read/write speeds, but what exactly does this mean to everyday users?

So far I have:

-Faster file copying
-Faster application opening
-Faster boot time
-Faster wake from sleep

Does this really need an answer. Faster means faster..a lot faster...night and day faster...Toyota Prius to Corvette kind of faster...

 

[Radiating]

I'd like to know what exactly an SSD has to offer over a hard disk. I am definitely getting one, but I'd just like to know what I can look forward to (what to test when it arrives).

I also have one question - I have seen chromebooks wake almost instantaneously (they wake before you open the lid even 1/4 of the way so you rarely even see the screen power on since it's outside of your viewing range) and my friend claims it is due to the SSD. Does the rMBP come out from sleep this fast? Or is the Chromebook only able to do this due to its very light OS?

I know it has faster read/write speeds, but what exactly does this mean to everyday users?

So far I have:

-Faster file copying
-Faster application opening
-Faster boot time
-Faster wake from sleep

The difference between an SSD and a hard drive is actually the same difference as the top speed of a golf cart and a supersonic jet. The RMBP has some of the fastest SSD's in the world topping out at 500mb/s write speeds, normal notebook hard drives have speeds around 30mb/s. That means it's 17 times faster.

While the RMBP won't turn on when you open the screen 1/4 of the way it will turn on when you open it 3/4 of the way due to the bulkier OS.

So yeah, 17 times faster. Everything will be ridiculously faster that involves the HDD.

 

[NewbieCanada]

The difference between an SSD and a hard drive is actually the same difference as the top speed of a golf cart and a supersonic jet.

Wow, where do you golf that the carts go 45 mph?

 

[Stetrain]

Also in the case that you have more stuff open than can fit in RAM, paging stuff in and out of RAM should be faster.

If you've ever switched to a program you haven't used for a bit and had to wait a bit for it to become responsive, that's usually the app waiting for paged out information to be loaded back into RAM.