Is it a smart move to use a 32GB SD Card as an SSD? I have a Early 2011 MacBook Pro and I'm think about putting Mac OS X on it to use as a boot disk and maybe for running a couple other programs off of too. I'm not planning on using the card or card reader for anything else, besides the use as an SSD. Would this be recommended?
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SDHC Card as SSD?
- Thread starter scandalouslime
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Most of these cards are not designed to be used for continuous writes/rewrites as an SSD (AFAIK).
So in addition to you probably not getting the same performance as an SSD, the lifespan of this card might will not be as long.
That being said, using it for storage (photos/music/etc) or even backups would give you a fast drive.
my 2c
So in addition to you probably not getting the same performance as an SSD, the lifespan of this card might will not be as long.
That being said, using it for storage (photos/music/etc) or even backups would give you a fast drive.
my 2c
It's not a good idea. The flash memory that is used in SD cards and USB sticks is poor quality. Running a system off of it is asking for all kinds of errors. SSDs use higher quality (thus, more expensive) flash in order to be more reliable. SD cards won't be very fast either.
Some more info: http://www.howtogeek.com/196541/emmc-vs.-ssd-not-all-solid-state-storage-is-equal/
Some more info: http://www.howtogeek.com/196541/emmc-vs.-ssd-not-all-solid-state-storage-is-equal/
It'd work, but the speed wouldn't be anything very impressive - even disregarding the bottleneck of the card reader's USB connection internally, even the fastest SDHC cards are around SanDisk's 95MB/s, versus a "real" SSD, where you're looking at anything from 300MB/s upwards. (The late 2013 rMBP's PCIe-connected SSD can sustain around 900MB/s - but then, you certainly pay for it)
That said, if it's just a matter of some extra space for occasional use, or booting into a different OS you don't necessarily want using space on the drive, it can work. I've got Ubuntu on such a SanDisk 95MB/s card for just that reason - I'm constantly near capacity on the rMBP's SSD, so having a 32GB card for just that occasional purpose made sense.
That said, if it's just a matter of some extra space for occasional use, or booting into a different OS you don't necessarily want using space on the drive, it can work. I've got Ubuntu on such a SanDisk 95MB/s card for just that reason - I'm constantly near capacity on the rMBP's SSD, so having a 32GB card for just that occasional purpose made sense.