I love the idea of anything making your machine perform much faster. But why the huge price tag on such small space?
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Why are SSD expensive?
- Thread starter macswitcha2
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SSD is a "new" technology, which is not mainstream yet. Look at past and current prices of cars with airbags and flat screen TVs or notebook computers.
Because SSDs are still new technology. All new tech cost more when it comes. There is also high demand for NAND chips since all phones and many other gadgets use them so there is no need for manufacturers to lower the prices that much as they can sell the chips with higher price tag.
You should see a price cut when 25nm NANDs hit the stores
You should see a price cut when 25nm NANDs hit the stores
Soooo I'll wait. My machine still is fast but love the idea of apps and boot up being faster.
Is it possible however to by one of the lower GB SSD and use it externally to have apps start from there? Or, have the machine boot up from there?
Yes, but USB or FireWire 800 are much slower than the internal SATA 3Gb/s connection so you would lose some speed. What you could do is get an SSD and then use the hard drive externally.
This is a very good idea if you're serious about getting a SSD. You really don't need a big one to store the OS and Applications. I'm using a 60GB SSD that's just under halfway full. If you go 80 or 120, you'll be set for quite some time. Unless I'm mistaken, it's going to be a while before we see anything like affordable 1TB SSD drives.
EDIT: the only downside to this solution is, if you're running a laptop, it'll tie it down to requiring that external drive. You could do what skorpien suggested if you're ok without an ODD.
You mean only use the SSD for OS and apps and the external hard drive for other stuff?
So how would you be able to use Disk for say, installing/reinstalling?
It will work better with a desktop but I guess for a laptop you will have to lug it around unless you use cloud based storage. <--- that will be a great alternative!
Yes. Or get like 120GB SSD so it can hold the most important files and then a big, 2.5" external HD for other files. That's what I have with my MBA, 128GB SSD + 500GB portable external HD. I rarely need the external so I'm fine with lugging it around when I need it.
However, OptiBay would be a better alternative as you get both, SSD and HD. You can put your SuperDrive in an enclosure or even better, put the install discs in an USB flash drive like the current MBAs have. That way you won't need the SuperDrive
For an SSD used as the OS drive, no need to go higher than 120GB.
I wish I would've gotten the 80GB instead of the 160GB as I only have it 40-50% full at most.
I wish I would've gotten the 80GB instead of the 160GB as I only have it 40-50% full at most.
I am running a SSD on my 24 (see specs below). What I did was to have the 640 GB HDD removed and the SSD installed. Then the 640 was placed in an USB dock. All my apps/programs are located on the SSD, and movies, music, and other files are located on the external HDD.
Works great. Highly recommend the SSD. They are now starting that slow decline in prize. The 80 GB SSD I bought almost two years age for $289.00 is now running around $220.00, and there are some out there even less expensive.
Just shop around, you should find something in the $150.00 to $300.00 price range you might find worth buying.
Good Luck
Works great. Highly recommend the SSD. They are now starting that slow decline in prize. The 80 GB SSD I bought almost two years age for $289.00 is now running around $220.00, and there are some out there even less expensive.
Just shop around, you should find something in the $150.00 to $300.00 price range you might find worth buying.
Good Luck
The SSD speed? Absolutely. It was, by far, the most noticeable upgrade I've done. I could never go back now (it was the first thing I bought after ordering a MP). Whether or not it's worth the current premium over HDDs is up to you.
Thanks everyone for great advise and comments. Thanks. I may give this a try.
What is a USB dock? You mean you turned the HDD that came with your mac into an external HD?
What is a USB dock? You mean you turned the HDD that came with your mac into an external HD?
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I hope I'm not stepping out of line for answering for lee14160, but yes. Although instead of using an external enclosure, he used a dock that allows you to plug in a SATA HDD and connect it to your computer via USB. It just allows you to be able to swap out drives faster than having to install them in and out of an enclosure.
Any worthwhile computer parts store/site. Just search for "hard drive dock".
Here's the search results from Newegg:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...BESTMATCH&Description=hard+drive+dock&x=0&y=0
Sorry to hijack the thread, but is there any speed/performance/reliability difference between a SSD and a CompactFlash card stuck in an IDE/SATA adapter?
The fastest CompactFlash card I've seen so far makes 90MB/s sustained. IDE has a maximum transfer rate of 133MB/s (theoretical).
SATA II SSD's have sustained transfer rates of 260MB/s +, SATA III drives (coming in a few weeks) will even go up to 500MB/s.
Not to mention 4k IOPS (which is what makes a SSD so fast for boot and apps). Todays SSD's make more than 50000, CF cards not even 5000.
So yes, there is a HUGE performance difference.
Yes, it is that much faster.
I ordered my iMac 27", i7 with the 256 gb solid state drive and a 2tb hard drive. I moved my user folder from the SSD to the standard Hard Drive and put all my applications on the SSD. It is so much faster at opening up the Adobe Creative Suite. It only takes a few seconds to open Photoshop and I finally feel like the computer is keeping up with my tasks instead of waiting for tasks. It is really helpful when I am running multiple applications at the same time.
I wonder how much better things would be with the OWC SSD that they say is faster than the Apple SSD.
I ordered my iMac 27", i7 with the 256 gb solid state drive and a 2tb hard drive. I moved my user folder from the SSD to the standard Hard Drive and put all my applications on the SSD. It is so much faster at opening up the Adobe Creative Suite. It only takes a few seconds to open Photoshop and I finally feel like the computer is keeping up with my tasks instead of waiting for tasks. It is really helpful when I am running multiple applications at the same time.
I wonder how much better things would be with the OWC SSD that they say is faster than the Apple SSD.
I doubt you would notice any difference. The SSDs that Apple use are already damn quick so the difference in normal tasks would be negligible.