Your Opinion: 1.5 TB Option

[Traverse]

I realize that this is just speculation, but I'd still be interested to hear your thoughts on this.

The original rMBP maxed out at 750GB which was bumped to 1TB a year later in 2013. Do you think we'll finally get a storage bump?

I realize that with Apple this will be cost prohibitive (which is sad since you can get a 1TB SSD for a few hundred today), but would still be nice to have. I have 700GB of data and a 50GB (want 100 GB) bootcamp. 1 TB leaves me some room to grow, but not much.

 

[robvas]

I realize that this is just speculation, but I'd still be interested to hear your thoughts on this.

The original rMBP maxed out at 750GB which was bumped to 1TB a year later in 2013. Do you think we'll finally get a storage bump?

I realize that with Apple this will be cost prohibitive (which is sad since you can get a 1TB SSD for a few hundred today), but would still be nice to have. I have 700GB of data and a 50GB (want 100 GB) bootcamp. 1 TB leaves me some room to grow, but not much.

2TB option would be sweeeet

 

[jerryk]

I suspect if you want 2 TB you are going to have to add something external like a Samsung T3 drive. I do not see apple adding a second m.2 memory slot.

 

[Traverse]

2TB option would be sweeeet

True, but I see 1.5 as more plausible .

 

[wegster]

Possible, but a toss-up at this point.

The only > 1TB SSDs I've seen are SATA/2.5-3.5" HD physical format. The blades are smaller and would need to either add a second slot, see the next gen of miniaturization to increase chip/storage density, or do a layered blade.

It's possible Samsung or others may have something up their sleeve w/vNand or similar on-chip 'vertical stacking' that's waiting to be revealed with the next MBP....although if Apple keeps going with their proprietary connectors for what is effectively a commodity SSD, it's going to be upsetting when non-Apple customers can pick up a 2GB SSD for reasonable $ in the future if Apple owners are left bending over or simply can't get one at all.

 

[tubeexperience]

Buy a 2012 MacBook Pro from Craigslist and put in a 2TB SSD.

 

[NathanA]

...although if Apple keeps going with their proprietary connectors for what is effectively a commodity SSD, it's going to be upsetting when non-Apple customers can pick up a 2GB SSD for reasonable $ in the future if Apple owners are left bending over or simply can't get one at all.

I typically agree with sentiments like this; however, just based on the history of flash blades alone, proprietary or not, my money is on Apple hitting 1.5-2TB on their proprietary form-factor blades well before the rest of the industry breaks the 1TB barrier on M.2/NGFF. Apple has had 1TB in rMBPs since the second half of 2013, and 1TB is *just* starting to become an actual thing in NGFF land. That's a nearly 3 year gap! Keep in mind that Samsung never released a 1TB version of the SM951, which is the model of blade that Apple's Samsung drives are equivalent to (same flash chips & controller). No wonder Apple has insisted on their own form factor to-date.

-- Nathan

 

[tubeexperience]

I typically agree with sentiments like this; however, just based on the history of flash blades alone, proprietary or not, my money is on Apple hitting 1.5-2TB on their proprietary form-factor blades well before the rest of the industry breaks the 1TB barrier on M.2/NGFF. Apple has had 1TB in rMBPs since the second half of 2013, and 1TB is *just* starting to become an actual thing in NGFF land. That's a nearly 3 year gap! Keep in mind that Samsung never released a 1TB version of the SM951, which is the model of blade that Apple's Samsung drives are equivalent to (same flash chips & controller). No wonder Apple has insisted on their own form factor to-date.

-- Nathan

Samsung SM951 is single-sided, while the one on the MacBook Pro is double-sided.

There is nothing special aside from that.

 

[NathanA]

Samsung SM951 is single-sided, while the one on the MacBook Pro is double-sided.

There is nothing special aside from that.

That's a good point, and I didn't know that all SM951 models were single-sided. But there is also no reason why Samsung could not have decided to manufacture double-sided NGFFs. (I have a 256GB one from MyDigitalSSD in my MacBook Air that has chips on both sides.) Nothing in the spec prohibits this, though I grant that it might reduce the number of computers that a 1TB model could have comfortably fit in.

For some reason, they chose not to. Whether that reason was technical, or just practical/political/marketing, or whatever, is somewhat academic. The fact is that those in the market for a standards-based form factor in 1TB capacities had either no or next-to-no options until recently.

-- Nathan

 

[jerryk]

That's a good point, and I didn't know that all SM951 models were single-sided. But there is also no reason why Samsung could not have decided to manufacture double-sided NGFFs. (I have a 256GB one from MyDigitalSSD in my MacBook Air that has chips on both sides.) Nothing in the spec prohibits this, though I grant that it might reduce the number of computers that a 1TB model could have comfortably fit in.

For some reason, they chose not to. Whether that reason was technical, or just practical/political/marketing, or whatever, is somewhat academic. The fact is that those in the market for a standards-based form factor in 1TB capacities had either no or next-to-no options until recently.

-- Nathan

Probably heat is an issue. We use the Samsung 950 Pros (m.2-PCIe, 512 GB) in our deskside systems. Under load they get really warm. We added fans to the cases directed at the module.