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Level 1

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Serial ATA vs Solid State Drive

Hi, i was configuring a new MacBookPro and found that Apple had introduced a new HDD "Solid State Drive". Costing wise the new 512Gb Solid State Drive is really really high when compared to the old 500GB Serial ATA drive.

I understand that the new HDD has "no moving parts for enhanced durability". Have anyone used it and can you post here the advantages you found compared to the old HDD.

Thanks
-Amstos

MacBookPro, Mac OS X (10.6)

Posted on Jun 6, 2010 9:39 PM

19 replies

amstos Author

Level 1

0 points

Jun 8, 2010 9:21 PM in response to Kappy

Kappy, you mean to say that i CAN'T run 'Win XP 64 OS' both in my current MBP Core 2 CPU T7600 2.33GHz and also in the latest MBP 2.66GHz Intel Core i7 under Snow Leopard.

But 'Win7 64 bit' can be installed on both of the above MBP's under Snow leopard. Am i right?

JoeyR

Level 6

8,305 points

Jun 9, 2010 8:14 AM in response to amstos

That's correct amstos. It should be noted that BootCamp is somewhat limited in terms of the OSes it supports. You can run nearly any OS using a virtualization option (Parallels, Fusion, VirtualBox). While I haven't checked them all, Parallels does support the 64 bit version of XP. Although, the 64 bit version of XP never really took off so there is generally limited support:

http://www.parallels.com/products/desktop/resources/sr/

danegeld

Level 2

185 points

Jun 9, 2010 1:22 PM in response to Kappy

As a simple example one might think the SSD is beneficial because of it's fast boot time. But if you never shut down your computer then it's a lot faster waking from sleep and doing so is just as fast if you have an SSD or a hard drive. Just a simple example to illustrate my point.

I have a MBP with a 128Gb SSD. I shut it down every day. It boots in less than 30 seconds. Windows 7 in a VMWare Fusion virtual machine boots in 35 seconds. I use Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign every day and I'm in and out of those applications 50 times a day. Photoshop CS5 boots in 3 seconds. Illustrator in 5 seconds. InDesign in 8 seconds. Time is money. I'll never go back to a mechanical drive.

For the OP, the trick is not to store data on the SSD system drive. My 128Gb internal drive is only half full even with a full range of applications. I store working files on an ExpressCard SSD and then offload them to a variety of external drives when it's convenient.

amstos Author

Level 1

0 points

Jun 9, 2010 9:24 PM in response to danegeld

Thanks JoeyR. Till now i had only used 'Parallels desktop' and 'Bootcamp' for running Windows on MBP. As 'Parallels' split the memory between MacOs and WinXp, as it's running parallel, its not good for my 3D applications. Hence, i had settled for Bootcamp for long time running Windows xp 32bit. I will be getting my new MBP in 20 days. I excited to try Win7 64 bit on it.

Hi 'danegeld'. I agree to your point of the speed in time on loading Photoshop, Illustrator etc. I use majorly 3D softwares like Maya and Compositing softwares like Eyeon fusion. Can you refer me to some benchmark done between rendering done between MBP running on Serial Atd harddisk and MBP running on SSD harddisk.

Serial ATA vs Solid State Drive