I'm considering getting a MacBook Air, but I'm concerned about the amount of storage on the device. If I use an SD card as storage for movies I'd rip from a DVD, would the Air be able to play these movies direct from the SD card without delays/skipping? I'm talking about 2 hour commercial movies, not shorter movies I've taken myself.
Also the specs page doesn't indicate what version of SD the MacBook Air has: 2.0 or 3.0.
Any advice? Thanks!
The potential bottleneck, if any, will not be the ability of the MBA to transfer the data off the card, but to decode the compressed file. Anything under 1080P should be just fine though.
My MBA 11.6" is not able to routinely play 1080P smoothly through USB, but it is the processor that is lagging, not the data transfer. A 13", with a faster processor may be able to do better though.
The potential bottleneck, if any, will not be the ability of the MBA to transfer the data off the card, but to decode the compressed file. Anything under 1080P should be just fine though.
My MBA 11.6" is not able to routinely play 1080P smoothly through USB, but it is the processor that is lagging, not the data transfer. A 13", with a faster processor may be able to do better though.
I agree with SP. I routinely run 720p movies off an SD card on my 13" MBA without any problems. I will say, though, that the card gets absurdly hot to the touch after 25-30 minutes. I suspect that's to be expected given where the cooling substructure on the machine is in comparison to the SD card slot.
Thanks guys, this is really helpful.
Do either of you have any idea which version of SD I should purchase? I've seen mentions of SD card specs of 2.0 or 3.0 but the tech specs page of the MBA doesn't specify which it uses.
MacBook Air SD Card for Watching Video?
