SSD ON CORE2DUO , WORTH IT ?

I have a MacBook pro 13 , 2010 model running core2duo that has 4gb ram. It takes me more than a minute to boot up.
So I want to ask will ssd and core2duo make it faster in every aspect or intel core i5 is necessary.
Is core2duo enough or I have to shift to new gen MacBooks with i5

An SSD can improve preformence greatly. It may not be as fast as a core i5 or i7 computer but it will definatley speed things up. If your not planning on buying a new computer anytime soon I would go for an SSD but if you are even in the next 3 years or so, wait unless you need the speed now. Computers are moving away from traditional HHDs and all of Apples new macbooks and macbook airs all have flash storage.

Similar Messages

Macbook Pro SSD SATA III - Worth it?

Hello everyone
I own a mid-2010 13 inch MacBook Pro (2.4 Core 2 Duo). Since i cannot afford a new mac, i want to speed it up a little bit.
The first thing i did was to upgrade the memory to 8GB (from Crucial). The next thing i would like to do, is replace the hard disk with
an SSD one. I have checked many SSD's and i ended up between Crucial and OWC (128GB versions).
I can afford the cost of an SSD but i just realized that these drives are SATA 3. While, if i am not mistaken, my macbook
supports SATA 2 as maximum speed. Is it worth to buy a 6GB/s SSD afterall or not?
I would really appreciate your help and experience.
Thanks
Dimitris

You're correct, they are SATA II, which is limited to 3Gb/s, so it's not worth it to get the faster solid state. Still, though, even at 3Gb/s, you're going to see a giant performance boost over your current hard disk. Enjoy your solid state!

SSD and 2.93 Worth It?

Hello I am looking to buy the 15 inch 2.66ghz MacBook Pro. I was wondering if upgrading to 2.93 ghz would be worth it and show that much of a difference in performance and if the 256gb ssd would be worth it for a performance upgrade. Ultimately if I were to choose just one of the two upgrades which would be the smarter choice. I will be carrying this laptop around a lot at college next year.
Taylor

I look at it this way (and it's the way I plan to go when I buy myself a new MBP 17" in June/July...):
You figure this laptop is going to last you at least 2-3 years... During that time, processing demands will only get higher.
The CPU can't be replaced/upgraded without buying a whole new machine. The HD/SSD CAN be replaced later.
So I'd get the CPU upgrade now, maybe drop the extra $50 for the 7200 RPM HD, then in the fall or early next year when the prices on SSD drives drops significantly (which it should) and the performance on them goes up (which they are starting to) you'll be able to get more bang for the buck, and get it for a LOT less than Apple is charging for it now. Plus it would make the machine faster and thus make it feel like a new machine a year from now when you put the faster drive in.
That should help it easily last 2-3 years.

HDD vs SSD for new MacBook Pro and FCP editing performance

I will be purchasing a new MacBook Pro and I'm curious about performance as it relates to large FCP projects. I'm looking to hear from folks who can help me determine if a solid state drive (SSD) would be worth the extra cost. I edit large FCP projects and I'm curious if using a SSD would be the way to go. Will I get better editing performance with a SSD as opposed to the 7200 RPM HDD?
Thanks!

As a boot drive, SSDs have exceedingly last fast access times, and great data throughput rates. My Crucial SSD has a write read of about 200 MB/s. I can boot in under four seconds, and access apps, and web sites pretty **** fast.
However, beyond this, I don't see any real, substantial or dramatic gains in editing performance at all as a boot drive. I'd save your money on get more RAM, and best CPU and GPU you can afford.

480Gb Mercury Accelsior PCI SSD on Mac Pro 2009

Just purchased a 480Gb Mercury Accelsior. Want to run System and Applications on it. Need best strategy for making the switch. Thanks.

Too big for OS and apps, costs too much for what you get, a $150 WD 10K 250GB 200MB/sec would do fine and OWC SSDs aren't worth the premium or as reliable as they use to appear, if they ever did. Whether the 3rd party TRIM Enabler is a good or bad thing, but TRIM is not support in Lion on 3rd party and it does play a role in reducing Garbage Collection on needless page cells. So you just purchased it? and the forum is littered with lots of threads on set up, cloning, moving home folder or maybe clean install is what you need to do.

Is 208mbs/write 260mbs/reads on a ssd fast?

OS: 10.8.2
I have a macbook pro, mid 2009
link speed negotiated: 3GB
drive: Samsung 500mb 840 model SSD
Is it worth the effort to try to get more speed from this
by seeing if the latest driver from samsung is up to date?
or comb through the forums here to see if I can get some
sort of mac/update to make it get the speeds it's rated for?
I do LOGIC AUDIO PRO recording, and just came off
the stock drive that did wonders for me over the past 3 years.....

Latest firmware for that drive won't increase speeds too much if any. You can try it. The only way you're going to get more speed from that is if you went to a drive that supports higher speeds like the 840 Pro, but the 840 should support read speeds upwards to 530MB/s and write to 330MB/s. If you're only seeing 2xxMB or so, then you're not even fully utilizing that speed yet. Of course, this is all on paper... real world numbers will be different of course.

Is this a reasonable SSD to install in a new Macbook Pro?

Hello all,
I have never owned an apple laptop or desktop and I am about to purchase a brand new macbook pro 15". I am trying to decide between ordering the pre-installed 128 ssd provided by apple versus buying and installing my own. Most people seem to think that the performance boost from installing a third party SSD is well worth it.
I'd appreciate any input on a good ssd to install in the macbook pro. From my limited research, http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227395&cmre=ocz_vertex_ssd-_-20-227-395--Product, would be a reasonable drive. This drive would cost me the same as the 128 SSD from apple.
Being a new apple user, I am also curious about the difficulty of installing the mac OS and programs. Does apple send this software in CD format with new macbook pros ? If I did go with installing my own ssd where would I get the software I will need?
Lastly, I just want to make sure that installing an SSD doesn't void applecare/warranty. I'm pretty sure that it doesn't, but there are alot of conflicting opinions on this for some reason.
Thanks for your help!

Maybe better:
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/internalstorage/Mercury_Extreme_SSDSandforce

Ram and SSD upgrade on MB Pro 13.3" 2.4GHz (Model ID: 7,1)

Hello,
I have a MacBook Pro 13.3" 2.4GHz (Model ID: 7,1) and I am looking to upgrade some of the hardware and make it run much faster. I currently am running both Mac OS X and Windows 7 on the computer using Boot camp. I've neglected upgrading the software on the laptop for a while now because I just wasn't using the computer too much due to always using my work computer at the office and using an iPad for the miscellaneous stuff done at home.
Anyway, I first plan to fully upgrade the OS, firmware, all system updates before doing anything and then I would like to upgrade the RAM to 16 GB and potentially put an SSD in there. My question is, can I put an SSD on there as the primary hard drive to really realize the booting speed advantages of an SSD. And can I somehow clone my original hard drive so I can maintain my Windows 7 install on there as well. The point of upgrading is that I'd like to get a home office setup going and need to run MS office apps, Factset, and Bloomberg natively on the windows side for work and also be able to log into Citrix to access work files and with my current setup this slows down the computer significantly. Just wondering if I would run into any problems or if the SSD is not worth the trouble and I should just stick with the RAM upgrade.
Thanks!

Anyway, I first plan to fully upgrade the OS, firmware, all system updates before doing anything and then I would like to upgrade the RAM to 16 GB and potentially put an SSD in there. My question is, can I put an SSD on there as the primary hard drive to really realize the booting speed advantages of an SSD. And can I somehow clone my original hard drive so I can maintain my Windows 7 install on there as well. The point of upgrading is that I'd like to get a home office setup going and need to run MS office apps, Factset, and Bloomberg natively on the windows side for work and also be able to log into Citrix to access work files and with my current setup this slows down the computer significantly. Just wondering if I would run into any problems or if the SSD is not worth the trouble and I should just stick with the RAM upgrade.
You can fit an SSD and there will be a significant performance increase.
I suggest that you first (using WinClone) clone the Windows installation to an image on the OSX partition, then (using CCC) clone the Mac partition to the SSD (assuming there is enough space). Then use WinClone to restore the Windows partition.

Z68 WIN 7 will not boot after setting drive BIOS from IDE to SATA

MSI Z68MA-ED55 (B3) Motherboard
Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit OS
SATA III Solid State Drive with greater than 500 MB/s throughput
After installing WIN7 and all my Applications programs I noticed in the BIOS that the driver for the SSD did not properly set to fully support the SSD but remained in the IDE mode.
This computer was built for technical graphics work and not for child's play. So I don't want to have to reinstall all the applications software for work with all its required protection features from theft.
QUESTIONS:
1. With this high transfer rate SSD, is it worth the performance improvement to reset the BIOS from the IDE driver to the proper driver?
2. If so, how can I set the BIOS to the correct driver without reinstalling everything?
3. At some level of the installation the system should have sensed the SSD SATA III and changed the driver from IDE. Where should this take place?

Hi,
I had the same problem. You need to put it back to IDE, boot to Windows then follow the below instructions and it works fine. (Courtesy of Guru3D)
Enable AHCI
The last tip we want to give you to gain a little extra performance boost is that you enable AHCI mode. AHCI mode can help out greatly in performance for SSDs. Now, if you swap out an HDD for an SSD with the operating system cloned and THEN enable AHCI in the BIOS, then you'll likely get a boot error / BSOD.
The common question is, is there a solution for this ?
To answer that question (and as we do safely with all modern chipsets) there is a way to safely enable AHCI mode. Here we go:
1. Startup "Regedit"
2. Open HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE / SYSTEM / CurrentControlset / Services
3. Open msahci
4. In the right field left click on "start" and go to Modify
5. In the value Data field enter "0" and click "ok"
6. exit "Regedit"
7. Reboot Rig and enter BIOS (typically hold "Delete" key while Booting)
In your BIOS select "Integrated Peripherals" and OnChip PATA/SATA Devices. Now change SATA Mode from IDE to AHCI.
You now boot into windows 7 or Vista, and the OS will recognize AHCI and install the devices. Now the system needs one more reboot and voilla ... enjoy the improved SSD performance.

System for ~ 1300 €

Hello,
I am going to set up a new system for PPro, After Effects and some C4D. That is what I came up with so far:
1 x Intel Core i7-2600K, 4x 3.40GHz, boxed (BX80623I72600K)
1 x ASUS ENGTX570 DCII/2DIS/1280MD5, GeForce GTX 570, 1.25GB GDDR5, 2x DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort (90-C1CQ60-X0UAY0BZ)
1 x ASRock Z68 Extreme3 Gen3, Z68 (dual PC3-10667U DDR3)
2 x TeamGroup Elite DIMM Kit 8GB PC3-10667U CL9-9-9-24 (DDR3-1333) (TED38192M1333HC9DC)
1 x Fractal Design Define R3 schwarz, schallgedämmt (FD-CA-DEF-R3-BL)
1 x Thermalright HR-02 Macho (Sockel 775/1155/1156/1366/AM2/AM3/AM3+/FM1)
1 x Seasonic X-Series X-560 560W ATX 2.3 (SS-560KM) (semi-passiv)
4 x Samsung Spinpoint F3 1000GB, SATA II (HD103SJ)
1 x Crucial m4 SSD 128GB, 2.5", SATA 6Gb/s (CT128M4SSD2)
After reading Harms article about SSDs I am thinking about not buying the SSD.
Here on the board I have the feeling that there is a tendancy for the EVGA version of the GTX 570 and for an ASUS P8P67 EVO instead of the ASROCK Z68. Am I right? Can someone tell me why? Also Corsair Vengeance RAM seems to be preferred but I could not see the point of 1600 RAM. Am I missing something?
It is the first PC I build after 10 years so every recommendation is very welcome!
Cheers
Erik

Erik,
With that PSU you will likely get into trouble. 560 W is really minimal, you are better off with a Gold label 750 - 850 W PSU. You can check your requirements by going to eXtreme Power Supply Calculator Pro v2.5
and getting the Pro version, setting CPU load to 100% and capacitor aging to 30%. Then add 10 - 15% for safety to the calculated wattage.
You are going for the unlocked version of the 2600, so persumably you may consider overclocking. Then 1600 memory will be most welcome. Also, Teamgroup is a rather obscure brand and I don't know how reliable such a brand is. The Crucial M4 is a good choice for the boot drive, but if you are in a budget squeeze, that is the first thing I would lose.
I tested the start-up time of Audition (3s), Dreamweaver (7s), Encore (5s), Photoshop (7s) and Premiere (7s) using a 150 GB Velociraptor. Keep in mind that this disk is slow in comparison to more modern disks, even with the 10000 RPM spindle. I really wonder if the alleged improvement in loading times of SSD's are worth the price difference. So far I have not heard from SSD users that their loading times are faster and this is measured up to the moment that the splash screen is displayed with the project to open.
Hope this helps.

Macbook Pro solid state hard drive?

I am getting ready to order a new MacBook Pro. What is the advantage, if any, of the solid state drive option? I would assume this is something that has no moving parts thus the computer could be moved while in use and there is greater dependabilty. True? I value any opinions that you can offer. Thanks.

SSDs are certainly more robust and nearly indestructible. It really depends on what your needs are. To be honest, standard hard drives are remarkably robust as well. I've never had a hard drive fail in a notebook (going back nearly 20 years)due to movement. I've never treated them particularly gently either. During that time they have become much more reliable and incorporated technologies to make them even more reliable. After all, billions of notebooks have been sold over the years with hard drives. SSDs are only a recent development. It's also worth noting that while SSDs have no moving parts, it is not all that uncommon for them to fail (although this tends to happen early on). If you need a rock solid drive because you expect to be in environments subject to some extreme shock and need to reduce the likelihood of failure to the absolute lowest possible, an SSD is probably worth it. If your consideration is more towards performance, an SSD is still your best bet, but a hybrid drive is a very close second at a very reasonable price.

15.4 MacBook Pro Non retina vs Retina

Hi everyone. I am purchasing a 2012 Non Retina 15.4" Mac Book Pro to replace a 2008 Macbook. I will be upgrading the memory from 4 Gb to 16 Gb, as well as the 500 Gig (5400rpm) to a 1 TB solid state drive. I will be using the MBP for DJing and possibly video in my shows. Crucial solid state drives and the Samsung EVO are my top choices, but I've heard the M550 and the Samsung EVO have issues. Should I just go with the Crucial M500? BTW, the reason I am going with the 2012 instead of the newer retina models is because they are still upgradable, unlike the Retina models. with applecare, I can upgrade as well as waranty for around $2,200 bucks. Are there any disadvantages to this route I am taking? Should I just bite the bullet and buy a newer macbook pro with retina with the same specs for around $3,000? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

DJServenti wrote:
Do you (or anyone else) recommend a solid state drive (1TB) to put in the MacBook Pro?
In my very biased view, the monetary premium spent on a SSD is not worth the benefits that they afford. I have installed a Seagate 1TB SSHD (hybrid) with good results for a very modest price increase over a conventional HDD. Boot and shutdown times are significantly less than what I experienced before.
For the applications that you are proposing to use the MBP, I do not think that the SSD costs are justified. A 7200 rpm HDD or a SSHD would be sufficient.
Ciao.

ATA vs. Solid State HD

Hello,
On the Apple Store site it says under MacBook Pro hard drive options "..Or you can choose a solid-state drive that offers greater durability."
Is the only advantage of solid state durability? I can't imagine spending an additional $750 for more durability. I've have yet to be dissatisfied with the durability of a regular ATA drive.
Is there a performance difference? Is it worth the difference in price? Is this a situation like with RAM, when one can save an incredible amount by buying elsewhere (like Crucial) and not through Apple? If so, where?
Thanks.

pianoman1976 wrote:
Is the only advantage of solid state durability? I can't imagine spending an additional $750 for more durability. I've have yet to be dissatisfied with the durability of a regular ATA drive.
The reason SSDs are durable is right there in the name: Solid State Drive. They have no moving parts. Hazards that a spinning hard drive is susceptible to, such as a head crash, do not exist with an SSD. It is basically a set of flash memory chips.
Is there a performance difference?
Oh, yes. SSDs are much faster than hard drives in most respects because you don't need to wait for right sector to spin under the head. Since it's all chips, you just go get the data. Boot times are incredibly fast. The only weak point of SSDs seems to be sustained writes.
Is it worth the difference in price?
For most people, not right now. SSDs are new technology and are at the early-adopter part of the price-benefit curve (translation: expensive). If you wait a couple years, they will be MUCH cheaper. Think of how an 8GB iPod touch costs about the same as a 120GB iPod Classic. Much of the reason is because the touch uses solid state memory and the Classic uses a traditional hard drive.
An SSD is only worth it now if you need performance and durability a lot more than you need space.
Is this a situation like with RAM, when one can save an incredible amount by buying elsewhere (like Crucial) and not through Apple?
No. SSDs are expensive everywhere right now. There are cheaper brands, but I read that they use a controller hardware that results in inferior performance. Again, just wait a while until there is more volume, diversity, and refined technology, and the prices will come down.

10.6.7 Combo Update Slows MacBook Air 3D Performance

Several weeks ago I noticed a dramatic slowdown in the graphics performance of my late 2010 MAcBook Air, and after weeks of futile searching, and falsely diagnosing the problem as SSD degradation, I came across the article below on MacWorld:
http://www.macworld.com/article/158494/2011/04/1067updatemba.html
There, the authors described the same problem I was having, and attributed the dramatic graphics slowdown to a problem with drivers installed by the OS 10.6.7 update. I've done my own testing and found that the bad driver problem is specific to the 10.6.7 Combo Update.
I was able to completely restore graphics performance on my MAcBook Air to waht it should be (ie Portal 2 runs great) by following the steps described by commenter shawnyeager (Thanks Shawn!) in the MacWorld article, which I'm copying here for the benefit of others:
Boot off the MAcBook Air USB media, do an in-place install of 10.6.5 (it's non-destructive) and then download individual (non-combo) updaters for 10.6.6, 10.6.7 and 10.6.7 Supplemental. After applying them, Portal 2 is will run beautifully on a late 2010 MacBook Air with native resolution and 'Medium' to 'High' settings on all graphics options. The difference is dramatic.
Cheers!

It's hard to compare the current Macbook air and MacBook Pro models, I'm lucky to have both and both are superb laptops .. but for different reasons.
The current MacBook Air models are head and shoulders above the previous MacBook Air models. Thanks to the SSD and the cache Boot times and basic disk i/o times are blindingly fast .. noticeably faster than my 15'' Thunderbolt MacBook Pro with 7200rpm drive. Overall CPU and graphcis performance are pretty impressive too. you won't find a faster mroe powerful ultralight laptop.
That being said, the current MacBook Pro's are performance powerhouses whose CPU and graphics performance definitely outclass the MacBook Airs ... but with a bit slower IO, and of course a much heavier form factor.
So, both are great, but it's really a matter of which type of machine you prefer. If you to go for eh MacBook Pro, though I don't think the SSD upgrade with worth the price. the 7200rpm drive is plenty fast and much cheaper.

Nikon D600, Lightroom 4.3 computer specs

I am using a Nikon D600, plan to purchase latest version of Lightroom. Need an updated computer for these large photo files. Would like recommendations on a system to keep this amateur happily editing in Lightroom. Thanks.

Lightroom noobie wrote:
Also want to go with Windows 7.
Then you have to build yourself - luckily they still sell Win 7 OEM versions (I just got one for my own new build)
For Lightroom the CPU is the critical component. You'll probably want to look at the quad-core i5 CPU's from Intel (or the equivalent from AMD) - they also have an integrated graphics controller which works fine with Lightroom (according to a recent thread), so that saves you the expense of a dedicated video card. You can get that later if needed (it will be with Photoshop for instance).
For RAM you probably don't need more than 8 GB. I've never seen Lightroom use more than 4 or 5, but remember that you have other things running as well. RAM is sensitive stuff, so make sure it's compatible with the motherboard and CPU. Pay attention to voltage (1.5 or 1.65).
An SSD is well worth the extra expense, but anything less than 256 GB is not very useful. Fill up with spinning drives as needed.
Finally - set up a detailed budget and save wherever possible, because I would strongly advise you to spend as much as possible on a good monitor. Don't settle for an ordinary office monitor, get one with an IPS panel. Office/consumer/gamer monitors use so-called TN panels, which are fast (and cheap), but have an awfully restricted viewing angle - to the point where the top of the screen is dark and the bottom washed out. Useless for photography.
Also make room in the budget for a calibrator. A good entry-level is the Spyder4 Express (about $100). You can upgrade later as your needs grow.

SSD ON CORE2DUO , WORTH IT ?

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