Freitag

The Importance of SSD

Yesterday, I bought myself a MacBook Air to replace my 15-inch MacBook Pro. As I’ve advanced in my career, I have started to require less and less power but more and more mobility. When the new Air was announced, I looked at the specs and thought it sounded like a computer I could actually use day to day for coding, diagraming, writing and occasionally photoshopping. But I was scared that I’d be taking away too much and would ultimately miss the power and flexibility of the bigger MacBook Pro.

My fears aren’t entirely quelled yet but after running Xbench, I’m certainly feeling better. Here are some interesting numbers running Xbench on a late-2009 15-inch MacBook Pro, an early-2010 13-inch MacBook Pro, and the new MacBook Air*. 

CPU Test:
172.52 - MacBook Pro 15-inch
189.60 - MacBook Pro 13-inch (winner)
147.59 - MacBook Air 

Quartz Graphics Test:
206.62 - MacBook Pro 15-inch (winner)
162.64 - MacBook Pro 13-inch
155.16 - MacBook Air

Disk Test:
45.29 - MacBook Pro 15-inch
44.60 - MacBook Pro 13-inch
234.15 - MacBook Air (winner, just by a hair)

Overall Score: 
134.44 - MacBook Pro 15-inch
130.65 - MacBook Pro 13-inch
178.91 - MacBook Air (winner)

If not for the disk test, the MacBook Air would not be close. But because of the extreme difference in performance of the read/write speeds to the SSD, the MacBook Air is the winner by a wide margin. I know this is nerd data but the real-world experience of using a MacBook Air is remarkable. The SSD makes the entire computer jump to life which really tells me that platter-based disk drives are the only thing really slowing computers down anymore and the time to move away from those liabilities has arrived. I think if I wanted pure power, I could easily return the MacBook Air and use the money to buy an SSD and more RAM for my MacBook Pro and it would smoke the Air. But with the Air I get both better performance and better mobility. The combined weight of the iPad, MacBook Air, and power supplies for both are less than the MacBook Pro alone and that’s a big deal when you’re flying all over the States doing usability studies.

*Each computer has 4GB of 1066GHz DDR3 RAM. They are all running Core 2 Duo processors but the 2 Pro models have 2.66GHz chips while the Air has a 2.13GHz chip. The 2010 Pro and Air are using the Nvidia 320M graphics chip and the 2009 Pro is running the Nvidia 9400M. I did not test the 2009 Pro discreet Nvidia 9600M GT graphics chip. Both Pro models are running a 320GB 5400RPM Hard Drive while the Air is running a 256GB SSD.