Corsair "P128" 128GB SSD in a MacBook Pro

Posted by on July 26, 2009 11 comments

After toying with the Seagate 500GB hard drive in my MacBook Pro for about 6 weeks, I realized that I needed an even faster drive to push through my photo and video projects. After conducting a ton of research and grieving over the expense, I decided to ‘invest’ in the Corsair P128 CMFSSD-128GBG2D at newegg.com.

There were two things that really sold me on the Corsair P128: the 220MB/s read and 200MB/s write speeds and the 128MB cache. The read/write speeds are near top of the line for SSDs. The Corsair’s 128MB cache is simply staggering compared to the average 8MB or 16MB cache on standard laptop hard drives (16MB cache for the 500GB Seagate).

The P128 is the exact length, height and width as the 500GB Seagate. The P128, however, is much, much lighter.

Here are some simple before and afters:

Action or Test Run   Seagate 500GB Corsair P128 Improvement
Startup to Desktop, Quicksilver & NewsFire   80 seconds 34 seconds 2.3x
Photoshop CS4   16 seconds 6 seconds 2.6x
Firefox 3.5   8 seconds 4 seconds 2.0x
Word/Excel 2008   11 seconds 4 seconds 2.7x
Mail   4 seconds 3 seconds 1.3x
Random Read (4k)   0.60 MB 16.19 MB 26.9x
Random Write (4k)   1.18 MB 12.30 MB 10.4x

Here’s the P128 getting mounted in the drive bay:

Dropping from 500GB storage was a bit of a mental hurdle, but I really value speed over size. That’s what external drives are for.

After a few days using the P128, I’m very satisfied. The price still makes me wince, though. Ouch.

MacBook Pro and the Seagate Momentus 500GB 7200RPM Drive

Posted by on June 7, 2009 58 comments

I went ahead and picked up the granddaddy of all laptop hard drives for my MacBook Pro – the Seagate Momentus 500GB 7200RPM with SATA 3.0 (model ST9500420AS). I upgraded from a Hitachi 320GB 7200RPM drive and boy, what a wonderful difference!

Using Carbon Copy Cloner, it took roughly 3 1/2 hours to clone the contents of my 320GB drive to the 500GB. 120GB of photos was the #1 slow down, and #2 was the 320GB drive dragging its proverbial feet. Once the cloning was done, replacing the 320 with the 500 took about 2 minutes – 5 little screws (1 brace and 4 stabilizers on the drive).

The first thing I noticed was that the 500GB Seagate drive boots about 40% faster than the 320GB Hitachi. Apps open up a little faster – not 40% faster, but certainly 20% or so.

Once I’d booted up, I ran several tests and scans on the drive to make sure the drive was going to be stable and error free. Nothing sucks quite so much as banking on a new hard drive, only to have it melt down. Tests showed no drive flaws.

I then ran an XBench test to compare the two drives. The 500GB drive scored well over twice as fast as the 320GB with sequential and random reads/writes. For the non-techies, this simply means that this new Seagate drive whips the snot out of the Hitachi drive.


(XBench is a free utility that every Mac user should have, even if it’s rarely used.)

On the down side, the Seagate drive is just as loud as the 320GB Hitachi. That was a little disappointment to me. That said, the drive isn’t “noisy” per se, it’s just that the spinning is clearly audible in a near silent room or if one listens within 6 or 7 inches of the laptop body. No huge deal.

Other positives? XP boots and runs faster in Parallels. So does Windows 7. So does Linux. Photoshop CS4 opens up 25% faster and runs actions in an instant. File transfers to other 7200RPM drives are way faster. In short, pretty much everything is better and faster.

The best part of all? After Leopard, tons of apps, tens of thousands of photos, etc. I’ve got about 300GB free. Awesome!!

If you’re considering buying the Seagate 500GB drive, I hope these comments help. And hopefully you wind up with a good stable drive that passes any tests you subject it to.

A Greener Apple – OS X on USB Flash Memory

Posted by on December 12, 2008 3 comments

A few quick thoughts on how to make Apple a little greener:

Over the last few years, Apple has been reducing the size of it’s product packaging. Some packaging has been reduced by well over 50% – iPod/iPhone cases, MacBook and MacBook Pro boxes, etc. Software packaging (like that for OS X Leopard, iLife, iWork, etc.) has been dropped by about 75% in size, which is really great for the environment (and for Apple’s profit margin – win win).

After getting a new MacBook Pro, I was looking at the installation DVDs for OSX and iLife. They’re still DVDs – ostensibly an aging medium, especially with USB sticks and other flash memory becoming so widely available and inexpensive.

I think it’d make sense for Apple to ditch future OS X installation DVDs in favor of a locked USB installation device (or even SDHC card with a USB reader). Every Intel-based Apple computer, whether an iMac, MacBook, MacBook Pro or Mac Pro, comes with USB ports and can boot directly from those USB ports. USB data transfer speeds are much better than DVD transfer, so theoretically, OS X installation or repair could be greatly improved via USB.

Price is one thing to consider. I know USB flash memory is higher priced than DVD disks, but in bulk, USB drives can’t be too expensive. Besides, Apple would be able to drop packaging sizes by at least another 50-75%, saving more money and earning an even better reputation.

I’ll bet even Greenpeace would give a thumbs-up. Maybe. Those guys are tough to please! (I remember when Greenpeace was warm & fuzzy, all about hippies saving the whales and seal cubs. Seems like such a long time ago.)