Will The New MacBook Pro Move To SSD…Without A Doubt

Posted on February 11, 2011 by AppleBitch


The MacBook Pro has been hotly tipped to receive an update soon and, while it is not clear yet if the changes would be a simple spec upgrade or a complete design refresh, one thing is absolutely certain. Apple is going to move to offering a Solid State Drive (SSD) as the default storage option. Why can we say this with such confidence? You just have to look at the precedence.

First, solid state drives are blisteringly fast.  You just have to look at the experiences that people have been having with the MacBook Air, a laptop with an Intel processor that, with the imminent release of Sandy Bridge architecture, is now two generations behind in technology.  Yet, the Air ‘appears’ faster than a hard drive based MacBook Pro and the reason is the SSD which essentially removes the bottleneck that we have seen previously when using hard drives.  With the Air, users are now seeing their laptops operate at the speed that they were designed to.

Second, flash storage has a lower power consumption than a hard drive and, as a result can increase the battery life dramatically.  The 11 inch Air has a battery life of around 5 hours and the 13 inch gives around 7 hours.  This is in a laptop that is one of the thinnest that we have seen.  Assuming that the MacBook Pro does receive a design refresh soon and moves to a moderately thinner form factor, although probably not as thin as the Air as there’s still a little more technology to fit inside.  Apple stated that moving to flash storage in the Air freed up around 90% more space when compared to using a hard drive.  Imagine using only a fraction of that space for a bigger, yet more efficient battery, and you move from the current spec of 8-9 hours use on a MacBook Pro into the deepest realms of double figures.  We obviously don’t know what new models would be rated at for wireless productivity but it’s a safe bet that it’s going to be a lot longer than 9 hours.

It was reported today that Apple is apparently doubling the order numbers of certain ‘hot-selling’ notebooks (via MacRumors).  While this more than likely refers to the Air, a revamped MacBook Pro would fall under this category if the refresh struck a cord with consumers.  A move to SSD and a thinner construction would do just that.  Apple has invested heavily in flash storage, purchasing large amounts of it for use in their devices.  The iPad, iPod Touch, iPhone, Apple TV and Mac Air all come with flash memory as standard and Apple has been offering it as an option in their MacBook Pro and iMac for quite some time.  The upcoming refresh will cement that migration and 256GB SSD will be the standard option when the new MacBook Pro is launched.

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  • james braselton

    hi there i am buying a macbook pro with 256 gb ssd i have a 24 inch imac with 750 gb hdd and only used 90 gb i am mostly hard core gamer soo a ssd be alwsoume

  • Scott

    Unfortunately, this didn’t pan out. I was really looking forward to selling my 17″ Unibody Core2Duo but today’s release simply isn’t anywhere near enough of an upgrade to justify the cost. Bummer. But definitely a money saver! So thanks Apple…I guess.

    • http://www.applebitch.com AppleBitch

      Yep – SSD is available as an option however

      • Scott

        Sure, has been in previous versions as well, no? The problem is that it remains an outrageously expensive options for all but those with the smallest storage requirements.

        Not even USB 3.0! I Personally think this is one of the biggest “swing-and-a-miss” scenarios I’ve seen from Apple in a while. They clearly weren’t ready to invest in this product line this year. Just hung a few new ornaments on last year’s tree and called it good. I’m curious to see if bloggers and reviewers will call them out on it or if they’ll fawn over it simply because, by golly, it’s from Apple.

  • Bill

    With the new mini-SATA format (basically an oversized stick of RAM), there’s no reason Apple can’t incorporate SSD and still leave the hard drive for mass storage.

    On the 15″ MBP there would still be enough room to keep the optical drive (maybe not on the 13″ model)

  • jsk

    @ Lauri Mueller:

    Safe practice is two have your photos stored in two different places on two different kinds of media. I would have a large HD in my laptop (and keep the photos there) but also have a DVD backup of the photos. That way, if my laptop gets nailed by an errant electro-magnetic force while in transit, I still have the originals safely stored on non-magnetic media.

    Yes, you can take a huge external HD and an external DVD burner with you into the field, but that’s no where near as “portable” as a laptop with a huge internal HD and a DVD burner. Digital photographers need to take less stuff with them into the field. Not more.

    Apple already has two different ultra-portable computer that ideally suit the needs spec’ed by this hypothetical MacBook Pro: the iPad and the MacBook Air.

  • Lauri Mueller

    Why wouldn’t a photographer use an external hard drive to dump photos onto? Dvd capacity is so small compared to an external hard drive. They are also making pretty big thumb drives now for a compact solution. Then they would be ready for editing when you are back in the studio instead of having to take the files back off all the dvds to some hard drive. Much more efficient. Optical drives are on their way out.

  • jsk

    How about offering a choice (this is a pro model, not consumer, after all) for those of use who regularly use their DVD burner (twice a week in the office, multiple times daily on road trips). Not everyone’s profession revolves around typing text into a blog post or are you suggesting that pro photographers dump multi-GB memory cards to “the cloud” while working in the field (for example)? Besides, 256GB SSD are what $600 to $1000. No thanks. Sounds to me like you’re more interested in (and would be better served by) an Air than a MacBook Pro.

  • huy

    Dear Steve,
    remove the dvd, have both ssd ( for mac os x) and sata hard drive i( for storage) in the laptop!!!

  • mexico

    From a power and price perspective it makes sense to add SSD and remove DVD at the same time.

    Apple should really offer a 512gb SSD for the mid-grade 15-inch. I suspect taking out the DVD drive would help level out the cost of this more expensive drive.

    As a Pro user, I’d be willing to drop the DVD and wonder if others are willing to get the Air-style external DVD drive (for those 1-2 times a year you actually need it).

  • Bigis Pucks

    Will the iMac get a refresh in March 11th aswell? Ive been waiting for this new iMac for a while now.

  • bmv

    Incorporate SSD; drop ODD. Keep similar form factor but enable docking of iPhone w/in chassis.

    • http://www.applebitch.com AppleBitch

      Haha not a chance

    • mbp17

      docking of iPhone w/in chassis. << WTF!! this is f'kng stupid, you are f'kng stupid!

      • Baldrel

        I don’t see how that is stupid. Apple won’t do it, as its not very elegant, but it is a cool idea. iOS syncing in the future will be done wirelessly anyway, this would be useful only to charge. I don’t think that they should make it thinner, i think they should make it faster/better battery life by removing the optical drive and using that space. They should put some better speakers in too, they are so weedy, like all the other apple laptops ones in the past.