The Hidden Benefits of SSD
Even though I have been lusting after a new MacBook Air since they were launched, I’ve held firm and decided to squeeze the most of out of my current MacBook1 for as long as I can.
My resolve hasn’t prevented me however from throwing some new hardware into the MacBook. I found a nice deal on a Kingston 128GB SSD last month, and I upgraded my machine.
I’ll quickly pile on what is now becoming the oft-repeated sentiments on SSD – it makes a huge difference, and I can’t imagine ever going back. My boot time is light years faster, I’ve yet to see a bouncing dock icon since the upgrade, and my machine is more snappy and responsive than ever before.
The biggest surprise though wasn’t the speed boost. It was discovering how lightweight I could operate my Mac and how liberating that was.
Instead of importing all of my settings via Time Machine or my cloned backup, I rebuilt the hard drive from scratch and only installed apps or restored data as needed. Now, I’ve settled in ~45gb of apps and data, and it feels great. I’ve got everything I need2 on the machine and have plenty of room to spare. I’ve also picked up more than a handful of new productivity tricks with OS X’s built-in apps and services since I have been adamant that I won’t install a third party application unless it is a must have.
I really have never felt better about the state of my Mac.