FileVault full disk encryption overhead on Lion

anandtech.com

19 pointswheels4 comments

The difference between machines with AES-NI and without is night and day; I'd basically consider filevault FDE mandatory on any machine with AES-NI unless it's physically secured all the time and really needs disk speed to the exclusion of all else.

The other great thing is filevault and timemachine now interoperate fairly well.

I was interested in which CPUs actually support AES-NI, and found[1] a list (intel only): http://ark.intel.com/MySearch.aspx?AESTech=true

[1]: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/AES_instructi...

Do the i5/i7 chips in the new MBA count?

Yes. Anything i7 or i5 that Apple has used has aes-ni in it. The last machines to fail this were the old mbp13 (2010), 2010 Mac mini, and 2010 MBA. Everything currently sold has aes-ni.

On the new MBA 13 1.8ghz, I don't even notice the hit.

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