As much as I love SSD's, is 256GB actually enough for power users? Or are they assuming the OS will be on the SSD and you can hook up an external HD for more space?
Just curious.
Just curious.
I've found 256GB to be a bit of a sweet spot. I can't get everything I would ever want on the disc, but it's enough with maintenance and uninstalling things I'm no longer using to any great extent. And the performance advantage of an SDD is so ridiculously nice that I would never give it up for a bit of extra convenience.
If you're doing things that are seriously space heavy like video editing, you'd probably need an external storage source to make up the difference. But for coding and general use, I find it to be more than enough.
Saying that, I'm sure there are developers out there who couldn't live in 256GB. I'm not sure how common they are but I'm sure they exist.
I really wish I could live in less space (I am constantly looking for stuff to delete) because then backups wouldn't be so painful.
You'd probably need external storage either way. I used to have some friends who were big into video editing, they could chew through 1TB with just a few projects.
At that, like 125GB is steam games.
I would definitely need a terabyte SSD to try to consolidate a system all on one disk. My notebook right now is a 256GB SSD + 1TB mechanical that works well.
Heh, that's a bit more than I expect from this form factor, but I can't believe Dell's calling this an "Ultrabook" and reviewers are calling it a "premium notebook" if the RAM maxes out at 8GB.
The Ars review included a similar remark:
> The year is 2015. 8GB of RAM should be the baseline, with 16GB as an option. 4GB is barely enough to run Chrome.
but noted that the CPU supports 16GB, so unless the RAM is soldered you can reach 16GB aftermarket.
Is is according to ifixit's teardown:
"Buyer beware: Just like in the MacBooks Air and Retina, the RAM in the XPS 13 is soldered to the motherboard, and cannot be replaced. When you're picking out your new laptop, configure what you think it'll need...forever." - https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Dell+XPS+13+Teardown/36157#s...
I'm not a fan of this trend.
Just recently, when Broadwell was released, Intel boasted how small their chips have become. This is necessary to make the as-thin-as-possible design of Ultrabooks and it's a trend that's not going to go away because having an Ultrabook in your bag is so much better than any other kind of laptop.
I don't really know how it would be possible to make an Ultrabook at that size still modular like a tower PC.
Nobody is asking for that, notebook CPU and GPU haven't been replaceable in years, and peripherals or the PSU are very much non-replaceable. Being able to replace the SSD (still possible so far through new-ish low-profile formats) and RAM (less and less possible these days) is not even remotely close to "modular like a tower PC", it's barely two steps above from "as unmodular as a cell phone".
You may be right about the long-term trend (but I hope not). In the short term my annoyance at this has me considering something other than a Macbook Pro as my next machine, which I never would have believed if you'd told me it a few years ago.
I'm envious of your attitude for not really caring about your laptop's size. That makes it a lot easier :)
Well, it's not that I don't care at all, but I'd much prefer an up-to-date processor, GPU, etc in a 2011 13" MBP chassis - with the ability to expand RAM & storage - over the slimmer MPB "retina" offerings.
The biggest stuff on my desktop are games.