Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

daveh0

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Apr 16, 2018
22
0
USA
I'm about to come into possession of a 2015 MBP with a stock 512GB SSD. I will likely only use this occasionally when traveling and having to work (web design and development... Adobe Suite, MAMP instances, VSCode... no VMs, very little video editing or rendering) and in those cases, I will likely transfer the files I need from my iMac (the REAL workhorse) before leaving, do my work while gone and then transfer them back upon my return... and remove from laptop. Under normal conditions, the 512GB would probably be plenty, but I'm considering purchasing some external storage just in case there are ever files for multiple projects that I need to transfer so that I can still have a decent amount of free space on the startup drive for Adobe scratch disk stuff.

I'm picking up this MBP on the cheap because my 2019 just died unexpectedly. Since this was an unexpected expense, I'd like to keep costs down, but I obviously want to balance that with performance. Any suggestions? With the exception of GIANT Photoshop or video files, with which I work with very few, will I notice a huge difference in performance between a regular USB3 external HDD (or maybe even something like https://www.amazon.com/USB3-1-Computer-External-Storage-Android/dp/B0BVG1W7X8/ref=sr_1_7_sspa) and something like an SATA enclosure connected via Thuderbolt 2? To me, the latter sounds like a bit of overkill and probably not worth the extra cost.

If anyone has any thoughts or wisdom to share on the matter, I'd be greatly appreciative.
 
As an Amazon Associate, MacRumors earns a commission from qualifying purchases made through links in this post.
I'm pretty sure SATA over thunderbolt will not be any better than equivalent HDD over usb 3 in any practical sense.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Brian33
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.