How to distinct MBA w/ SSD & HDD ?

[wombon]

so basicaly how the hell can I tell differnce between solid state drive MBA over one w/ normal hard disk drive ? Ive read on some other forum of a guy who thought he bought a SSD MBA but it turns out it was HDD MBA but he could not see a diference when he made a deal w/ this scam guy. So im in process of getting myself MBA but I'm a bit afraid now getting. SO how could i tell this one is SSD version and this one isnt right away - not looking in system specs.

 

[dudeitsjay]

so basicaly how the hell can I tell differnce between solid state drive MBA over one w/ normal hard disk drive ? Ive read on some other forum of a guy who thought he bought a SSD MBA but it turns out it was HDD MBA but he could not see a diference when he made a deal w/ this scam guy. So im in process of getting myself MBA but I'm a bit afraid now getting. SO how could i tell this one is SSD version and this one isnt right away - not looking in system specs.

In the capacity.
Rev B's are 120gig for HDD and 128 for SSD
Rev A's are 80 for HDD and 64 for SSD

Just FYI, people can custom order and mix and match, so though generally 1.6 will come with a HDD, sometimes they opt to upgrade the HDD to SSD, in which case you just look at the capacity to tell the difference.

 

[justit]

SO how could i tell this one is SSD version and this one isnt right away - not looking in system specs.

You're not alone, you'd be surpised how many Apple Store employees can't tell either

Quick way is to look at drive capacity:
64 GB (rev A) and 128 GB (Rev B) are SSD models

 

[wombon]

yes Im aware of the capacity of both HDD & SSD version, but actually his system profile was completely wrong from what he bought. poor bastard got the cheapest revA version thought he got revB 1.86Ghz. his specs were complete false, after reinstalling the OS he saw he got scamed
how the hell can one change system specs im not aware but obviously it can be done. that why I could use tot tell them appart by just holding it and (maybe ) trying to feel the HDD version when disk spins. is it noticable ?

 

[dudeitsjay]

yes Im aware of the capacity of both HDD & SSD version, but actually his system profile was completely wrong from what he bought. poor bastard got the cheapest revA version thought he got revB 1.86Ghz. his specs were complete false, after reinstalling the OS he saw he got scamed
how the hell can one change system specs im not aware but obviously it can be done. that why I could use tot tell them appart by just holding it and (maybe ) trying to feel the HDD version when disk spins. is it noticable ?

Oh jeez. When you're going to buy from shady places like craigslist, you want to thoroughly inspect the hardware. Run iStats to get realtime information on the MBA. It'll show the HD info, though that may be alterable as well... Additionally, run a benchmark for the hd and proc and match it up to what is expected of each model. If anything, go through all of the system profiler and also find the serial number and check it out. In terms of physically telling the difference, it'll be hard. The HDDs will make the typical read accessing cricking noise. The SSDs are virtually silent. Go by the sound it makes. But in the end, nothing beats an old fashion benchmarking and CPU-Z style analysis.

Also, a general rule for buying used parts from places like craigslist is to ask direct questions. Ask if the seller has done anything or anything is wrong, and especially find an honest answer as to why he's selling. Sniff him out, so to speak. Check the screws on the bottom plate to see if they've been tampered with, supposedly leaving trace signs of minor stripping on the heads of each screw if they weren't meticulous. Uhmm... yeah. Getting scammed like that blows...

 

[stoconnell]

I am trying to understand the scenario you are operating under? Are you in a position where you are prevented from firing up system profiler or running system_profiler in a terminal? or disk utility? Are you able to lookup the serial number on the bottom plate (obviously, a devious person could switch around bottom plates).

I am guessing you might be able to listen for disk head/platter noise, esp. if you are able to generate some activity on the machine. Otherwise, the units are not visually distinct between the HDD/SSD models of each revision. You can get an idea of what revision you looking at by opening the port door and looking to see if there is a mini-displayport or mini-dvi port.

If you aren't given full access to the machine, walk away.

 

[Airforcekid]

If possible tell them to sleep and or reboot if you hear ANY noise HDD SSD has no moving parts and startup time under 50 secs while hdd is around 80secs! No way to tell other than that....

 

[wetrix]

A quick way is to tell is click everything on the dock. If it takes almost no time at all (office/cs3 excluded) then it's SSD. If it takes over 10 seconds, it's HDD.