Hi, I see many people go for the 256GB internal SSD + external route for this year's Mac lineup. While some are happy with the approach, others are not. Besides the need of attaching an external SSD to the Mac all the time, what other potential issues are there for the 512Gb SSD + TB5 external SSD approach? I used a 1TB SSD 10+ years ago. Ideally when buying a new MacBook Pro, I should choose a 2TB internal SSD.
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Is 512GB SSD absolutely sufficient?
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Just my approach. For laptops I go with 2TB. It provides about all I need away from my desk. For desktops I go with 1TB. I like free space for anything that might need space.
Is the problem happening only when the Mini lost connection with the external SSD? I think I read that even we could make the Mini to save all photos and videos to an external SSD, Photos will create a new folder in the main internal drive and mess everything up?
You need to manage the space - but that is not difficult. With 512Gb I would keep my home folder on the internal and move anything large to the external. That is what I do with 512GB internal and external USB 3 and 3.1 SSDs. Unless you store videos you are actively editing on the external you probably don't need TB5!
As others state - the rules/options are different for a MacBook vs desktop. In particular the ease of access to external storage.
With my Mac mini (M1 and now M4 Pro) 512GB internal was PLENTY - I have a TB 4TB drive for photos, media, etc. which is slower (TB3 moved from the M1 to the M4 Pro) but still “pretty fast.”
With my MacBook Pro I want all my data on the built-in storage, which means the storage requirement depends on how big that data is. For me 1TB is plenty; some might need 2TB or 4TB or more.
It massively depends on you use-case. I'm an audio-creator, and I have a 2TB Mac Studio where I keep literally everything on the internal storage because the projects and files I create are large, and I use iCloud to make sure I can access everything from all my devices. Even if I want to share something with a Windows user it's just a matter of logging into iCloud on their computer and downloading it. The only thing I use an external drive for is Time Machine backups (because iCloud is not a backup service).
Mostly though it seems many people spend a grand or more on a 1TB 16GB RAM computer just to open web-based apps in 100 tabs, and save to One Drive or Google Drive. Which personally I think is stupid, they may as well just have a ChromeBook (or at least a less expensive computer), but ultimately it's their money to spend it how they wish. If you're mostly going going to be that type of person and save basically f-all to your hard drive, I don't see why 512GB isn't way more than enough. Even 256GB.
Mostly though it seems many people spend a grand or more on a 1TB 16GB RAM computer just to open web-based apps in 100 tabs, and save to One Drive or Google Drive. Which personally I think is stupid, they may as well just have a ChromeBook (or at least a less expensive computer), but ultimately it's their money to spend it how they wish. If you're mostly going going to be that type of person and save basically f-all to your hard drive, I don't see why 512GB isn't way more than enough. Even 256GB.
No it is an independent factor. A Photos Library on an external can be on iCloud or not. The only thing I have seen about Photos libraries on externals is that they are not indexed by Spotlight (reference).
In my view - no. Using a NAS requires the network up and running at all times and a NAS is slower than DAS.
The settings message refers to Spotlight searching, not indexing.
All Photos libraries (in my experience) are indexed by Spotlight and the index is searchable from within Photos. They are not searchable from Finder.
Much of this ties in with the distinction between Spotlight and Core Spotlight.
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Move your Photos library to save space on your Mac - Apple Support
To save storage space on your Mac, you can move your Photos library to a different storage device.
By the way, you can do this for other Apple apps:
Change where your music files are stored on Mac
On your Mac, change where your Music files are stored on your computer. You can also manage your files and create folders for better organization.
support.apple.com
Change Files settings in the Apple TV app on Mac
In the Apple TV app on Mac, set options for folder locations, automatic delete options, and more.
support.apple.com
Move your iMovie for Mac library - Apple Support
To save space on your Mac, you can move your iMovie library to an external storage device.
Thanks @gilby101. So what difference does the user notice about searchability of Photos Libraries on internal and external? IE what does the message mentioned in the link I posted, "This Library isn't searchable in Spotlight due to its location" actually mean in practice? Is it that search from Finder doesn’t work, but search within Photos does?
Anything mentioning Spotlight needs be carefully thought through and, probably, experimentation. The word is used so loosely. Is it saying something about indexing or about searching? Is it about Spotlight or Core Spotlight?
By experiment:
1. Searching in Photos works when the library is on a volume with Spotlight indexing enabled (and so long as it has had time to do the indexing - many days in some cases).
2. I have not experimented with libraries on a volume which has Spotlight indexing disabled - needs testing (tomorrow?).
3. Searching with Finder always fails to find photos in libraries.
This is typical of Core Spotlight. Just as with Mail and Notes - searching in the app works, but searching in Finder fails.
I believe we can say:
a) Finder search never produces results from inside Photos libraries. (Just like with Mail and Notes)
b) Spotlight indexes are created for Photos libraries stored on an external disk for which Spotlight indexing is enabled. Search inside Photos app then works.
c) It is an open question (needs testing) whether Spotlight creates indexes (and so enables search) for Photos libraries on external volumes with Spotlight indexing disabled. I suspect that is the situation where "This Library isn't searchable in Spotlight due to its location".
Whether 512 GB of internal storage capacity is sufficient or not highly depends on the intended use. For me, it is, but I don't deal with videos, games, or photos - mainly PDFs and some programs. Therefore, I always choose 512 GB SSD and focus on maxing out the RAM, which is much more important for my workloads (which are somewhat heavy). Sometimes I might choose 1 TB SSD just to have some extra space available, just in case. That's it. For others, though, 2 TB is the absolute minimum. Thus, you have to identify your specific use case and prioritize SSD capacity over RAM capacity or vice-versa (unless you have unlimited budget, in which case this whole conversation is meaningless!).
I have a 512 GB 14" MBP, but I can expand the storage via the SD card slot and one of those flush microSD adapters. It's not the fastest storage, but I can offload larger files like music, movies, etc. onto the SD card and access them perfectly fine as needed.
Define "super." Takes a few minutes to copy over a multi-GB video file but that's not really a problem for me. Playback is instantaneous. Point is it's an easy portable solution if you don't want to carry around a portable SSD
Yes it is an easy portable solution but I am an impatient person.
I should give it a try but I returned a M4 Pro MacBook Pro already. If it works fine, I should just get the 512GB SSD configuration from now on?
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I went the route of 512 GB internal storage and a 2 TB SSD on USB-C external for my M1 iMac from July 2021, and it has served me very well. After 3.5 years of use I’m at 100 GB used on the internal storage and about 700 GB on the external, so there is plenty of room to grow. The external drive transfers at around 1 GB/s, which is plenty fast enough for my purposes.