New MBP vs external drive

[kallisti]

I have a 2014 rMBP with 1TB storage. My photo library has been growing exponentially and I was recently down to around 10 GB left on my hard drive. Was thinking about purchasing a new MBP to get more storage.

I edit photos at home but also at work. I need my photos to be available regardless of where I am. External drives didn't seem to be an option for my needs.

Wasn't excited by the new MBPs. Minimal improvements aside from the option for a 2 TB SSD. Which would cost me $4k.

Just got this on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01AVF6UHK/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Was plug-and-play without hassles. Was easy to move my photo assets over to it (just copied my photo folders over and the LR folder). Launched LR from the copied library on the new external drive and it "just worked".

Even with the default USB-C to standard USB cable it took 19 minutes to copy my ~520 GB photo library over to the new drive. Was pleasantly surprised as I was expecting something closer to several hours.

The new drive is small--close to the size of a credit card. Very small. The added bonus of moving my photos over is that the drive can be connected to any computer. Since LR is now subscription and in the cloud I can use my photos on any "blessed" computer.

This drive is also very good for backups--may get others to serve as clones of my main drive and/or the photo drive. Very portable and may get one or more for off-site storage.

The newest MBP isn't a meaningful upgrade for me. This external drive just extended the useful life of my machine in a very real way.

Wanted to share.

 

[mofunk]

Yeah idk why Apple decided to do away with all the multi ports. I'm not happy. I use a dongle for my current MBP because there is no firewire on them. It makes you really think about your next move, all while preserving the photos you have already archive. Which I don't get especially for a company that suppose to protect the environment and has aways been backwards compatible. (end rant)

If you need to be portable, why not house you big external drives at home and have another drive for on the go. This way you can work from home and then dump them to your drives you have sitting at home. $800 why Samsung? and SSD? How much faster is SSD over 7200rpm? I like either Glyph or G-Technology.


https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/buy/External-Drives/ci/6543/N/4294542383

I think you think out your next step and find what's best for you.

 

[kallisti]

Yeah idk why Apple decided to do away with all the multi ports. I'm not happy. I use a dongle for my current MBP because there is no firewire on them. It makes you really think about your next move, all while preserving the photos you have already archive. Which I don't get especially for a company that suppose to protect the environment and has aways been backwards compatible. (end rant)

If you need to be portable, why not house you big external drives at home and have another drive for on the go. This way you can work from home and then dump them to your drives you have sitting at home. $800 why Samsung? and SSD? How much faster is SSD over 7200rpm? I like either Glyph or G-Technology.


https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/buy/External-Drives/ci/6543/N/4294542383

I think you think out your next step and find what's best for you.

I have been using external 7200rpm drives for backup up until now. The ones I have aren't portable at all. Which is a big strike against what I need and why this SSD solution works for me.

Regarding speed: copying 520 GB to a 7200rpm drive is hours. Copying to this external SSD is minutes. Even with a legacy USB port (on my 2014 MBP).

Speaking to portability: this drive lets me carry all of my photo assets with me at all times because it is tiny. An external 7200rpm drive doesn't let me do this because it isn't portable in any real or meaningful way.

Regarding backup: the speed matters as does the portability. Much easier to put a credit card sized drive in a bank box compared to a bulky 7200 drive for offsite storage. Or just having a backup with a tiny footprint with you at all times or at home. Doesn't replace good asset management with multiple copies in multiple places, but a tiny speedy drive as opposed to a bulky slow drive is good for every scenario.

 

[kenoh]

Yeah I have a dilemma coming too.

My library sits on a NAS at home. When mobile I can do my imports and then merge Catalogs later but my mobile needs are light enough to not drive the need for a robust catalog workflow.

My issue is I am still using my 2010 MBP which has been and is fine for my needs, no drive to upgrade it thus far. Second to that I have a Surface Pro 3 which I only seem to use occasionally and I got a Z1 windows workstation from work for fee so feel obligated to make use of that. The latter run windows of course.

I don't know what to do as the latest MBPs are not worth £2,499 to my needs yet I don't want to have to keep using Windows as I don't really like it as a platform for personal use.

As I have already spent the money on the Surface Pro and I have this Z1 (high end PC workstation like an iMac from HP that one if the sales guys wanted me to try in an attempt to stop me using Mac) then I think I need to stick with them for a while before I get a new Mac.

I am really scunnered at the Apple pricing on the new MBPs as they are nice machines but not worth the premium - to me. I am forced to use Windows at work and so we have a mix of tech in the house anyway so my preference is that, while I prefer MacOS, I can use anything while I prefer not to shell out the cost of a FF DSLR on a new laptop - when I have 9 other computer options in the house (no my gas isn't limited to camera gear embarrassed).

The external drive situation sounds good but man, the cost of a 2TB drive is monstrous. I get the SSD argument but the NAS at home and cheaper external disk has to be worth considering? A rule with disk storage is don't buy it today if you don't need it as it will be half the price next year for the same capacity. So if you can clear it up and make do, that is a good practice. No matter how portable one drive is, having to carry multiple drives gets old real fast.

IMHO..

 

[kallisti]

Yeah I have a dilemma coming too.

My library sits on a NAS at home. When mobile I can do my imports and then merge Catalogs later but my mobile needs are light enough to not drive the need for a robust catalog workflow.

My issue is I am still using my 2010 MBP which has been and is fine for my needs, no drive to upgrade it thus far. Second to that I have a Surface Pro 3 which I only seem to use occasionally and I got a Z1 windows workstation from work for fee so feel obligated to make use of that. The latter run windows of course.

I don't know what to do as the latest MBPs are not worth £2,499 to my needs yet I don't want to have to keep using Windows as I don't really like it as a platform for personal use.

As I have already spent the money on the Surface Pro and I have this Z1 (high end PC workstation like an iMac from HP that one if the sales guys wanted me to try in an attempt to stop me using Mac) then I think I need to stick with them for a while before I get a new Mac.

I am really scunnered at the Apple pricing on the new MBPs as they are nice machines but not worth the premium - to me. I am forced to use Windows at work and so we have a mix of tech in the house anyway so my preference is that, while I prefer MacOS, I can use anything while I prefer not to shell out the cost of a FF DSLR on a new laptop - when I have 9 other computer options in the house (no my gas isn't limited to camera gear embarrassed).

The external drive situation sounds good but man, the cost of a 2TB drive is monstrous. I get the SSD argument but the NAS at home and cheaper external disk has to be worth considering? A rule with disk storage is don't buy it today if you don't need it as it will be half the price next year for the same capacity. So if you can clear it up and make do, that is a good practice. No matter how portable one drive is, having to carry multiple drives gets old real fast.

IMHO..

I hear you about the cost. I went for the 2 TB drive because based on my current shooting it will last me for ~3-5 years. $730 USD for 3-5 years works for me. At that point Apple will hopefully be offering something that I consider a real upgrade performance-wise. While I currently get stutters in LR when I zoom in waiting for the image to resolve, I'm not sure the new MBP would fix that for me. I actually started looking at PC gaming systems and for about the same price as a tricked out MBP I could get a 17inch screen and a desktop graphics card as opposed to a 15 inch screen and a midrange mobile card with the MBPs.

http://www.razerzone.com/gaming-systems/razer-blade-pro

https://www.originpc.com/gaming/laptops/eon17-slx/

The former is more apples to apples, but it's kind of pathetic that I have to look outside the Apple ecosystem for this. I don't want lighter. I don't want thinner. I want a quasi-portable (in the sense that I need to carry it to work and home every day, but don't give a crap about battery life or plan to travel with it) machine that can handle LR/PS without dropping a beat and can also serve as a gaming machine in my downtime. A 17 inch screen would be ideal. Why the **** doesn't Apple offer this? Different discussion for a different day....

 

[The Bad Guy]

Yeah, Apple has lost me I'm afraid. Don't like their direction on the OS side and I don't like the bang-for-buck on the hardware side. I'm not happy about going to Windows, but the only software I use is Lightroom, Photoshop and Chrome (used to love Safari, but that seems like a lifetime a go).

I've exclusively used laptops (MacBook Pro's more specifically) for the past decade and I'm thinking that's about to change too. Think I'll go with a custom build PC tower and fill it with RAM, SSD's and a fat video card that Apple just won't offer.

Hopefully the change is a while off though as my 2012 15" high-res matte screen, quadcore i7 / 16GB / 512GB SSD + 2TB spinning disk running Mac OSX 10.8 is still doing a nice job for me currently.

So is my iPhone 5...well, not so much.

 

[OzBok]

I had the same problem as you Kallisti except mine was full. My retina had an accident at work during renovations though. Repairs were going to take too long so bit the bullet on A new mbp which they a couple available. I probably would have got the 2tb if available, but have the 1. Ive been trying to work out what to do storage wise so glad to see your feedback on the Samsung as that's where I've been leaning.

I thought I'd hate the usb-c only ports, but actually like that I can plug whatever wherever it suits me. Charger was wrong side of the old macbook for my workspac3 and power source. And USB ports, same issue with externals that needed power.

Touchbar is not as gimmicky as I thought it would be, actually back using safari because of it. Be interesting to see what the non apple apps do with it if anything. Lightroom would be interesting if they integrate it right (whenever that may be).

I got a demo of it running 2 displays without breaking a sweat. But the screen it has is amazing for photos, did a comparison with a friends 2012 retina looking at POTD and difference is very obvious. Might be on the expensive side and at the time I wasn't keen on the price but after just over a week with it, I'm not regretting it. Be interesting to see the file transfer speed compared to kallistis.

The trackpad is smooth and in Lightroom, zooming is instant and not jumpy. And haven't had to wait for any images to resolve either.

Would I have got it had my old MacBook not been crippled? Wouldn't have upgraded this early, but being pushed into it. I'm on the other side and getting less upset about the price each time I use it.

 

[MCAsan]

To me any laptop is not about storage, it about mobility. I don't need to try to carry around my multiple TB of images in my photo library, not to mention all the documents, movies, and music files.

So all my libraries, music, documents, videos, photos,...etc. all sit in an external RAID set and are backed up on a seperate external drive by Time Machine. The local drive is for boot/MacOs, apps, caches, and the relatively few documents I need to carry into the field.

My new camera body has two SD slots. With a 256GB card in each, I can have over 10,000 raw files in the camera without touching cards in the field. When I get back home then I will cull the images and move the keepers to the library on the RAID array. No need for large, and relatively expensive, storage inside my MBP. If I were to purchase a new MBP, it would a 512GB SSD, not a 1TB one.

 

[OzBok]

What's the raid setup you use MCasan? After the last computer damaged, I need a better workflow for backup etc. I get your point on the 512 vs 1tb. In hindsight I may have got the 512 had I had a better workflow in place, but at the same time I always tend to gravitate to higher storage on most devices just for flexibility.

 

[MCAsan]

The enclosure is a LaCie 2Big Thunderbolt unit into which I put two 6TB drives. I setup the two drives as RAID 0 in MacOS. The backup drive is a LaCie d2 Thunderbolt with a single 6TB drive.

Of course these days I could easily use 8TB drives instead. That will likely be the next upgrade for the d2 backup drive to allow for more backup history.

 

[randy98mtu]

Look at the Seagate Backup Fast 4TB (4192 on Amazon). It's a single USB 3.0 cable with 2 2TB laptop drives in Raid 0. I have one and it flies.

 

[MCAsan]

With any USB 3 drives, check that ithey does UASP over USB3. It makes for a faster transport.

 

[phrehdd]

Let's see now - a simple (but incomplete overview)

RAID 0 - two or more drives striped together. Advantage - speed. Disadvantage - one drive fails you lose everything.
RAID 1 - two drives both with the same data (mirrored) - Advantage redundancy. Disadvantage cost.

I use NAS and DAS and RAID for years and know well enough that RAID 0 is never on the table as a "final backup" solution. RAID 0 is awesome where constant access is require for reads and writes such as maybe working of a video project and scratch space is needed etc. and ultimately, the final file(s) are stored in a safe manner.

RAID 0 creates more failure points that can cause cases where data is beyond difficult to retrieve and those "services" that handle lost data, corrupted data are not always prepared to deal with RAID 0 and those that do, it costs a tidy sum. In short, I am suggesting if people are backing up their photo files etc., RAID 0 for the most part should be off the table (unless you have also a more static safer place to back up along side your RAID 0 hardware).

 

[MCAsan]

Of course if you have more money there is RAID 5 or RAID 10. But none of the RAID configurations will get the final level of security.......getting backups off the property to a safe location via internet backup service or swapping out backup drives to a bank vault or other location. This final step should seriously be consider by all professionals who's income rests on maintaining their library.

 

[randy98mtu]

I use the raid 0 drive as a way to transport whatever I want with me. I also have a western digital desktop 4TB drive that I keep at my office that is my primary backup. I also keep all my music and my keepers in jpeg and raw on Dropbox.

 

[Boneheadxan]

I recently had a Raid 0 fail on me I realised recovering the data is quite difficult. Fortunately, it seems like only one of the disks has failed. It runs very slow but lets me use it in read-only mode to copy the data. A complete failure would have been disastrous. The drive I'm using is one of the Lacie 2Big drives.

 

[Mark0]

I was looking at getting the WD McCloud EX2 Ultra for a NAS but held off as I'm finding my Fuji X-T2 24MP RAW's are eating up space on my rMBP 512Gb SSD.
Instead, I cleared out a fair bit of redundant images and stuff.
I just bought the new 500Gb G-Technology Slim SSD USB-C external drive and I'm quite happy with it. Maybe not credit card sized but it's small enough and thin enough (ha!) for my needs.

 

[MCAsan]

I recently had a Raid 0 fail on me I realised recovering the data is quite difficult. Fortunately, it seems like only one of the disks has failed. It runs very slow but lets me use it in read-only mode to copy the data. A complete failure would have been disastrous. The drive I'm using is one of the Lacie 2Big drives.

RAID O is done for faster performance, never for higher availability. RAID 1 is about higher availability. But it is still no true backup. Regardless of running RAID 0 or 1 for your main library, always have Time Machine or CCC backup the entire file system to a completely separate drive or drive set.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID