I have used GrandPerspective, which is a free alternative and plenty capable.
http://grandperspectiv.sourceforge.net/
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Tricks to managing with a 128GB SSD (vs 256GB)
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I have used GrandPerspective, which is a free alternative and plenty capable.
http://grandperspectiv.sourceforge.net/
Is Airport Extreme with attached HD a good option?
What about getting an airport extreme and hooking up a USB HD to it?
Is this a good option to increasing storage space on your MBA?
If you put iPhoto and iTunes media on this "wireless" HD, is it fast enough or is write speeds too slow? Can you attach a camera to the MBA, and pull photos off it to the wireless HD with speeds that aren't too slow?
The other question is will Time Machine back up the HD that is attached to the airport extreme?
What about getting an airport extreme and hooking up a USB HD to it?
Is this a good option to increasing storage space on your MBA?
If you put iPhoto and iTunes media on this "wireless" HD, is it fast enough or is write speeds too slow? Can you attach a camera to the MBA, and pull photos off it to the wireless HD with speeds that aren't too slow?
The other question is will Time Machine back up the HD that is attached to the airport extreme?
When I try to access photos in my iMac, it does get quite a lot time. I have a wireless N router (only 2.4GHz though) but it is not very new and quite far away from both computers. iTunes works fine but photos aren't fast enough in my opinion. It works, but slowly. Maybe others with different setups have better success.
Yes.
Unless you replace it with an Apple drive like I did. With a non-Apple drive only the drive wouldn't be covered. Replacing the drive doesn't affect the warranty for the rest of the MBA unless you do some kind of physical damage.
Yes I bought a 256gb off of ebay about a month ago.
Doubtful unless the upgrade was done by an authorized servicer. Just cause you used an Apple Drive means nothing. If Apple notices you did an upgrade and asks for documentation, you'll probably be SOL. The MBAs are not meant to be user servicable/upgradable as far as I know.
Moot point however until you need service...then we'll know if its void.
I think you have to make your storage strategy evolve to something more "cloudy". As an example, here is how I do:
- Music on Spotify
- Files on Dropbox
- Documents on Evernote
- Mail on Gmail
- Archive files stored on an Amazon S3 bucket
- Movies on Vimeo
I have not found a good solution for pictures though. I could go for Flickr but I don't want my pictures on a social website...
- Music on Spotify
- Files on Dropbox
- Documents on Evernote
- Mail on Gmail
- Archive files stored on an Amazon S3 bucket
- Movies on Vimeo
I have not found a good solution for pictures though. I could go for Flickr but I don't want my pictures on a social website...
You know you can make all your photos / albums private on Flickr? Thats what I did. And I made a zip copy of each album and uploaded to my iDisk and another copy to photo bucket. The only problem with Flickr is you can only see your last 200 photos without upgrading for $25. Photobucket restricts to 1mb per pic on free plamn but you can see all your pics. I don't view photos at all but I just wanted a few copies (old family pics) here and there but not taking up HDD space.
I also moved vids to vimeo for viewing (private) and stuck an original zip copy on iDisk. I will have to look into spotify. I got all my stuff down to about 45gb including music. My personal files that i wish to keep on the hdd is under 3gb.
Whether you want to go to an air or not it's good practice to 'archive'. I also want to move to an MBA at some point but space isnt a big issue... It's money to buy it! :-(
Whether you want to go to an air or not it's good practice to 'archive'. I also want to move to an MBA at some point but space isnt a big issue... It's money to buy it! :-(
OP: if I were you, I'd hold my breath and shell out the extra £££ for the bigger SSD. It's horrible having to constantly monitor your space, and, although external HDs are a good idea, they can be a bit of a pain in the a*se most of the time.
I think the real question is when do you need your content. For example, if you have a large iTunes library that you only need at home - because you sync with an iPhone/iPod/iPad to use when away from home, then an external drive is OK. But if you're going to be constantly switching content on/off the main internal drive, I'd agree with you.
Based on all the posts here- I agree. I'm going to spring for the ultimate.
Cloud is great, but just not there yet for must of us.
Anyway, who knows what 10.7 will really bring. Even the new "versions" feature of OS Lion makes me think drive space is even more important as it will store every revision of every document you make.....
And while I know it really doesn't make that much of a difference, conceptually going from a 4 year old Macbook 2.0GHz C2D DOWN to a 1.8 just doesn't sit right with me.
Thanks all for the advice.
Now I just need to figure out if I just restore my Time machine Backup to the new MBA or if I install apps from scratch. Not sure if there is a difference in "efficiency" of the new MBA if I do one or the other.
Asking here on the board, I think you'll hear both sides of the argument. In my case, I've kept upgrading systems rather than starting fresh. Mac OS X doesn't carry around nearly as much cruft as Windows, so I haven't seen enough of a reason to start fresh.
Actually no, this is why I raised this issue. But I would like to get rid of iphoto to something more cloudy so your feedback is interesting. Can you download a bulk of all your pictures from Flickr or Photo Bucket as a backup ?
I'm looking forward to the next generation MBA, hopefully Thunderbolt compatible external HDDs will be out then. Take it that means I can just get a 128GB MBA and still have good read/write times on the external due to the Thunderbolt?
Cloudy with a chance of meatballs!
The problem I have with 'cloud' computing is that the cloud is not always available. I work in a corporate environment and also do a lot of travel to locations where public or private wifi is not available. In the UK (for example) there are large swathes of the countryside where you won't get an EDGE network, let alone 3G. I also travel to countries where 3G is not an option as well as buildings where you get no phone signal (like Datacenters and basements).
The upshot is that I love the MBA (I'm still using 1st gen 80GB HDD but considering an upgrade shortly). It is light and portable and does exactly what I want it to. However, emails and documents NEED to be available at all times. Therefore, they need to be offline, not stored in Gmail or Yahoo or MobileMe or any other internet based system. Dropbox is useful but again, only when I am connected, which is about 25% of the time.
I would question your requirement to have iTunes and iPhoto stores local but if that is what you need to be mobile, then that is your requirement. But ask yourself, how often do I need to change these libraries, and how often do I access ALL the libraries? Can I run with a subset? Can I sync between MBA and external storage/home MAChine?
If you MUST have all you stated above local, then go for the higher storage onboard. Using external drives with a MBA kinda negates the benefits of having a MBA. You might as well use a 13" MBP with 500GB storage and be done with it.
Just my 2p worth.
The problem I have with 'cloud' computing is that the cloud is not always available. I work in a corporate environment and also do a lot of travel to locations where public or private wifi is not available. In the UK (for example) there are large swathes of the countryside where you won't get an EDGE network, let alone 3G. I also travel to countries where 3G is not an option as well as buildings where you get no phone signal (like Datacenters and basements).
The upshot is that I love the MBA (I'm still using 1st gen 80GB HDD but considering an upgrade shortly). It is light and portable and does exactly what I want it to. However, emails and documents NEED to be available at all times. Therefore, they need to be offline, not stored in Gmail or Yahoo or MobileMe or any other internet based system. Dropbox is useful but again, only when I am connected, which is about 25% of the time.
I would question your requirement to have iTunes and iPhoto stores local but if that is what you need to be mobile, then that is your requirement. But ask yourself, how often do I need to change these libraries, and how often do I access ALL the libraries? Can I run with a subset? Can I sync between MBA and external storage/home MAChine?
If you MUST have all you stated above local, then go for the higher storage onboard. Using external drives with a MBA kinda negates the benefits of having a MBA. You might as well use a 13" MBP with 500GB storage and be done with it.
Just my 2p worth.
You are totally right on all the points except this one. Dropbox syncs the cloud with a local folder on your harddrive. Which means you always get access to your files.
Yes, but having it all stored in a local folder doesn't save any hard drive space.
Not too long ago Gmail messed up and a lot** of people lost their email with no way to retrieve it. Ask those people now if storing their gmail locally is a bad idea.
**Not a lot when viewed as a percentage of total users, but when looked at as a specific number it was a lot.
I've tried all the NAS, AEBS and cloud solution and find them all too slow for me. Why have a blindingly fast SSD and cripple it with slow data transfer.
Also the reason I love the Air is that I can pull it out of my bag anywhere and use it, which means I need access to my data.
Get the biggest SSD you can. I keep and my documents on the SSD along with a stripped down iPhoto library which I export from my main Aperture library. I keep my complete Aperture library, iTunes lib (180gb) and my in-car racing video on a LaCie 500Gb Rikiki drive. It's small and robust enough to take everywhere too. All files on both drives get backed up every day at my office to a huge external drive.
If OWC ever send me my replacement 360Gb SSD I can just about get away without the Rikiki.
Also the reason I love the Air is that I can pull it out of my bag anywhere and use it, which means I need access to my data.
Get the biggest SSD you can. I keep and my documents on the SSD along with a stripped down iPhoto library which I export from my main Aperture library. I keep my complete Aperture library, iTunes lib (180gb) and my in-car racing video on a LaCie 500Gb Rikiki drive. It's small and robust enough to take everywhere too. All files on both drives get backed up every day at my office to a huge external drive.
If OWC ever send me my replacement 360Gb SSD I can just about get away without the Rikiki.
Thanks to all who replied to my original post.
I decided to get the MBA ultimate 13. (256GB SSD)
I came to the conclusion that ultimately, the point of having a MBA is speed, portability and being able to access ALL your data whenever you want (not being tethered by wifi and the cloud). Having to settle with a 128GB SSD would defeat the purpose for me, and while it is a $$$ premium to move up to the next larger SSD, over the next 3-4 years it will be worth it.
Now I just hope I don't regret the decision to buy if a new MBA with some major enhancement comes out in the next couple of months.
I decided to get the MBA ultimate 13. (256GB SSD)
I came to the conclusion that ultimately, the point of having a MBA is speed, portability and being able to access ALL your data whenever you want (not being tethered by wifi and the cloud). Having to settle with a 128GB SSD would defeat the purpose for me, and while it is a $$$ premium to move up to the next larger SSD, over the next 3-4 years it will be worth it.
Now I just hope I don't regret the decision to buy if a new MBA with some major enhancement comes out in the next couple of months.
Brought my MBA to the genius bar for a warranty question. My MBA had been dropped before I bought it but everything worked fine. I wanted to know if they could somehow note that everything was working so that if I had a problem in the future then they would know that the bent corner wasn't something new that caused the problem. Reason for my question was because I want to get AppleCare before the end of the first year.
I told the person that I had changed the drive to an Apple 256gb. He asked how I got one and I told him that I had bought it from someone that had upgraded his drive. Not only did he not care (his only concern was if I had backed up my info), but he proceeded to the paperwork needed to replace the outer shell, palm rest, and bottom cover for free.
I think this answers the question of voiding the warranty.
If the drive wasn't intended to be user replaceable then why does it only take the removal of a few screws to replace it? BTW, for those afraid to remove their bottom cover, there is no void if removed sticker on the hard drive
