Your experience & thoughts on SSDs for MacMini

Dmccombs,

An internal SSD is way better than a regular hard drive, sonically.

According to several trusted audiophile ears I've talked to (both Win and Mac users), there is no difference they could hear with internal SSD against HDD.

Even with a 5400rpm 8MB buffer HDD, burst-loading of the entire audio track to the system main SDRAM takes a second or less. What about Barracuda XT drives with 64MB buffer? HDD jitter? No such thing, IMO! And let’s not forget that the SSD also has a SDRAM buffer, just like HDD.

It does not matter where your audio file is stored; it is always double buffered (at minimum); first in the storage device own memory buffer, and again to the main system memory. So I do not see a reason for SSD to sound better than HDD.

Best,
Alex Peychev

03-08-11: Aplhifi
HDD jitter? No such thing, IMO! And let’s not forget that the SSD also has a SDRAM buffer, just like HDD.

It does not matter where your audio file is stored; it is always double buffered (at minimum); first in the storage device own memory buffer, and again to the main system memory. So I do not see a reason for SSD to sound better than HDD.

Alex, no one has mentioned "HDD jitter" in this thread, which I agree is a nonsensical expression. A question was asked as to how changing from an HDD to an SSD could affect sonics. I responded that jitter and noise on output signals of the computer, that will be connected directly into a dac in many setups, could conceivably be influenced by crosstalk, ground-bounce, voltage droop and voltage fluctuations at various circuit points, rfi, and other similar effects that in ANY digital design that involves a large number of signals that have fast edges can result in subtle interactions between circuits that are ostensibly unrelated. Particularly when the destination to which some of those signals are sent (the dac) may be especially sensitive to small amounts of noise and jitter.

I take no position as to the likelihood that using an SSD instead of an HHD will make a sonic difference in any given computer, or as to whether the difference, if any, would be for the better, or if any such effects would be consistent across different computers, because I have no experience upon which to base such a position. What I have said is simply that it is technically conceivable that there could be a difference, in at least some setups with some computers and some dac's. I don't think that is disputable.

Best regards,
-- Al

Alex,

Have you, yourself actually tested for this? Are your friends testing this with thier ears or making assumptions?

If you and your friends actually tested this, then I guess we have very different experiences.

In my tests, tests of other I know and trust, and people who where there for some of my tests, ALL heard a definite improvement when going from an internal regular drive to an SSD.

I've done the tests several times for friends and audio nuts, after all, I have modded and stock machines here every day of the week.

The audio systems I have done tests in have all been very good so maybe it comes down to how well the systems resolve fine details. Maybe you are using external USB drive instead of Firewire drives with good controllers?

I don't have time to sort out the differences in our results, but after hearing a clear difference in our numerous tests, I am surprised you don't hear any. TO each thier own I guess.

Darrell
www.mach2music.com

I don't think the difference in performance between HD and SSD will yield any measurable difference in sound quality. I do think however that there will be more noise generated by spinning magnetic disks compared to SSD with zero moving part. The sensitivity to such noise and any effect will probably be system dependent.

"I don't have time to sort out the differences in our results, but after hearing a clear difference in our numerous tests, I am surprised you don't hear any. TO each thier own I guess." Blind or sighted tests? If there are truly differences in sound with just changing out a HDD for a SSD then there is something truly broken in software and/or hardware in some other part of the system.