Your experience & thoughts on SSDs for MacMini

Perrew, having had two prior Windows servers, my expectations are the opposite of yours. Also, several Dac manufacturers, I know, one being Weiss, think the Apples are better. I certainly would like the convenience of Itunes with less of the money grubbing they do. I also wish that Apple had not followed the other Windows manufacturers down the road of really cheap components, such as drives.

I will probably go with a very modified Mini with a Raid 5 storage and a pro external drive for ripping my discs. All I will continue to use FW to the Weiss Dac202, but sata elsewhere.

Dmccombs,

Extrapolating from the mach2 you are saying the Linear PS is worse than the switching inside the mac mini but the ssd makes a big enough difference?
Could you please elaborate on the sonic differences between the SSD vs. the HDD?

Tbg, agree, I would love the convenience of just using Itunes. Imagine if it had the capability of the Sooloos with grouping and searching.
As for FW Im not convinced by what Ive heard.
I use a Plextor, one of the old really well built ones for ripping. And have a BR drive for movies since Steve dont fancy the BR format.
I have ordered the Server version of the mini which has 2x500Gb 7200rpm drives inside so that should be able to hold most of the music, extremely convenient. Then I have Plex with external drives for movies.

Perrew,

No, I did not comment on the linear power sound quality at all. I simple said I did not do A/B tests between SSD and regular hard drives, when using the linear power supply.

When we did A/B tests between SSD external hard drives and regular hard drives, we used stock Mac Minis and our Mach2 units.

In the A/B tests, we used the same cabling, external HD enclosure, Mac, software and music. We simply swapped out the hard drive in the external enclosure. We used Memory Play in these tests since this is always a big debate.

We normally use a Firewire enclosure that has the Oxford chipset. When using a regular hard drive, we get a nice sounds stage, good detail, low background noise, good dynamics. It is way better than USB set ups we tried in the past.

When we swapped the SSD in for the regular hard drive, the noise floor was quieter. The dynamics improved, the width of the soundstage got better and the depth of the soundstage was much better. The sound was tighter too (i.e. cymbals had more definition).

I'm not saying everyone should run out and buy external SSD drives. They do sound better, but the price increase is significant. You may have other things in your system that need addressing.

The internal drive is a no-brainer, although you must be careful in doing the swap. The cost to replace the internal drive is reasonable and the gains are very noticeable.

Darrell
www.mach2music.com

Darrell,

I just extrapolated from that the mach2 has switching PS you preferred that?

So if I understand you never A/B the internal HDD vs. internal SSD?, couldnt this have been easily done by having a stock vs. a Mach2?
I dont see why youd wanna use external drive for playback when you can use internal?
Cheers P