What is the difference between ssd flash storage and PCIe for MacBook Pro Retinas?

Answer 1

Looking at the information on Apple's website located at http://www.apple.com/mac/compare/notebooks.html, I don't see anything about PCIe but what I do see is that one particular model (the 13-inch Macbook Pro without the Retina display) has a traditional hard drive or a solid state drive as an option, so I must presume it is about that difference that you are seeking to learn.

A traditional hard drive is of the type that has been in use for decades. It is a motor attached to multiple spinning disks (referred to as platters) frequently nowadays made of a light ceramic material and coated with what amounts to iron oxide (aka rust) so as to allow its surface to retain magnetic signals. Those signals are written to and read from the platters by read-write heads that are just a few microns above the surface of said platters. This technology is very mature and quite reliable in most circumstances.

A solid state drive is a more modern technology based on flash memory. Just like a thumb drive, digital camera memory card, and other types of flash memory, it is able to both store and retrieve data and can do so fairly quickly. This technology is used by many as a substitute for traditional hard drives as they can permit faster bootup times. The problem is that they also have a limited lifespan because of the way that the technology works. Flash memory uses a system called wear levelling that tries to insure that all parts of said memory wear at the same rate to help extend the life of the drive. However, each sector (for lack of a better term) can be written to and erased in practice only up to about 1000 times. As such, they are not a good substitution for traditional hard drives in my professional opinion unless what you tend to do is use the machine in a fairly static configuration. By this, I mean that you use it to access the internet, write emails through a web interface such as Gmail, and so forth. If you, instead, use the machine for storing lots of data, modifying files, video or photographic editing, or otherwise have a lot of files that cycle through or that often get modified, then a traditional hard drive is a better option as it will last longer.

Now something else to keep in mind is that solid state drives are not as susceptible to damage as traditional drives are. Thus, if you are one who is not as delicate with your laptop as you should be, then you have less concern for data loss due to a "drive crash" with an SSD. After all, there are no moving parts in an SSD unlike the read-write heads and platters in a regular hard drive. So, if you intend to travel with your laptop on a regular basis (and by travel, I mean taking it onto a plane or, worse yet, checking it in as luggage), then a solid state drive would be a better option.

A final issue is that presuming that the drive inside your laptop fails, it is far easier and cheaper to recover the data from a failed traditional hard drive than it is from an SSD. If professional data recovery is necessary, you will typically need to pay about $1000 for a traditional hard drive but anywhere from $1500 to $2000 (or more) for an SSD.

So, based on all this, you should be able to make a decision about what is best for you. If you have any further questions or want additional assistance in making the decision, though, feel free to drop me a line. I'm glad to do what I can to help.

Answer 2

A PCIe (peripheral component interconnect express) SSD is a card format where the solid state drive is directly connected to the computer. A SATA SSD in essence is sharing along with other components with the computer. So in theory, at PCIe SSD should perform faster.