The MacBook Pro :
As the owner of a MacBook Pro (which is an amazing bit of kit) I fall victim to the same downfall as most owners – the small internal SSD. My MBP holds a mere 128Gb of internal built in storage.
Now that 128Gb storage is almost instant access – being a quick SSD. When paired up with 8Gb of RAM and the 2.7GHz i5 machine it really is a very capable bit of kit – in fact most of this blog, associated photos and media all stem from this very machine.
But let’s be honest 128Gb is not enough.
But let’s be even more honest. It isn’t a huge deal either. With portable options now readily available, you can easily get 4TB in your pocket, 400Gb SD Cards are becoming more affordable £ / $ per Gb and you can even get super fast tiny and portable SSD drives which are amazing for rending video and other demanding tasks.
Personally I have always opted for a connected portable hard drive. My drive of choice at the moment being a USB 3.0 2TB Seagate drive. It is quick (as you will soon see), it is small, and it is plug and play. I have the majority of my apps on it, all my games and store images on it that I won’t be using immediately.
I keep it pretty clutter free and it means my storage issues – aren’t issues.
As far as SD cards go I always (from habit more than anything else) use a USB 3.0 card reader. (The one I use is from Anker). It means I can just pop the card out of my camera / GoPro / drone… whatever and have the media transferred quickly and hassle free on my terms. I don’t like plugging in a device and having it tell me what image importer to use, or what editor, so with the Card Reader I import and use as I please.
If I am editing photos / video on the go I import them onto the Mac’s SSD, do what I need to do, then upload them or store them on the portable drive. It is no doubt easier and quicker to run on the SSD, and it means if I am mobile I don’t need to worry about the portable drive and where to set it. But then you reach the limiting factor of the maximum available space.