Solid State Drive Upgrade
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- wagshaft
Looking to upgrade my mac pro with a SSD.
Keeping the apps and OS on the SSD and all the other stuff on the old HDs.
Anyone done this? Any issues you've run into.
This guy makes it seem like a piece of cake:
http://www.beato.com/2013/06/fix…PS
My mac pro is ancient (2008) but still singing with RAM upgrades.
- yurimon0
Yes its faster, did it on a macmini 2009 for a friend.. you just need to make sure its compatible. the newest and greatest wasnt compatible for the 2009..
- akrok0
it's great. i got mine at macsales.com
- they have videos of how to install etc.akrok
- http://www.ifixit.co…sem
- ArchitectofFate0
I've done it on my Imac and 2007 macbookpro, the only issue I've had is that I needed a fan-control program since the sad didn't have the necessary triggers...
- mekk0
Is the fusiondrive available for your machine? Seems to be the easiest way to have big storage and fast speeds.. I have it in my 2010 or 2011 machine at work and it feels like SSD only
- zombee0
Yep, did exactly this on a 2012 Mac Pro. Was a doddle. Went for a Samsung 830 250GB SSD for OS and Apps, and used a couple of standard HDDs for working files and backup.
Only thing to bear in mind is you won't get SATAIII (6GB transfer) speeds if your using the Mac Pro's HDD bays as they are only SATAII (3GB transfer), but his still yields way faster read/write speeds than a spinning hard drive. If you're going for this option, would recommend one of these: http://eshop.macsales.com/item/O…
If you want full transfer speeds and you have a spare PCI slot, you'll need one of these: http://www.sonnettech.com/produc…
Also grab a free app called 'Trim Enabler' which will help manage garbage collection on the SSD: http://www.cindori.org/software/…
- why would one need insane transfer speeds of 6GB/s when the hdd is only at 200MB/s read/write?mekk
- drgs0
is it true SSD's only last for a couple of years?
- never heard of it, HDDs tend to break down because of their moving parts. Heat could be a problem with SSDsmekk
- not becaue of failure, they have a limited number of writes per celldrgs
- so you're saying planned obsolescence?mekk
- Yes and they fail instantly not gradually.animatedgif
- sources/tests?mekk
- there is software which can predict the rest life of your SSDdrgs
- see my postmekk
- MrT0
Done it (or rather a mate with skills did it) on a 2009 MBP and it's a vast improvement. Quick startups and no heat issues even on 46°C day last summer...
- rascuache0
Aye did this on a unibody macbook (the last gen of plastic ones), with a cheapo ebay optibay thing. The optibay thing was NOT well made, but everything went in fine and the computer's heaps faster. Like a new machine really!
Used an intel drive, can't remember which now...
- BarryEvans0
I don't think the OWC Mount Pro fits inside a 2008 mac pro, I used one of these http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/produ… with a samsung SSD and it went in fine
- mekk0
"Planned obsolescence" or lifespan of an SSD (theory):
One cell has a lifespan of 10.000 - 100.000 writes before it dies. When it dies, it becomes read-only, so your data is safe.
So a 250GB HDD x10.000 writes capacity can write 2.500.000 GB of data before it dies completely. When you write 10GB a day, you need 25 days to write just one of the 10.000 (to 100.000) cycles before it dies. You'll end up writing the ssd for almost 70 years (25days * 10.000 cycles / 365) before it dies. This calculation is based on the minimum lifespan of an consumer SSD.
So in theory yes, the SSD dies one day you may be able to calculate. But expect an SSD to have a longer life than a HDD.
- drgs0
I dont get it
25 days * 10.000 cycles / 365 = 687 yearsthis assumes that whole disk is available for rewrite at any time
if say 80% of your disk is in use (movies or whatever), with 50 GB available free space you write 10 GB a day = 136 years
- mekk0
^ and this is where theory vs. practice kicks in. the remaining 20% of the disk is what you use then for daily operations so this part of the SSD is faster 'dead' than the part that isn't touched. And yes, I forgot a zero in my calculator and you're right. it's almost 700 years.
No matter how you turn it, the lifespan of the cells itself is not critical in my opinion. The controller of the drive will break down way before them.
- sem0
You....you have a computer without an SSD running the OS?!
- why not?monospaced
- More reliable, faster, quiet etc. Why would you not want that?sem
- SSD BootDrive 4 evadetritus
- < preachsem
- sem0
Also, get yourself a 2.5 caddy and replace your MacBook Pro dvd drive with ANOTHER Hard Drive.
I have a 250gb SSD where the original drive was, and 1tb HD where my DVD Drive (Superdrive) was. So the OS and apps boot up on the SSD and there is 1tb for storage.
Make sure you buy the correct caddy on eBay though as I warned about on here a good while ago http://www.qbn.com/topics/679745…
- wagshaft0
Thank bitches. This was more than helpful.
- ernexbcn0
I have a Mac Pro (early 2008).
I added an SSD drive to it, I put it under the DVD drive and attached it with a SATA cable to a spare port that the mainboard has, it was a bit of a pain in the ass to pass the cable from the mainboard to the area where the DVD drive is.
It won't go at its full speed since the port is SATA 2 but it's way faster than normal drives.
I didn't want to use a special case for it or use any of the 4 hard drive slots.
- nocomply0
Once you go SSD you'll never go back! It's way faster.
I upgrading to an SSD on my old windows laptop about 2 years ago, installed windows 8, and my startup/shutdown times were less than 10 seconds. Apps like photoshop open within 5 or 6 seconds.
I bought a macbook pro with an SSD about a year ago and have noticed similar performance, but believe it or not windows still starts up and shuts down faster.
I use the SSD for my OS and all apps, and store all of my work files, music, movies, etc... on a USB 3.0 external HD. It's a system I've been doing for many years now and it works for me.
- Windows takes forever to shut down compare to Macs. It has a shutdown screen and all. Macs just turn off instantly.monospaced
- Sometimes. Since Mountain Lion, shutdowns have been a little funky for me.nikdaum
- Windows 7 on bootcamp via SSD shuts down perfectly fast for me?sem
- Windows 7 shuts down slower than Mavericks for me on my new iMacmonospaced
- I was referring to boot up / shut down times in Windows 8, which has been really quick for me with SSD.nocomply
- yurimon0
So if ssd's have limited write capacity? So how does virtual memory use effect ssd's lifespan? better to put all temp files or uses on another hd non solid state if you want to be more particular?
- ernexbcn0
SSDs have improved a lot, I think they are as reliable as magnetic media now.
If you are not on SSD yet do it, the difference is night and day. Put your main OS on an SSD and large media on traditional drives.
- sem0
Bare in mind, sometimes your Mac won't notice the new SSD on boot options. This is because sometimes you have to update the drives firmware first.
Also, if using two drives inside a MacBook Pro like I said above. A good tip is to move your itunes folder to the 1tb drive to save space on the SSD (esp if you have many game apps etc) you can also move any other big folders to the 1tb and make an alias (with the same name) to trick OSX into using the storage drive rather than the SSD.
If that makes sense to you, you'll have tons of space on your SSD for OS and Programs.