I have a MacBook5,1 from October 2008 and Im trying to decide if I should purchase a 480GB mercury electra 3g ssd or a 480GB mercury extreme pro 6g ssd? Whould my macbook even be able to realize the difference between the two or would I just be wasting my money on the pro 6g?
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3G SSD vs. Pro 6G SSD for 2008 Macbook
- Thread starter JLEW700
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The macbook will only use it as a SATA2 (300).
If you plan on keeping the drive post-macbook then the SATA3 Pro is a better bet, but as the trend for non-user upgrades is growing it might not be usable in a future mac anyways.
save your pennies and get the 3G version.
If you plan on keeping the drive post-macbook then the SATA3 Pro is a better bet, but as the trend for non-user upgrades is growing it might not be usable in a future mac anyways.
save your pennies and get the 3G version.
Is there any speed advantage at this point of the pro 6g for me or because of the limits of my older macbook are they the same?
Not really - the macbook will use either and both are capable of pretty much maxing out the SATA2 spec interface on it, so I would predict no real speed benefit.
Ok. Ill got with the 3g. Should I get he ssd by itself or should I get it with a data doubler? What does a data doubler do?
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/SSDEX3G480/
VS
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/DDMBSSD480/
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/SSDEX3G480/
VS
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/DDMBSSD480/
The data doubler is an adapter to 'add' a second HDD/SDD to a macbook. You lose the optical drive and it is not as simple as just swapping the hard disk out for an SSD.
If you are a novice I would say leave the data doubler alone. If you are technically competent, then perhaps go for it (if you can live without the optical drive).
If you are a novice I would say leave the data doubler alone. If you are technically competent, then perhaps go for it (if you can live without the optical drive).
So the data doubler would take the physical spot of my cd drive? I Dont really want that so maybe Ill just stick with the straight swap.
If I just swap in the SSD along with 8gb of ram you think that will make a big enuf difference in speed and performance?
Also, If I did take out the cd drive to add a data doubler, I could always just add an external optical drive, correct?
yes. basically what they have done is make a hard drive bay in the shape of the optical drive. you take out the old optical drive, put your hard drive inside the data doubler, install the data doubler where the optical drive went and boom - two hard drives.
Looks like your questions have been answered on the speed issue, but if I could make another suggestion. You can get a 500GB Samsung 840 SSD for $334. I don't see anything compelling about the OWC for an extra $112.
The Samsung is 6Gbps, but is backwards compatible, and as was pointed out would be more suitable if you upgrade to a new machine with SATA III later.
So I should realize the same speed weather I get teh samsung or the OWC? Does anybody else have any pros/cons of one over the other?
That is correct.
Unless you are just enamored with OWC for some reason, I can't think of a reason to spend an extra $100 with them.
ok. so this will do even though it says its for a pc?
http://aaawave.com/p-16438-samsung-mz-7td500bw-840-series-sataiii-tlc-ssd-500gb.aspx
http://aaawave.com/p-16438-samsung-mz-7td500bw-840-series-sataiii-tlc-ssd-500gb.aspx
You will need to format this, or any other, SSD you install. Just use Disk Utility to format to Mac OS Extended and you will be good to go.
So when I receive this one I just remove my old hard drive and install this one and then format it using disk utility?
Yes, but you will need an external drive of some sort with your OS on it to boot from to do this. What version of OS X are you running now? Do you have an external USB disk we can use for a backup to move the OS and data to the new drive? If not, you can buy a cheap external USN drive enclosure and just move the old drive there, then use that to setup the new drive.
Tell me what OS and external drives you have now and we will work this out for you.
Im on os x snow leopard and I have a 1TB western digital external HD I could use.
That will work fine. Just use the free version of Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC) to copy your data from the existing drive to the external. Then install the new drive. Then option key boot to the external and use Disk Util to format the new drive to Mac OS Extended. After that start CCC and copy back from the external to the new drive. Then restart and go to System Prefs and in the Startup Disk panel set the new drive as the boot drive.
That should fix you up.
I want to start from scratch on the ssd so do I still need to copy the data from my existing drive to the external drive?
Only if you don't need the OS or any of the data from the existing drive.
Do you have the Snow Leopard installer DVD? You can boot to that and install it on the new drive and that would be a fresh start as you want. But then you would not have any of your data (like documents and music etc) from the old drive.
If you want a fresh install, I would still cone the old drive to the external, then install Snow Leopard from the DVD and after that manually move over whatever files you need from the external.
All of that said, unless you are having real problems with your existing install, there really is not much need for a clean start. It can be a lot of work and get you in the weeds if you are not familiar with where things are stored.
I do have the snow leopard disk and I've done several fresh installs on my current HD so I think Ill just move the files I need onto the external HD and then move them back to the ssd once I have that up and going. Thanks for all the help. Ill let you know if I run into any problems.
Will this SSD work for my current computer?
What is the difference between this one and the one we been looking at?
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Elect...382727147&sr=8-1&keywords=Samsung+MZ-7TD500BW
What is the difference between this one and the one we been looking at?
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Elect...382727147&sr=8-1&keywords=Samsung+MZ-7TD500BW
That is exactly the same drive as the other one and will work fine in your machine.
How come the price is different? Is one newer than the other?
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-Elect...382736324&sr=8-1&keywords=Samsung+MZ-7TD500BW