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Best place to install a SSD in a Mac Pro 1.1

D

Dc2006ster

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jun 9, 2011
310
124
Alberta, Canada
I already have an OWC SSD installed in the spare optical bay and connected to one of the 2 sata connectors on the motherboard. Works very well as a boot and applications drive.

A local dealer had a good price ($89) on a Crucial 128GB M4 so I picked one up. My question now is where is the best place to install this 2nd SSD? In the optical bay again using the other SATA connector on the motherboard? In one of the hard drive sleds? Or in an external enclosure with eSATA connection to my LaCie 2 port SATA card in one of the PCI slots. THere may be other issues but my concern is which method would give the maximum performance.

Apologies if I have used incorrect terminology. Hope you get the picture.


Thanks
 
Last edited:
ssgbryan

ssgbryan

macrumors 65816
Jul 18, 2002
1,488
1,420
Dc2006ster said:
I already have an OWC SSD installed in the spare optical bay and connected to one of the 2 sata connectors on the motherboard. Works very well as a boot and applications drive.

A local dealer had a good price ($89) on a Crucial 128GB M4 so I picked one up. My question now is where is the best place to install this 2nd SSD? In the optical bay again using the other SATA connector on the motherboard? In one of the hard drive sleds? Or in an external enclosure with eSATA connection to my LaCie 2 port SATA card in one of the PCI slots. THere may be other issues but my concern is which method would give the maximum performance.

Apologies if I have used incorrect terminology. Hope you get the picture.


Thanks
Click to expand...

I have both of mine (see sig.) sitting under the optical bay. I use the 2 sata ports on the motherboard & a y-power connecter.

I picked up a Pro Caddy 2:
http://www.transintl.com/store/category.cfm?category=2790

just to keep everything neat.
 
D

Dc2006ster

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jun 9, 2011
310
124
Alberta, Canada
I have an OWC item that does the same thing so I could put both in the optical bay. I was really asking which arrangement would give faster speeds.
 
rGiskard

rGiskard

macrumors 68000
Aug 9, 2012
1,800
955
Lower optical bay, no question about it. Get two SATA cables and run both of them from the logic board SATA ports to the lower optical bay. When the need arises, you can add a second SSD :p

Forget that nonsense about a "pro caddy" for $90. Get a set of mounting brackets that will hold two SSDs, something like these from newegg (total about $12):

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817994073
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817990015

Don't forget a power splitter, you'll need a molex to two SATA like this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812191171

Total cost is under $25 and you'll have a second 2.5" bay waiting for that second SSD you know you'll want in a few weeks.
 
F

fiatlux

macrumors 6502
Dec 5, 2007
351
139
I'd vote for the lower optical bay as well.

I did not care about a caddy or a bracket: my SSD just sits loose in the bay but who cares? I'm not wandering around with my Mac Pro and SSDs have no moving parts inside anyway.

Note that I used the second SATA connector on the mobo for my new optical disk drive (a Blu-Ray burner ;) ). But as I have a SATA/eSATA PCIe card too, I have a spare internal SATA connector on that one that I could use for a second SSD.

If you run out of SATA connectors, one more option is to get a PCIe SATA card with built-in SSD support, such as the Sonnet Tempo SSD (but there are others). You may be limited by the PCIe speed, though, and not benefit from SATA-3.
 
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