MCE Optibay Alternative CHEAP

[MacModMachine]

Originally Posted by tofagerl

Got the cable from Startech today. Overnight shipped across countries FTW!

Edit: To bad my Laptop won't be here till sunday.

Edit2: Ok, I'm confused. The Slimline sata power connector that goes into the MBP has two wires coming out of it, not four - and those are red and black. Isn't black ground? Should I just rewire them as if it was yellow? I mean, it can't be + and ground...

Edit3: Apparently it can. It's apparently 5V and ground, which seems about right.

your cable should look like this....



keep in mind the yellow and red wire have to be there with there grounds in order for the drive to properly support power management features sata has.

now, if you have a sata to molex converter WITH orange....cut it off completely, laptop sata drives DO NOT need 12v lines.

The yellow supplies 3.3v and the red supplies 5v , both of these must be present to properly use power management on the sata drive (such as allowing the macbook to use a main drive in place of optical drive and properly sleep)

hope this helps, here are some pictures of a properly made cable, and how the ends should look.

make sure you grab some heatshrink tube to make it look nice .

you can decrease cable length as much as you like to make it look better also.

good luck!

[shaunymac]

Reporting in from my conversion on a 2.4 Santa Rosa platform. For those of you with this platform, you have a pata superdrive. That will save you some trouble hunting down your enclosure.

I put a X-252 80gb in the original hd spot and moved over my upgraded , 320gb 7200rpm hd, to the optical bay spot. No problems.

What I have noticed and loved:

1. With the SSD, I have gotten amazing battery life from the get go. My battery status said it was poor and needed to be replaced before the SSD was installed but after the SSD I am still on my original battery getting 1:30 or so.

2. The benefit of having all of my files with me. I love having all of my photos with me. Being a photographer, I struggled with just the SSD. I carried around a little 2.5" external but it was a pain. This setup is amazing!

3. Uh, is the computer on? It is so quiet and cool. I often times un-mount the drive in the optical posistion, the large one that gets hot, to save battery and to conserve energy all around. If I don't need files, there is no need right? As soon as I need something of that drive, open disk utility and mount that sucker.

4. My only problem now is that people seem to be wanting freakin cd's/dvd's! What the heck? I went 2 years on this machine and used maybe a pack of 25 dvd's? Now I'm running into people wanting this type of media. Ugh! I'm going to have to figure out something with the superdrive I took out. Some of you have some good ideas. I'm curious to see how they worked.

So, I love my setup now. All I am lacking is something to stick this superdrive in. I want something that looks nice and clean. Something to stick it in that looks presentable. I don't want something tacky sitting out that looks like it belongs to a pc! Yikes!

[Tweak3D]

Originally Posted by shaunymac

Reporting in from my conversion on a 2.4 Santa Rosa platform. For those of you with this platform, you have a pata superdrive. That will save you some trouble hunting down your enclosure.

I put a X-252 80gb in the original hd spot and moved over my upgraded , 320gb 7200rpm hd, to the optical bay spot. No problems.

What I have noticed and loved:

1. With the SSD, I have gotten amazing battery life from the get go. My battery status said it was poor and needed to be replaced before the SSD was installed but after the SSD I am still on my original battery getting 1:30 or so.

2. The benefit of having all of my files with me. I love having all of my photos with me. Being a photographer, I struggled with just the SSD. I carried around a little 2.5" external but it was a pain. This setup is amazing!

3. Uh, is the computer on? It is so quiet and cool. I often times un-mount the drive in the optical posistion, the large one that gets hot, to save battery and to conserve energy all around. If I don't need files, there is no need right? As soon as I need something of that drive, open disk utility and mount that sucker.

4. My only problem now is that people seem to be wanting freakin cd's/dvd's! What the heck? I went 2 years on this machine and used maybe a pack of 25 dvd's? Now I'm running into people wanting this type of media. Ugh! I'm going to have to figure out something with the superdrive I took out. Some of you have some good ideas. I'm curious to see how they worked.

So, I love my setup now. All I am lacking is something to stick this superdrive in. I want something that looks nice and clean. Something to stick it in that looks presentable. I don't want something tacky sitting out that looks like it belongs to a pc! Yikes!

Im doing this same mod, but for an external I modified a macbook air superdrive to work with any computer, looks great and works great too!

[orthorim]

Originally Posted by shaunymac

Reporting in from my conversion on a 2.4 Santa Rosa platform. For those of you with this platform, you have a pata superdrive. That will save you some trouble hunting down your enclosure.

I put a X-252 80gb in the original hd spot and moved over my upgraded , 320gb 7200rpm hd, to the optical bay spot. No problems.

What I have noticed and loved:

1. With the SSD, I have gotten amazing battery life from the get go. My battery status said it was poor and needed to be replaced before the SSD was installed but after the SSD I am still on my original battery getting 1:30 or so.

2. The benefit of having all of my files with me. I love having all of my photos with me. Being a photographer, I struggled with just the SSD. I carried around a little 2.5" external but it was a pain. This setup is amazing!

3. Uh, is the computer on? It is so quiet and cool. I often times un-mount the drive in the optical posistion, the large one that gets hot, to save battery and to conserve energy all around. If I don't need files, there is no need right? As soon as I need something of that drive, open disk utility and mount that sucker.

4. My only problem now is that people seem to be wanting freakin cd's/dvd's! What the heck? I went 2 years on this machine and used maybe a pack of 25 dvd's? Now I'm running into people wanting this type of media. Ugh! I'm going to have to figure out something with the superdrive I took out. Some of you have some good ideas. I'm curious to see how they worked.

So, I love my setup now. All I am lacking is something to stick this superdrive in. I want something that looks nice and clean. Something to stick it in that looks presentable. I don't want something tacky sitting out that looks like it belongs to a pc! Yikes!

Interesting information - I wish I had gotten a 160 now then I could move over all folders that I use regularly.

Then again, I might still try to squeeze everything onto the 80GB - unmounting the HD is a great idea! It would get around the only problem I have which is that any spotlight search wakes the HD from sleep which shortens battery life.

I can't do it right now because my Downloads and Documents folders are on it. But I could rearrange that stuff. Trim these folders down, shuffle all the old stuff I am carrying with me (but never use) to some sort of attic folder on the HD.

Here's what I really love: SILENCE when waking from sleep. I hated the noise that the DVD makes when you wake the MBP. That's now gone. I have a completely silent system.

[NC MacGuy]

Originally Posted by Tweak3D

Im doing this same mod, but for an external I modified a macbook air superdrive to work with any computer, looks great and works great too!

That would be my suggestion too. Not a hard mod. at all.

Have you modified your Mac to use Apple's DVD player yet? Do that and you've got a real nice package. VLC is okay but a bit of a hassle.

[tofagerl]

Originally Posted by MacModMachine

your cable should look like this....
good luck!

But... But... The cable only has two leads.
It's just like the picture on the Startech.com page: http://www.startech.com/item/SLSATAM...-with-LP4.aspx
Red and black, no yellow and second black.

[MacModMachine]

Originally Posted by tofagerl

But... But... The cable only has two leads.
It's just like the picture on the Startech.com page: http://www.startech.com/item/SLSATAM...-with-LP4.aspx
Red and black, no yellow and second black.

it will still work, your laptop just will not sleep properly,

[tofagerl]

My laptop or the harddrive? Cause the second part doesn't matter, but the first one does.

Edit: I just cursed a bit and ordered the caddy from newmodeUS with priority fedex shipping. Hopefully they will follow the plea I added to mark the price as 32$ instead of 42$, thus saving me time and money. I really want this to be ready by monday/tuesday.

[MacModMachine]

Originally Posted by tofagerl

My laptop or the harddrive? Cause the second part doesn't matter, but the first one does.

Edit: I just cursed a bit and ordered the caddy from newmodeUS with priority fedex shipping. Hopefully they will follow the plea I added to mark the price as 32$ instead of 42$, thus saving me time and money. I really want this to be ready by monday/tuesday.

well with the new modeus caddy you should not have any sleep troubles,

.

[tofagerl]

Yeah... I have those anyway, I'm babysitting my mom's puppy while she's on vacation (buying my laptop), and he's sick, so I don't get any sleep anyway.

[MrMyth]

I can confirm that using the two-lead Startech cable leads to sleep issues. My unibody 2.4 appears to go to sleep normally, but wakeup ends up with nonresponsive keyboard, nonclickable items, all kinds of silly stuff. I have to hard boot to get back to normal operation. Not so much an issue with an SSD, but annoying nonetheless. I finally had to move the SSD to the main bay and use my spinning disk via usb until I receive this cable -

http://satacables.com/micro-sata-cables.html

It appears to have all four leads. (first one on the page). If this one gives me crap I'll be buying a bay converter and using the spinning disk from the optical bay. I wish we had confirmation that SMS doesn't work from that bay.

[MacModMachine]

Originally Posted by MrMyth

I can confirm that using the two-lead Startech cable leads to sleep issues. My unibody 2.4 appears to go to sleep normally, but wakeup ends up with nonresponsive keyboard, nonclickable items, all kinds of silly stuff. I have to hard boot to get back to normal operation. Not so much an issue with an SSD, but annoying nonetheless. I finally had to move the SSD to the main bay and use my spinning disk via usb until I receive this cable -

http://satacables.com/micro-sata-cables.html

It appears to have all four leads. (first one on the page). If this one gives me crap I'll be buying a bay converter and using the spinning disk from the optical bay. I wish we had confirmation that SMS doesn't work from that bay.

the star-tech cable i linked to in the first of this thread is the one i used, it has all the lead's you need.

anything with red and black are going to give you sleep issues and other problems.

[tofagerl]

The one you linked to in the first post is the one I ordered, though. And it has two cables. They must have changed the cable without changing the SKU.

[MacModMachine]

Originally Posted by tofagerl

The one you linked to in the first post is the one I ordered, though. And it has two cables. They must have changed the cable without changing the SKU.

thats unfortunate, i hate it when companies do that,

i guess getting the cable will be more difficult now.

ill find another,

[tofagerl]

Just link to the caddy in the first post instead. Like you said, less sleep issues

[Tweak3D]

Originally Posted by NC MacGuy

That would be my suggestion too. Not a hard mod. at all.

Have you modified your Mac to use Apple's DVD player yet? Do that and you've got a real nice package. VLC is okay but a bit of a hassle.

not yet, I am recieving my second HDD and my SSD this afternoon so I will be doing a fresh install and this mod. Which tutorial did you use? any advice to keep me from breaking anything?

[tofagerl]

Measure twice, cut once!

[NC MacGuy]

Originally Posted by Tweak3D

not yet, I am recieving my second HDD and my SSD this afternoon so I will be doing a fresh install and this mod. Which tutorial did you use? any advice to keep me from breaking anything?

I started a thread on it about a month ago, I'll try and dig it up if you can't find it.

Backup your DVDplayback.framework file before you start. I screwed mine up big time the first go around and had to do major repairs.

In hindsight, the Apple DVD player app. is very nice and was well worth the trouble.

[CrackedButter]

If anybody is interested I managed to setup my RAID 0 in my macbook, the discussion can be found here: http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=819128

I used 2, 500GB drives.

UPDATE. The RAID 0 doesn't work because MacModMachine figured out the interface was PATA.

Instead now I'm just running 2 drives in this laptop, with the second one being a backup drive. I also figure that if I unmount the second drive should be saving battery power. Anyone confirm this, does unmounting the second drive kill power to it?

[tofagerl]

The bay from Newmode seems perfect, looks perfect, and installs perfect.
Unfortunately, my MBP won't boot from the SSD installed in it.
I've installed twice now, there are no other Mac installs on the system, and the only thing it will boot from is the bootcamp partition on the HDD.

I really don't want to spend an hour switching the disks around only to find it doesn't work that way either, so does anyone have any other things I can try?

[MacModMachine]

reset your smc , did you clone your drive or install from scratch ?

[tofagerl]

I don't really know how to reset the SMC since the battery can't be removed...
I've reset the PRAM three times though.

Fresh install.

Edit: SMC reset. I was looking at the wrong KB article. No change. About to wipe both disks, and then try to reinstall again.

[tofagerl]

After wiping the entire 500gb disk and reinstalling both Mac OSX and Windows, I am finally done!

*Slow exhale*

[orthorim]

newmodeus fit is indeed perfect.

I now shuffled my files and folders so that I can unmount the hard drive when not needed. That greatly enhances battery life, to the point where it's better than before the SSD install.

With full battery and HD unmounted, running off the SSD, the system showed me a remaining time of 8 hours 30 minutes this morning. Certainly a record. Once I start doing things that should then work out to 7:30 which would also be better than before.

Thanks to the poster who mentioned that trick. It turns out unmounting is the only thing that will keep the HD in idle state. Other than that, there are programs that wake all disks, including OS X's own Spotlight search which wakes the HD on ever search.

[rgarjr]

are u saying that if you unmount the HDD, it will spin down? How do you mount it back up again?