Snow Leopard Optimization for SSD?

[tejota1911]

I have a 2.26GHz 13"MBP, and I just ordered the intel 160GB Gen2 SSD for it. I'm curious if there are any changes I should make in Snow Leopard to optimize it for the SSD. I did some searching and saw that a lot of people are disabling the Sudden Motion Sensor in the Terminal. Are there any other things I should do? Also, I plan on doing a fresh install on the SSD, not cloning my existing drive. Will the SL Upgrade DVD that Apple sent me do the job, or will I need to first install Leopard, off the DVD that came with the MBP, then install SL? When I first install the intel SSD, will it be recognized, or do I need to format it a special way to get it to show up? Thanks in advance. I'm just trying to get everything squared away before the SSD arrives, so that I can do it right the first time.

Also, I don't know if this matters or not, but I DO have the 1.7 Firmware Update installed.

Compiled List Of Suggestions:
1. Disable Sudden Motion Sensor
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1934
2. Uncheck "Put the Hard Disk to sleep when possible", under Energy Saver in System Preferences.
3. "noatime" *Check OCZ Forum for How-To.(I haven't decided if I am going to do this one.)

[maflynn]

What's the advantage if disabling the sudden motion sensor for SSDs? I don't see why you'd need or want to do that since SSDs have no mechanical parts.

[Bostonaholic]

Originally Posted by maflynn

What's the advantage if disabling the sudden motion sensor for SSDs? I don't see why you'd need or want to do that since SSDs have no mechanical parts.

Since the SSD doesn't have moving parts, the motion sensor is useless. So disabling it will remove 1 (or more) process(es)--possibly freeing up some resources.

I'm not sure how the motion sensor works i.e. if it's controlled by the OS or strictly hardware but if it is controlled by the OS, with the motion sensor on, if it is triggered by a "sudden movement", the OS would stop reading from the HD--which would be useless when using a SSD.

[fehhkk]

Agreed! ^^.

If you placed your SSD in the optical drive SATA port, I believe the sudden motion sensor doesn't apply there.

I have this disabled, since my SSD is on the regular HDD drive bay. Disabling it is a good idea, in my opinion.

[TIGOS]

Well... how i do this?

[fehhkk]

Originally Posted by TIGOS

Well... how i do this?

Here you go

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1934

[TIGOS]

Thanks!

[tenderidol]

Originally Posted by fehhkk

Here you go

http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1934

Thanks! I didn't know about that... I am also gathering as much info as possible about installing an SSD into my 15uMBP while waiting for the Intel G2 160GB drive to arrive.

[sascha h-k]

dissable motion sensor and no sleep in energy-safe pane is a MUST !

beside this: "noatime"; visit ocz osX forum for a how to do ..

[tenderidol]

Originally Posted by sascha h-k

dissable motion sensor and no sleep in energy-safe pane is a MUST !

Thanks. Will include that in the "SSD preparation list". Anything else?

[Bostonaholic]

Originally Posted by tenderidol

Thanks. Will include that in the "SSD preparation list". Anything else?

Will there be a compiled list somewhere? Maybe the OP? If I'm getting my SSD in about a month, I don't want to have to search through this thread (which may be pages long by then) in order to find everything.

[sascha h-k]

Originally Posted by tenderidol

Thanks. Will include that in the "SSD preparation list". Anything else?

yes, as posted: noatime

it's done in several minutes via terminal and so please look into the ocz forum to find the strings to copy/paste;

so nothing bad will happen ..

[fehhkk]

Originally Posted by tenderidol

Thanks. Will include that in the "SSD preparation list". Anything else?

Screwdriver #00 for the bottom case screws
Torx mini T-6 (or some heavy duty pliers) for the hard drive mounting screws.

[pgharavi]

I'm having terminal issues. I only have my default (admin) account. There is no password. In other words, whenever I am prompted for a password, I just hit enter.

In Terminal, when I try to do the command described here, it tells me that my password is incorrect.

Anyone know why?

[Grimmeh]

Isn't the Sudden Motion Sensor a hardware thing, mainly? Turning it off would yield negligible performance boosts.

What does preventing the disk from sleeping do for the SSD? (Apart from the obvious)

[sascha h-k]

sudden motion sensor "on" dirsturbs when playing a movie, even when there is "no motion" of the machine ..

it's not for speed reason (when off)

[Dan73]

Originally Posted by Grimmeh

Isn't the Sudden Motion Sensor a hardware thing, mainly? Turning it off would yield negligible performance boosts.

What does preventing the disk from sleeping do for the SSD? (Apart from the obvious)

Possibly if you trigger it, it causes the SSD to stop reading/writing because the SMS can't tell the difference between a SSD and HDD...

Also why turn off put the hard drive to sleep? Just curious.

[kanon14]

Originally Posted by Dan73

Also why turn off put the hard drive to sleep? Just curious.

I think it has to do with some SSDs fail to wake up upon sleeping.

[twitchgreen]

I've got a MBP (3, 1) with a Crucial 256GB SSD (M225) as the internal boot drive w/SL 10.6.1. I've tried repeatedly to turn off Sudden Motion Sensor w/no success via Terminal. "About this Mac" still continues to show it as enabled. I also unsuccessfully tried several utility programs (such as Cocktail & MacPilot) to help turn it off. Any ideas?

[disconap]

You could disable spotlight indexing, I'm betting that might speed things up a bit.

[mackmgg]

The only problem with disabling the SMS, is there goes programs like iAlertU

[Craiger]

Originally Posted by pgharavi

I'm having terminal issues. I only have my default (admin) account. There is no password. In other words, whenever I am prompted for a password, I just hit enter.

In Terminal, when I try to do the command described here, it tells me that my password is incorrect.

Anyone know why?

I think to use sudo command you MUST have a password. An empty string won't work.

[villager990]

just out of curiosity what's noatime?

[bware189]

If the TS is looking at taking out his old HDD, and replacing the optical drive with it, then there is a lot more to do. The SSD is very straightfoward if the HDD is to be removed entirely from the machine.
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=680228
This post is choke-full of goodness on the SSD/HDD setup.

Otherwise, the Intel ssds are flawless bits of hardware. I have not run into a single problem with mine.

On this note about having an extra HDD in the optibay along side an SSD, does anyone know a method of getting sudden motion sensor to work for the optibay HDD? I've been trying to figure this out for a while, as the HDD always comes to a shrieking halt when restarting or when ejected.

[Essjay]

Just put my Intel X-25M 160GB in my June MBP, best thing I ever did. Disabled SMS and the sleep feature right away. Also updated the firmware. Gotta love 18 second boot times.