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Just installed the Momentus XT in a 2011 MBP. It is well worth it!

lavrishevo

lavrishevo

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Jan 9, 2007
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So, after debating back and forth between the Vertex 3 and the OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 6G I just can't justify the price per GB for the speed increase. I mean 240 GB for about $600.00 is just outrageous. I think in the future I will go for the OWC 6 GB or similar but I really need at least 500 GB drive and for only $99.00 (Amazon) you can't be the price per GB.

Anyone with the 2011 quad-core go from the stock 750 GB 5400 to the Momentus XT? If so, what kind of speed increase are you seeing?
 
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I have a late 09, early 10 Pro 13 and am going to pick up the Momentus XT as well. Would love to plink the cash on a SSD but after much thought, I may as well upgrade my entire book if I went SSD. I think the Momentus will be fine with the system I have. $99 is hard to beat for the 500GB Momentus XT.
 
Alright guys. So I just installed the Momentus XT in my 2011 I7 Macbook pro and I am impressed with the results. It's a very noticeable speed increase over the stock 5400 drive. Boot time averages between 17 - 20 seconds.

Here a little video for your perusal. I am very happy with the purchase.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhkE2Gqp7Jw

Just used Carbon Copy to clone my stock drive and performed a SMC and PRAM reset and everything is working great. Nice drive for $99.00!
 
I did the exact same thing w/ my 17 inch, 750GB 5400RPM to the Hybrid drive, well worth it. Boots are from 16-19 seconds for me, and everything is really snappy. I've had this drive in a few other devices I've worked on and it's well worth it. Especially if you want space but a nice performance boost. Great compromise between a HDD and SSD, but I would have liked to seen an 8GB SSD Cache instead of the 4. And maybe a 640GB or 750GB variety of the drive. Maybe in the next generations.
 
lavrishevo said:
Alright guys. So I just installed the Momentus XT in my 2011 I7 Macbook pro and I am impressed with the results. It's a very noticeable speed increase over the stock 5400 drive. Boot time averages between 17 - 20 seconds.

Here a little video for your perusal. I am very happy with the purchase.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhkE2Gqp7Jw

Just used Carbon Copy to clone my stock drive and performed a SMC and PRAM reset and everything is working great. Nice drive for $99.00!
Click to expand...

Did you upgrade the firmware?
 
uplusd said:
Are the SMC and PRAM resets recommended after HD swap?
Click to expand...

Let me put it this way. When I first booted I was getting a hang before the Apple logo as if the computer was taking it's sweet time to recognize the drive. The resets took care of that. It never hurts to reset the PRAM and / or SMC when installing new hardware. Helps the computer deal with a new hardware configuration.
 
Another note.

All sleep / spin down functions are working as they should.
 
lavrishevo said:
Let me put it this way. When I first booted I was getting a hang before the Apple logo as if the computer was taking it's sweet time to recognize the drive. The resets took care of that. It never hurts to reset the PRAM and / or SMC when installing new hardware. Helps the computer deal with a new hardware configuration.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I'm glad I stumbled on this thread. I recently added an OptiBay with 64 gig SSD and moved everything over to it except the User folder which I left on my 500GB 7200rpm HDD. Anyway, my boot times were just as slow with normal HDD, I expected some type of increase with the SSD. After doing the SMC and PRAM resets the boot time is cut in half! :D
 
uplusd said:
Thanks. I'm glad I stumbled on this thread. I recently added an OptiBay with 64 gig SSD and moved everything over to it except the User folder which I left on my 500GB 7200rpm HDD. Anyway, my boot times were just as slow with normal HDD, I expected some type of increase with the SSD. After doing the SMC and PRAM resets the boot time is cut in half! :D
Click to expand...

Cheers! ;)
 
is getting one of these a no brainer (vs staying with 5400rpm standard drive). i've been eyeing it. really don't need more space than what i currently have, so upgrading would be solely for the speed benefit.
 
Got mine for $99 from newegg to replace the 320GB 5400RPM stock HDD and for the price I can't see a better solution. After a day of it "learning" what I use everything is much snappier.

Oh, and boot time from the moment I push the power button until OSX is loaded is between 18 and 19 seconds :D
 
With Parallels?

Am wondering if anyone's used this with Parallels running Windows? Would switching between Mac OS programs and Win programs "confuse" the SSD cache's learned "memory" of frequently used files/apps?:confused:
 
I bought one at best buy for 150 returning it after doing some research while cloning the drive. Reasons:
1) I paid too much at retail, at newegg its only $99
2) Conflicting stories, some said it was acceptable but 4 months out it started exhibiting problems from not powering down correctly (battery drain) to the computer not recognizing the drive
3) Firmware updates are mixed, some said patch 25 did not address fundamental problems
4) Increased vibration and heat

And the most important reason:
5) Very concerned about battery life. Performance / watt. I am not a gamer and I analyzed my activity any extra battery drain is not worth it for me. Plus, I have a macbook non-unibody with a weaker charge density.

I am definitely returning the device today. I'll use this time to think if I will rebuy.
 
I installed one in my 2.6 2008 MBP.

Thing flies.

I updated to SD25 prior to cloning over my previous drive (Hitachi 5K500)

No problems with the Momentus XT in this machine.
 
I've had one installed in my Early 2009 17" unibody (2.66GHz) since November running without issue. Ran SD23 initially, also problem free, but updated to SD24 shortly after. It seemed to run cooler, and possibly quieter (I say possibly because it was very quiet before).

I'm still waiting for a bit more feedback on SD25 before upgrading. The feedback in this thread seems to indicate it's OK. Not having any problems with SD24, but it's usually a good idea to keep it up to date.

Bottom line - it's fast, very quiet, and no vibration.
 
gr8tfly said:
I've had one installed in my Early 2009 17" unibody (2.66GHz) since November running without issue. Ran SD23 initially, also problem free, but updated to SD24 shortly after. It seemed to run cooler, and possibly quieter (I say possibly because it was very quiet before).

I'm still waiting for a bit more feedback on SD25 before upgrading. The feedback in this thread seems to indicate it's OK. Not having any problems with SD24, but it's usually a good idea to keep it up to date.

Bottom line - it's fast, very quiet, and no vibration.
Click to expand...

I'm happy with the quick boot time and snappier response over my stock 320GB 5400RPM HDD, however I have questions regarding my xbench scores.

I agree with your bottom line, just curious about my low scores

Link to thread

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1150061/
 
zwodubber said:
I'm happy with the quick boot time and snappier response over my stock 320GB 5400RPM HDD, however I have questions regarding my xbench scores.

I agree with your bottom line, just curious about my low scores

Link to thread

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1150061/
Click to expand...

Can't really add much to what was said there about what could affect XBench scores.

Check to make sure you don't have anything running in the background which would also be accessing the HD (such as Time Machine backup, or Spotlight indexing).

You can get some feel for background access to the HD by using Activity Monitor before running XBench. In other words, there shouldn't be much access with the system "idiling".
 
Tensakun said:
Am wondering if anyone's used this with Parallels running Windows? Would switching between Mac OS programs and Win programs "confuse" the SSD cache's learned "memory" of frequently used files/apps?:confused:
Click to expand...

I dunno about vmware, but bootcamp definitely screws up the caching algorithm. If I boot up windows 7, it will slow down my next osx bootup back to stock mechanical HD speeds. One of the reasons I went with a ssd/750gb optibay combo instead of the momentus xt.
 
happy camper here.. it seem that its much snappier and boot time from when i press power to log in screen is about 13-15's consistently either way, might be too early to tell as i just installed this last night, but for how cheap i paid for it no complains here...
 
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