Optibay, Mavericks install on SSD

[townsend2005]

Basic question:
Can I install Mavericks on an external USB drive, then clone it (using latest SuperDuper) to an internal SSD drive in the Optibay?

Can 10.6.8 (my current OS) co-exist on the HDD in the main bay?


My Current configuration:
Early 2011 MBP
HDD in Original Bay.
SSD in Opti-bay.
(Currently) Single boot to 10.6.8 with Parallels

My Goal:
Mavericks on my SSD in Optibay
Keep 10.6.8 on my HDD in the main bay
(Eventually put Windows 7 on the HDD, via bootcamp)

I've read a lot of threads, but... everybody's outcomes seem so different. The clone method seems to overcome the limitation of installing onto SSD in the optibay.

But will an install to external USB configure the install to that particular hardware setup?

Thank you!

 

[Weaselboy]

All of that will work fine. When the OS boots to new hardware it will automatically load the new drivers (kexts) it needs.

 

[chrfr]

Early 2011 MBP
HDD in Original Bay.
SSD in Opti-bay.

Keep in mind that the SATA port in the HDD bay of the 2011 MBP is faster than that in the Optical bay. Depending on your SSD, you may see a performance increase putting the SSD in the disk bay.

 

[townsend2005]

Thanks, guys!

Wease - have you done this yourself, or read of others successfully doing it with Mavericks? I tried to clone 10.6.8 from HDD to SSD, a couple years ago and it led to a strangely long shutdown times. I assumed it was a hardware mismatch between the install and the new boot HW or location. Had to do a clean install to fix it.


Chrfr, I have heard of this as well, but I believe the early 2011 MBP's (and some others) had an exception, with 6GB SATA in both ports. These are the specs listed in my system profiler for both SATA ports:
Product: 6 Series Chipset
Link Speed: 6 Gigabit
Negotiated Link Speed: 3 Gigabit

 

[simonsi]

Keep in mind that the SATA port in the HDD bay of the 2011 MBP is faster than that in the Optical bay. Depending on your SSD, you may see a performance increase putting the SSD in the disk bay.

Thats not 100% true, mine syncs at 6G to both optibay (SSD) and drive bay (HDD). Disk speed tests reflect the sync speed.

No doubt some early-2011 have issues with some drives but not all. Certainly my config works just fine.

 

[Mike Boreham]

Any 6G device (SATA 3) in the optical bay of a 2011 MBP is asking for trouble. Google "6G in Optical bay MBP". There are many threads on these forums. One of the more authoritative links is this one. Look in "optical bay" section of the "special notes" in the compatibility tab.

I know Simonsi says they are not all bad and that his works fine. Believe me his is rare and may have problems not visible to the user.

I have had two 2011 MBPs and tried 6G SSDs and HDDs in the optical bays. One wouldn't see the drive in the optical bay at all. The other appeared to be working fine, and I used it that way for some weeks before I found that SMART was showing thousands of CRC errors. These are errors where the data has to be retransmitted so not noticeable to the user, and are typically caused by cabling errors, which is consistent with the 2011 MBP problem of shielding not supporting 6G. When I knew this was happening I took it out and put a 3G (SATA 2) device in the optical.

Much better to put 6G devices in the main bay.

 

[simonsi]

Any 6G device (SATA 3) in the optical bay of a 2011 MBP is asking for trouble. Google "6G in Optical bay MBP". There are many threads on these forums. One of the more authoritative links is this one. Look in "optical bay" section of the "special notes" in the compatibility tab.

I know Simonsi says they are not all bad and that his works fine. Believe me his is rare and may have problems not visible to the user.

I have had two 2011 MBPs and tried 6G SSDs and HDDs in the optical bays. One wouldn't see the drive in the optical bay at all. The other appeared to be working fine, and I used it that way for some weeks before I found that SMART was showing thousands of CRC errors. These are errors where the data has to be retransmitted so not noticeable to the user, and are typically caused by cabling errors, which is consistent with the 2011 MBP problem of shielding not supporting 6G. When I knew this was happening I took it out and put a 3G (SATA 2) device in the optical.

Much better to put 6G devices in the main bay.

The data we have simply supports that some 2011 have an issue and some don't, ratio would probably only be visible to Apple. As with all forums, issues are over-represented here. I'm simply saying that out-of-the-box with no special effort mine works and is error-free by smart reporter. There is no indication of problems on either drive, even low-level issues would cause the sync speed to be renegotiated down by either controller or disk.

This would indicate a component dependency for the issue (which would fit with a shielding problem), or it being compatibility with certain combinations of SSD/HDD put in the optibay - or indeed a combination of the 2.

8mths in service and counting....Indeed that OWC article quoted states they have "observed a high rate of success using SATA 3.0 6Gb/s drives in Apple 13" bays where 6Gb/s link is present, some systems may not operate properly with this setup." That implies a success rate of 50%+

 

[townsend2005]

I have Sata II (3Gbit/s) devices in both bays, so it should be moot for the install.

 

[Mike Boreham]

The data we have simply supports that some 2011 have an issue and some don't, ratio would probably only be visible to Apple. As with all forums, issues are over-represented here. I'm simply saying that out-of-the-box with no special effort mine works and is error-free by smart reporter. There is no indication of problems on either drive, even low-level issues would cause the sync speed to be renegotiated down by either controller or disk.

This would indicate a component dependency for the issue (which would fit with a shielding problem), or it being compatibility with certain combinations of SSD/HDD put in the optibay - or indeed a combination of the 2.

8mths in service and counting....Indeed that OWC article quoted states they have "observed a high rate of success using SATA 3.0 6Gb/s drives in Apple 13" bays where 6Gb/s link is present, some systems may not operate properly with this setup." That implies a success rate of 50%+

Certainly 13 inch seem to fare better, I hadn't noticed that in your sig.

Smart Reporter won't show the CRC errors (AFAIK). It was Drive DX which showed my CRC errors. The error rate was only several thousand per day, and wouldn't have had any noticeable effect on speed, but being OCD inclined, I wasn't happy with the set up, even though it probably would have been fine for years.

All 2011 MBP owners thinking of putting 6G in the optical bay need the warning. I agree we don't know how many are "bad", and forums tend to make problems look much note common than they are, but my feeling is that it is worse than 50%. 50% is not good odds if you are spending $£ to do it.

Actually my experience implies it isn't a simple "good" or "bad" issue, but a spectrum from very bad (not seeing drive at all) to good (working and with no, or few SMART errors). Not many people use Drive DX so we don't know if any actually have no CRC errors, but probably are some. Many users report that the drive mounts but then misbehaves during data transfer. It depends on the drive as well.

The OP will be fine as he says as he has SATA2 in both bays.

 

[simonsi]

Certainly 13 inch seem to fare better, I hadn't noticed that in your sig.

Smart Reporter won't show the CRC errors (AFAIK). It was Drive DX which showed my CRC errors. The error rate was only several thousand per day, and wouldn't have had any noticeable effect on speed, but being OCD inclined, I wasn't happy with the set up, even though it probably would have been fine for years.

All 2011 MBP owners thinking of putting 6G in the optical bay need the warning. I agree we don't know how many are "bad", and forums tend to make problems look much note common than they are, but my feeling is that it is worse than 50%. 50% is not good odds if you are spending $£ to do it.

Actually my experience implies it isn't a simple "good" or "bad" issue, but a spectrum from very bad (not seeing drive at all) to good (working and with no, or few SMART errors). Not many people use Drive DX so we don't know if any actually have no CRC errors, but probably are some. Many users report that the drive mounts but then misbehaves during data transfer. It depends on the drive as well.

The OP will be fine as he says as he has SATA2 in both bays.

Just put Drive DX on and its showing 0 CRC errors on both drives. If shielding was an issue there must have been a grounding issue with the cable or something, or a fixed spec cable - although mine has never been for service so whatever was in it was there from new cable-wise.

 

[Mike Boreham]

Just put Drive DX on and its showing 0 CRC errors on both drives. If shielding was an issue there must have been a grousing issue with the cable or something, or a fixed cable - although mine has never been for service so whatever was in it was there from new cable-wise.

That's good . After following this subject very closely on many forums, you are only the third person who has reported success (but of course forums distort), and the only one of the three who tested it with Drive Dx.

 

[simonsi]

That's good . After following this subject very closely on many forums, you are only the third person who has reported success (but of course forums distort), and the only one of the three who tested it with Drive Dx.

Only recommendation Drive DX has is to update the firmware on my Crucial SSD but I'll be leaving well alone

 

[Mike Boreham]

Only recommendation Drive DX has is to update the firmware on my Crucial SSD but I'll be leaving well alone

I am a bit of an update junky and (when I had Crucial SSDs) always updated to every new firmware....even though I had to refit the optical bay to do so.

Unlike many, I never had any problem doing this, or with the results, though I can't say I ever saw an improvement either.

 

[simonsi]

I am a bit of an update junky and (when I had Crucial SSDs) always updated to every new firmware....even though I had to refit the optical bay to do so.

Unlike many, I never had any problem doing this, or with the results, though I can't say I ever saw an improvement either.

I would normally update but I'm not going to rock this particular boat