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Advice on putting old ssd in new MacBook Pro

N

nicolanicola

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 11, 2009
73
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I am considering buying a 13inch MacBook Pro and selling my mid2010 mbp. I bought a 500gb SSD for my MBP. I was hoping to just take it out and switch it with the sata drive that comes with my new MBP.

However, I am concerned that the drive format or something may be the reason my current MBP is quite slow and therefore putting into the new one would not change anything and in fact slow down my new mac. Should I maybe back everything up to another drive and reformat my SSD before installing it? Or would it be ok just putting it in as is?

Thanks for any responses.
 
If you have Mac OS X 10.7 Lion on that SSD, it will probably not work in the 2013 13" classic MBP due to driver issues. You need at least OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion on that SSD, though since it is a mid-2012 model and came with 10.7.3, it might not be necessary.

As to the slowness, it may be due to not enough RAM, but that is guessing, since you did not elaborate on how the slowness manifests.

Open Activity Monitor and select All Processes and then sort by Real Mem to show you the process(es) using up your RAM.

PS: As you probably know, the MacBook Pro with Retina Display has no room for a 2.5" SATA SSD, as it uses PCIe flash modules.
 
simsaladimbamba said:
If you have Mac OS X 10.7 Lion on that SSD, it will probably not work in the 2013 13" classic MBP due to driver issues. You need at least OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion on that SSD, though since it is a mid-2012 model and came with 10.7.3, it might not be necessary.

As to the slowness, it may be due to not enough RAM, but that is guessing, since you did not elaborate on how the slowness manifests.

Open Activity Monitor and select All Processes and then sort by Real Mem to show you the process(es) using up your RAM.

PS: As you probably know, the MacBook Pro with Retina Display has no room for a 2.5" SATA SSD, as it uses PCIe flash modules.
Click to expand...

Hey thanks for the reply.

I updated my signature to show current specs. I have mavericks on that SSD.

So will it work with the current 13" MBP?

I'm not going with for the retina as from what I can tell images don't look too good on it as they don't have enough resolution. Plus I'm a web developer and I really need to view websites the way most of my clients users would be, so I can see what they see.

The slowness is just waiting for an action to happen. For example clicking finder, it doesn't open instantaneously. It's become more noticeable due to the fact I've a XPS Dell laptop for work which is lightening fast at responding to interaction.

Photoshop has slowed down loads for some reason. For example scrolling redraws the screen in like 2 second delays. Since ts is just photoshop though I'm thinking it's maybe a software issue that would be sorted if I got the newest (legitimate) version.
 
nicolanicola said:
Hey thanks for the reply.

I updated my signature to show current specs. I have mavericks on that SSD.

So will it work with the current 13" MBP?

I'm not going with for the retina as from what I can tell images don't look too good on it as they don't have enough resolution. Plus I'm a web developer and I really need to view websites the way most of my clients users would be, so I can see what they see.

The slowness is just waiting for an action to happen. For example clicking finder, it doesn't open instantaneously. It's become more noticeable due to the fact I've a XPS Dell laptop for work which is lightening fast at responding to interaction.

Photoshop has slowed down loads for some reason. For example scrolling redraws the screen in like 2 second delays. Since ts is just photoshop though I'm thinking it's maybe a software issue that would be sorted if I got the newest (legitimate) version.
Click to expand...

Then the slowness is probably due to the C2D CPU. The i5 or i7 is faster than that, twice to thrice compared to the C2D.
 
simsaladimbamba said:
Sorry, forgot you had a 15", was too focused on the 13", which in 2010 was still using the C2D.

And yes to your question.
Click to expand...

Cool ok then. Thank you very much :). When I get it should I not bother turning it on, but replace the drive first then turn it on?
 
nicolanicola said:
Cool ok then. Thank you very much :). When I get it should I not bother turning it on, but replace the drive first then turn it on?
Click to expand...

Either way will work fine, but I would turn it on and make sure everything is working okay out of the box. This way if there is a problem, Apple can't try and say it is because you messed something up swapping the drives.

After that just do the swap and once the new drive is in go to System Prefs and in the Startup Disk pane select the SSD as the boot drive.
 
Weaselboy said:
Either way will work fine, but I would turn it on and make sure everything is working okay out of the box. This way if there is a problem, Apple can't try and say it is because you messed something up swapping the drives.

After that just do the swap and once the new drive is in go to System Prefs and in the Startup Disk pane select the SSD as the boot drive.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that.

You know what? I'm not wondering if I should cancel and get the retina display model. The retina display is .5kg lighter and supports 16gb of RAM and the battery last longer. It's also a bigger resolution meaning I can fit more in the screen. It's is an extra £400 though... I don't know if those reasons warrant all that extra money...

If I did do that, I know I'd need to backup my current mac to time machine and do it that way as I understand the retina models aren't customisable.
 
nicolanicola said:
Thanks for that.

You know what? I'm not wondering if I should cancel and get the retina display model. The retina display is .5kg lighter and supports 16gb of RAM and the battery last longer. It's also a bigger resolution meaning I can fit more in the screen. It's is an extra £400 though... I don't know if those reasons warrant all that extra money...

If I did do that, I know I'd need to backup my current mac to time machine and do it that way as I understand the retina models aren't customisable.
Click to expand...

Those new Retina machines are nice! You can swap out the flash storage in them, but the problem is at this point nobody makes a replacement. I believe OWC announced they are working on a flash storage upgrade for the new Retina.
 
Weaselboy said:
Those new Retina machines are nice! You can swap out the flash storage in them, but the problem is at this point nobody makes a replacement. I believe OWC announced they are working on a flash storage upgrade for the new Retina.
Click to expand...

Yep, but they are expensive. You mind as well just buy the storage you need from Apple upon initial purchase.
 
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