Best SSD for Macbook Pro?

[seong]

I've been thinking about upgrading to 2011 MBP SB, but since I don't have enough money, I thought upgrading to new SSDs would boost my speed, so I can wait until 2012 or 2013.
I used MRoogle to search for the answer, but there hasn't been any replies that said which SSD to buy.
Few weeks ago, I heard that after the new update, some SSDs didn't work properly as it used to.
Do you guys have/used any SSDs that you can recommend? I heard about Seagate Momentus XT, but there has been reports that it malfunctions after two years of usage.

 

[Cyberheart]

I've been thinking about upgrading to 2011 MBP SB, but since I don't have enough money, I thought upgrading to new SSDs would boost my speed, so I can wait until 2012 or 2013.
I used MRoogle to search for the answer, but there hasn't been any replies that said which SSD to buy.
Few weeks ago, I heard that after the new update, some SSDs didn't work properly as it used to.
Do you guys have/used any SSDs that you can recommend? I heard about Seagate Momentus XT, but there has been reports that it malfunctions after two years of usage.

I have been checking out SSDs for about a month now i say they are good but i dont trust them i had a kingston SSD 250 read and 230 write and i had a bad experince it was fast but it was noisy they say that SSDs dont make noise but they do well some of them do. The SSDs have a power thing inside them and that makes the noise.. If you want a good SSD though i would go for intel M series they are selling like Hotcakes because of their popularity. Please feel free to ask me any other questions you need to know..

 

[Gofre]

I have been checking out SSDs for about a month now i say they are good but i dont trust them i had a kingston SSD 250 read and 230 write and i had a bad experince it was fast but it was noisy they say that SSDs dont make noise but they do well some of them do. The SSDs have a power thing inside them and that makes the noise.. If you want a good SSD though i would go for intel M series they are selling like Hotcakes because of their popularity. Please feel free to ask me any other questions you need to know..

How on earth did it make noise? They have no moving parts.

 

[pullman]

Few weeks ago, I heard that after the new update, some SSDs didn't work properly as it used to.

I thought this was related to the 6GB/s SATA III drives.

Do you guys have/used any SSDs that you can recommend?

Go OWC Mercury Extreme. Excellent price for outstanding performance.

I heard about Seagate Momentus XT, but there has been reports that it malfunctions after two years of usage.

The Momentus is not an SSD, it's a 7200 rpm hybrid drive with 4GB of memory that caches the most used (parts of) programs. I have it in my 2008 Macbook and it works very well (though it vibrates quite a bit).

/p

Ps.

I used MRoogle to search for the answer, but there hasn't been any replies that said which SSD to buy.

Umm, what about this search?

 

[Cyberheart]

How on earth did it make noise? They have no moving parts.

Thats what i was asking myself for 2 weeks before i took it back now i have my HD and im good i dont hear that sound anymore.

 

[Tamasi]

I remember having read the Intel X25-M is the only SSD that (just like Apple stock SSDs) is guaranteed of not raising any issues in a MBP (for instance related to sleeping/waking the computer etc). Even OWC would have a decent chance to run problematic.

Could anybody please comment to that? I'm looking for an SSD to put in an optibay, but my prime concern (above speed) is that I don't want it to have ANY issues. Second concern obviously is speed, then size, and least important is price. What would you recommend?

Thanks a lot in advance for any help/advice, hopefully I won't have to create my own thread.. yes, I used MRoogle a lot as well, but must agree with the OP, that although threads with questions like these are raised a lot, hardly any useful answers come up..

 

[dusk007]

Well afaik there are no troubles with Sandforce drives ala Vertex 2 or Micron C300 either. With Intel is only that everybody thinks that it is coming form a big company and that they test more thoroughly than Sandforce there are little hard facts that actually state they are in any way more reliable or less trouble.

@op if you still have a 2010 MBP there is little reason to wait for the latest and greatest SSD. You cannot make use of 6Gpbs SATA 3 drives anyway. And it is very much possible that by the time you upgrade to a newer Notebook with SATA3 SSDs will be even faster and cheaper and you want a new one because of space and speed.
Also the SSD510 on the MBP 15" doesn't seem to truly benefit from the SATA 3 speeds. It only just manages to break the SATA 2 limits and is not nearly as close as on Desktop systems.
IMO a waste to buy an SSD 510 over one of the current SATA 2 models. The big benefits such as latency, noise, power consumption didn't change.

 

[Weaselboy]

I remember having read the Intel X25-M is the only SSD that (just like Apple stock SSDs) is guaranteed of not raising any issues in a MBP (for instance related to sleeping/waking the computer etc). Even OWC would have a decent chance to run problematic.

From user reports in the forums, the Intel X25 does seem to be the most trouble free and although maybe not the fastest SSD, it is reliable. Intel also has a solution to update firmware on your Mac from a bootable CDRom.

OWC is a good performer, but the forums are full of people having sleep and hibernation issues with OWC. OWC has been promising a firmware fix for this for months and it still has not materialized. When they do issue a firmware fix the only current way to install it is under Windows in Bootcamp.

I just installed a Intel 510 SSD in my 2011 13" MBP and it works perfectly, but others have had problems. There is a long thread here all about it.

If you want safe, trouble free choice I would go with the Intel X25.

 

[ddehr026]

From user reports in the forums, the Intel X25 does seem to be the most trouble free and although maybe not the fastest SSD, it is reliable. Intel also has a solution to update firmware on your Mac from a bootable CDRom.

OWC is a good performer, but the forums are full of people having sleep and hibernation issues with OWC. OWC has been promising a firmware fix for this for months and it still has not materialized. When they do issue a firmware fix the only current way to install it is under Windows in Bootcamp.

I just installed a Intel 510 SSD in my 2011 13" MBP and it works perfectly, but others have had problems. There is a long thread here all about it.

If you want safe, trouble free choice I would go with the Intel X25.

I agree

 

[ppilone]

My brother and I (early '09 MB and late '08 MBP) just upgraded our machines by replacing the SuperDrive with a 120GB SSD from OWC. This was the kit we purchased:

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other World Computing/DDMBSSD120/

Everything went really smoothly and the performance increase is huge - we benchmarked the drive at about 6x faster than our HDs. I moved the OS and apps over to the SSD and kept /Users on the my HD. I haven't had any problems so far with the drive.

As another post mentioned OWC does advertise an issue with the drives and hibernation. The easy solution for now is to disable hibernation in power and battery modes. It's not ideal but does work - for now.

 

[Weaselboy]

Well afaik there are no troubles with Sandforce drives ala Vertex 2 or Micron C300 either. With Intel is only that everybody thinks that it is coming form a big company and that they test more thoroughly than Sandforce there are little hard facts that actually state they are in any way more reliable or less trouble.

There are problems reported with both if you search the forums.

Here is reliability data on SSD brands.

 

[paulrbeers]

I've used a Sandforce 1200 based SSD in my 2009 MBP and I currently have an Apple branded one in my 2011 MBP (the one that comes with the 15"). Both work flawlessly.

Those are the only ones I can speak to with personal experience.

 

[spooky69]

Well afaik there are no troubles with Sandforce drives ala Vertex 2 or Micron C300 either. With Intel is only that everybody thinks that it is coming form a big company and that they test more thoroughly than Sandforce there are little hard facts that actually state they are in any way more reliable or less trouble.

@op if you still have a 2010 MBP there is little reason to wait for the latest and greatest SSD. You cannot make use of 6Gpbs SATA 3 drives anyway. And it is very much possible that by the time you upgrade to a newer Notebook with SATA3 SSDs will be even faster and cheaper and you want a new one because of space and speed.
Also the SSD510 on the MBP 15" doesn't seem to truly benefit from the SATA 3 speeds. It only just manages to break the SATA 2 limits and is not nearly as close as on Desktop systems.
IMO a waste to buy an SSD 510 over one of the current SATA 2 models. The big benefits such as latency, noise, power consumption didn't change.

I have got to disagree with nearly all of that. Firstly, I am not sure how you can look into SSDs with Macs and make those comments about Sandforce and, even more so, the C300. The comment about the Intel drives is just wrong. Have you seen the failure rates relative to the others?

Given that the OP stated that he will probably upgrade in 2012 or 2013, it might make some sense to get the best you can afford, as when you upgrade you can take the SSD with you into the new model. It is equally valid though to wait for the new stuff to come out and the prices to settle and then hopefully get the current stuff for a better price.

 

[desantii]

Agree, using an X-25 with no problems after multiple issues with an Intel 510

From user reports in the forums, the Intel X25 does seem to be the most trouble free and although maybe not the fastest SSD, it is reliable. Intel also has a solution to update firmware on your Mac from a bootable CDRom.

OWC is a good performer, but the forums are full of people having sleep and hibernation issues with OWC. OWC has been promising a firmware fix for this for months and it still has not materialized. When they do issue a firmware fix the only current way to install it is under Windows in Bootcamp.

I just installed a Intel 510 SSD in my 2011 13" MBP and it works perfectly, but others have had problems. There is a long thread here all about it.

If you want safe, trouble free choice I would go with the Intel X25.

 

[Bigmacduck]

Just installed OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 480GB

I just received my BTO 15" 2.3GHz i7 AG Highres MacBook Pro tonight. I already replaced the stock HDD and replaced it with a brand new OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 480GB SSD.

Currently I am reinstalling the OS and migrate from my old Mac. I will post SSD benchmarks tomorrow.

I upgraded my 2009 MacBook Air (Rev C) with a 240GB OWC Mercury Auro Pro SSD two months ago and I am EXTREMELY happy with it. It extended the useful life of my old MBA for some additional years.

I would never again buy an SSD that has no over-provision. It is much more secure, has a much longer lifetime, and allows for superior garbage collection with no performance degradation over time. Most SSDs are not over-provisioned (including Apple's stock SSD), OWC is 7% OP, and their RAID (Pro RE) models are even 28% OP.

 

[DarwinOSX]

The best in terms of compatibility and support is the Apple SSD. It's speed is middling though. But still far better than a hard drive and I don't think most people will notice the difference.

I've been thinking about upgrading to 2011 MBP SB, but since I don't have enough money, I thought upgrading to new SSDs would boost my speed, so I can wait until 2012 or 2013.
I used MRoogle to search for the answer, but there hasn't been any replies that said which SSD to buy.
Few weeks ago, I heard that after the new update, some SSDs didn't work properly as it used to.
Do you guys have/used any SSDs that you can recommend? I heard about Seagate Momentus XT, but there has been reports that it malfunctions after two years of usage.

 

[baypharm]

SSD's and flash memory share similiar problems in that individual data cells have a finite number of times that they can be written to. So write performance will suffer when SSD's fill up over time. Some mfgs have constructed technologies to increase the life of flash and SSD memory. TRIM is one of them but isn't supported by the MAC OS. If you search each mfg, they will generally tell which technologies they employ to address the shortcomings of SSD's. Obviously Apple doesn't talk about it since they don't mfg the SSD's or the flash memory modules used in their computers.

Generally speaking rotating platter hard drives offer the longest life so far. While flash and SSD offers fastest speeds while they are new. No one can say for sure how long SSD's will last in real life. However that should not deter you from using one. All storage devices will fail eventually. The good idea to do is have several sources of archiving your data so if one fails the other two or three will continue to safely hold your information.

 

[Ifti]

Although TRIM isnt supported by OSX just yet, Sandforce based drives TRIM on-the-fly. I have a Vertex 2, and havent had any issues whatsoever over the past year or so Ive had it. No slowdowns, no issues.

 

[spooky69]

I think you will find that OSX does support TRIM but only for the Apple SSDs at the moment. Let's hope that they change that!

 

[seong]

To the person who wrote: "I moved all OS to the SSD and kept the /Users on the HDD."
How do you guys even do that? Is there like a trick to do this?
I might just consider replacing the Superdrive with the SSD&Opti-bay, because I rarely use it anyways.

 

[Hansr]

To the person who wrote: "I moved all OS to the SSD and kept the /Users on the HDD."
How do you guys even do that? Is there like a trick to do this?
I might just consider replacing the Superdrive with the SSD&Opti-bay, because I rarely use it anyways.

There are quite a few threads about it but generally you just move the folder and then link it with a symlink.

 

[spooky69]

You can change the location of the user folder in the advanced settings for the user account.

 

[RedDiamond]

Although TRIM isnt supported by OSX just yet, Sandforce based drives TRIM on-the-fly. I have a Vertex 2, and havent had any issues whatsoever over the past year or so Ive had it. No slowdowns, no issues.

Strange, you made an identical post just minutes apart on this thread - TRIM only works when it is on both the drive And the OS. If it is not on the OS, it does not operate on the drive unless you use a 3ed party utility application. (Read more about it here.) The Mac OS on 2011 MBPs does support TRIM but only with SSD drives Apple ships.

 

[ppilone]

To the person who wrote: "I moved all OS to the SSD and kept the /Users on the HDD."
How do you guys even do that? Is there like a trick to do this?
I might just consider replacing the Superdrive with the SSD&Opti-bay, because I rarely use it anyways.

In System Preferences->Accounts you can view advanced options by right clicking on a user (make sure you're logged in as an admin). One of the advanced options is the location of the user's Home folder. Be careful in this dialogue - bad things can happen if you change something you're not supposed to.

 

[dagamer34]

Strange, you made an identical post just minutes apart on this thread - TRIM only works when it is on both the drive And the OS. If it is not on the OS, it does not operate on the drive unless you use a 3ed party utility application. (Read more about it here.) The Mac OS on 2011 MBPs does support TRIM but only with SSD drives Apple ships.

What he meant to refer to is the fact that SandForce based drives have their own garbage collection system that works independently from the OS.