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Downside to data doubler?

D

dnadrifter

macrumors member
Original poster
Mar 21, 2009
42
0
Hi All,

I am getting close to purchasing a 15" MacBook Pro, Antiglare and am planning on putting an OWC SSD in the original drive slot and then using a OWC data doubler to install a Seagate hybrid drive in the optical slot.

Will be running the OS, programs and Lightroom catalog on the SSD and all image files, data, etc will be on the hybrid drive.

I am also planning on putting the original Apple superdrive in an enclosure so I can use it. I know I won't be able to watch movies on the external superdrive, but as long as I can install software and rip movies from it (not watch) I should be fine.

Are there any other negatives/downsides to the plan I have above before I go out and place the orders. Thanks for any comments you have....I appreciate it.
 
Check whether the optical bay issue with SATA3 has been fixed yet.

In the 2011s, RF interference from the wireless can cause corruption on SATA3 devices in the optibay.

Given the 2012 classic is essentially the same design, i'd check before going down that route - its possible they have a better RF shielded SATA cable, who knows...
 
The downside of the data doubler is the ridiculous price tag for something that should really cost no more than a few bucks. It is less complicated than a passive HDMI Adapter. I would get one of the ebay optibays. Same thing from the same companies but even with shipping it costs a fraction.
 
1. Pretty sure that 2011 issue got fixed in the 2012. It was really only bad in the 15" anyway.

2. You may wish to put your SSD in the optibay as it will be quieter and vibrate less than a 7200rpm MoXT and doesn't need the SMS protection that only the HDD bay has.

3. You can get $10 doublers on eBay which work as well as the OWC, so there's no reason to pay up for that. MCE, however, makes a kit with the circuitry to fool your Mac into thinking that the Superdrive is still internal, thus allowing you to use the DVD Player app with an external drive.
 
throAU said:
Check whether the optical bay issue with SATA3 has been fixed yet.

In the 2011s, RF interference from the wireless can cause corruption on SATA3 devices in the optibay.

Given the 2012 classic is essentially the same design, i'd check before going down that route - its possible they have a better RF shielded SATA cable, who knows...
Click to expand...

I couldn't find much on this recently. Seems like it was a bigger issue with the 17" back in 2011?

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NewishMacGuy said:
2. You may wish to put your SSD in the optibay as it will be quieter and vibrate less than a 7200rpm MoXT and doesn't need the SMS protection that only the HDD bay has.
Click to expand...

Thanks. Hadn't thought much about the SMS protection or noise. Seems like the optical is now doing 6g/s without problem? Will I need to redirect the startup disk to this location, or will the computer figure it out?

NewishMacGuy said:
MCE, however, makes a kit with the circuitry to fool your Mac into thinking that the Superdrive is still internal, thus allowing you to use the DVD Player app with an external drive.
Click to expand...

Thanks. Didn't know any of this. Looks to be a good option. Only thing I don't understand is that their website says this will also enable the superdrive to be used for movies if you put it back in the optical internal bay. Does this mean that usually if you take it out it won't work normally again if you put it back in the MBP?
 
dnadrifter said:
I couldn't find much on this recently. Seems like it was a bigger issue with the 17" back in 2011?

----------



Thanks. Hadn't thought much about the SMS protection or noise. Seems like the optical is now doing 6g/s without problem? Will I need to redirect the startup disk to this location, or will the computer figure it out?



Thanks. Didn't know any of this. Looks to be a good option. Only thing I don't understand is that their website says this will also enable the superdrive to be used for movies if you put it back in the optical internal bay. Does this mean that usually if you take it out it won't work normally again if you put it back in the MBP?
Click to expand...

You will likely need to redirect. Heck, I have to redirect every so often to the main bay.

Don't know what the MCE confusion means. I think it means that you can use the optibay with DVD Player if you install it in their (or somebody else's) external case. If you take it out correctly it should work fine when you put it back, or in an external case. If you use another video player (like VLC) then you don't need the MCE caddy trick, that only applies to Apple's DVD app.
 
Are you sure you need two internal drives? Since the new cMBPs have USB 3.0, why not just install a 512 GB internal SSD and use an external USB 3.0 drive for any extra storage?
 
duckrabbit said:
Are you sure you need two internal drives? Since the new cMBPs have USB 3.0, why not just install a 512 GB internal SSD and use an external USB 3.0 drive for any extra storage?
Click to expand...

Yeah, I thought about having an external usb 3.0 for my files. I hadn't thought about get a bigger SSD though and just putting everything on there. For awhile I could probably get away with 512 GB, but RAW files take up a lot of space. I think I am okay right now as I only have about 200 GB of pictures, but that doesn't include video, or moving to a full frame camera where the RAW files will be much bigger.

But then again I could move older stuff to the external if I had to.

I assume that working off of 1 SSD for both a program like Lightroom and picture files would be faster than using two drives (SSD for OS/programs and a hybrid for picture files)?
 
201q 17in and never had a corrosion problem.
Honestly, the only downside is you have to use external ODD when needed.
And the sound of HDD spinning (I would get a bigger SSD if it becomes cheaper)
 
dnadrifter said:
Yeah, I thought about having an external usb 3.0 for my files. I hadn't thought about get a bigger SSD though and just putting everything on there. For awhile I could probably get away with 512 GB, but RAW files take up a lot of space. I think I am okay right now as I only have about 200 GB of pictures, but that doesn't include video, or moving to a full frame camera where the RAW files will be much bigger.

But then again I could move older stuff to the external if I had to.

I assume that working off of 1 SSD for both a program like Lightroom and picture files would be faster than using two drives (SSD for OS/programs and a hybrid for picture files)?
Click to expand...

IMO, external drives defeat the primary purpose of laptops and given the huge storage options available these days are unnecessary unless you need multiple TBs of storage. The cheapest 512GB SSD is about $300 now, which is about 2x what you'll pay for a dual drive setup using your original HD and a 128GB SDD, and you can DIY FUD the dual drive setup. The Sammys are closer to $400 and for that you could do a 1.25TB FUD (256GB SSD + 1TB HDD) or an even faster 1TB FUD (256GB SSD + hybrid 7200rpm 750GB HDD).

512GB is all I'll need for the foreseeable future so I'm waiting until the price drops below $200 on the Sammys or until they're standard on a price dropped rMBP-15 with 802.11ac. Until then, the MoXT does just fine for my needs.
 
NewishMacGuy said:
IMO, external drives defeat the primary purpose of laptops and given the huge storage options available these days are unnecessary unless you need multiple TBs of storage. The cheapest 512GB SSD is about $300 now, which is about 2x what you'll pay for a dual drive setup using your original HD and a 128GB SDD, and you can DIY FUD the dual drive setup. The Sammys are closer to $400 and for that you could do a 1.25TB FUD (256GB SSD + 1TB HDD) or an even faster 1TB FUD (256GB SSD + hybrid 7200rpm 750GB HDD).

512GB is all I'll need for the foreseeable future so I'm waiting until the price drops below $200 on the Sammys or until they're standard on a price dropped rMBP-15 with 802.11ac. Until then, the MoXT does just fine for my needs.
Click to expand...

Sorry. FUD?

Maybe I should look into the Samsungs. I was just going to get one of OWCs 240 Gb SSDs. I just want to make sure I don't have problems with it as I had read about some problems with the crucials needing updates etc.
 
In the new MBPs I've been running a Dual SSD+HDD setup since day one with no issues at all. I have never once had the HDD drop out on me. I use this HDD for my Capture Data from my Elgato Game Capture HD. I am constantly writing data to that drive at a high rate with no issues.
 
dnadrifter said:
Sorry. FUD?

Maybe I should look into the Samsungs. I was just going to get one of OWCs 240 Gb SSDs. I just want to make sure I don't have problems with it as I had read about some problems with the crucials needing updates etc.
Click to expand...

FUD = Fusion Drive

Some decent DIY instructions: http://tomasz.korwel.net/2012/11/04/apple-fusion-drive-on-late-2010-macbook-pro/

I thought about getting an OWC SATA II drive for my 2011 cMBP-15, but they're not the cheapest and it seems like Samsung is providing more bang for the buck these days. Plus rather than settle for SATA II speeds out of my optibay (b/c I really don't want to put the MoXT in there), I can just do the aforementioned wait.
 
Last edited:
I've been running my late 2008 2.53ghz MBP with a data doubler, 128gb SSD, and 1tb HDD for 4 months now, and it's made the biggest difference. Yes, OWC is definitely making money hand over fist on these things, but for what it's worth, the kit is very comprehensive. It comes with all the tools (cheap but workable) needed to complete the install, as well as the most dummy-proof installation guide I've seen. Besides a tiny hit on battery life, which shouldn't be too big of a problem for all of you 8-hour-battery-people, I haven't found any disadvantages yet.
 
non-working non-OWC data doubler scenario

just wanted to post my issue here in summary, since I'm going to be resolving it by removing the data doubler and memory I have.

I have a 9,1 macbook pro quad core (mid 2012). It was purchased in Korea. I have the data doubler inside with two 256 gb samsung 830 SSDs.

With the stock 4 gigs of memory this setup works beautifully.

I also purchased 16 gigs of OWC memory. With this setup, after a few days of transferring files between the two internal 830 SSDs, finder begins to crash. Soon it's impossible to transfer files between the two drives because finder always crashes. The first time this happened last year, I could not recover even my system. I assume this is because of file corruption. My time machine backup itself would not migrate onto a fresh system.

I pulled the memory (which passed memtest / rember). I put the 4 gigs of apple memory in again and ran it about half a year on a new system with no problems. Visiting the U.S. now, I RMAd the 16 gigs and put in a new pair of the same 8 gig modules. It's been a few days and the same problems with finder have happened. I cannot transfer clusters of data between the two drives with this memory.

Something about my computer (perhaps the SATA controller in the optical driver spot), this memory, and the SSDS does not work. I haven't encountered others with this issue but it's absolutely devastating because my recent backups are all corrupt again and I hope I can get my data back.

I'm cloning drives to external backups now, and will pull out the 16 gigs of memory. I ran memtest on them and the memory has no problem. Talked to a friendly tech at OWC this morning who recommended I check each module individually, check that the memory is matched, and run a data corruption check. Assuming this is all okay he said trying to replace the cheapest component (the memory) with another brand, which is what I was thinking as well. I verified the memory is matched but I'm not going to check each memory module individually because my guess is that it'll b
​
e okay––there's just something wrong with this particular setup although each component apparently works fine on its own. Too many hours of checking so far for a problem no one else seems to have, and at the end of the day I just need a working computer. I guess I was hoping for some insight instead of more tests.

So, I'm pulling all my OWC components, the data doubler and the memory, to be safe. Their products seem to be fine, and many people have similar functioning systems, but I can't use them on my mac and have a stable system.

Anyway I just wanted to put this out there. If anyone has any insight, I would love to hear it. To the rest of you, good luck!
 
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