How to Increase Performance of Macbook Pro 13

[ahhhyeah]

Hi, I was wondering what the best ways to increase performance of a macbook are in terms of Hardware

(The model is mid 2012, 13 inch, 2.9 GHz Intel Core i7)

I've increased it to 16GB Ram (I use a lot of graphic and video editing programs)

I was wondering how much increased performance a Solid State Hard Drive could bring
and what would be the best model or brand to buy (are they all similar?? Do you need specific for a mid 2012 model?)

Are there any other hardware improvements??


(Also, if there are any system improvements you think would make a big difference? I've been recommended to go to the mac store and get them to reset the system.)


Any ideas would be much appreciated (or any links, as I'm sure I'm not the first person asking this).

Thanks

 

[keysofanxiety]

SSD would be the absolute best upgrade for any computer. Upgrading to an SSD will significantly improve performance in every area, to the point where it will run considerably better than new. You don't need a specific SSD. Any 2.5" SSD will fit fine.

Any Crucial or Samsung drive would be best, as they're the cheapest and most reliable. A Samsung 850 EVO is currently your best bet IMO, but anything else will be fine.

Beyond RAM & SSD, you can't do any more upgrades to your model, but the SSD will improve the performance so much that you won't be disappointed.

 

[Sprakster]

I have the exact same model as you and I just did an upgrade to 16GB RAM and 1TB Crucial SSD. Did a clone over to my SSD before installing it and it's flying now! Boots up in 20s with all my apps and my 4 desktops loaded. Highly recommended to extend the life of your cMBP by another 3 years or so (my own opinion of course).

 

[Samuelsan2001]

Hi, I was wondering what the best ways to increase performance of a macbook are in terms of Hardware

(The model is mid 2012, 13 inch, 2.9 GHz Intel Core i7)

I've increased it to 16GB Ram (I use a lot of graphic and video editing programs)

I was wondering how much increased performance a Solid State Hard Drive could bring
and what would be the best model or brand to buy (are they all similar?? Do you need specific for a mid 2012 model?)

Are there any other hardware improvements??


(Also, if there are any system improvements you think would make a big difference? I've been recommended to go to the mac store and get them to reset the system.)


Any ideas would be much appreciated (or any links, as I'm sure I'm not the first person asking this).

Thanks

An SSD will speed up file transfer, app opening and make the system smooth and responsive. Any modern SSD will be fine for this but samsung and crucial make the best price/performance compromises.

However if you are using it for graphics and video, it is the graphics card that will make the difference and that is not upgradeable at all, basically the HD4000 on that machine is just not a great graphics card and the only way you can increase graphics performance is to get a new machine.

 

[snaky69]

Hi, I was wondering what the best ways to increase performance of a macbook are in terms of Hardware

(The model is mid 2012, 13 inch, 2.9 GHz Intel Core i7)

I've increased it to 16GB Ram (I use a lot of graphic and video editing programs)

I was wondering how much increased performance a Solid State Hard Drive could bring
and what would be the best model or brand to buy (are they all similar?? Do you need specific for a mid 2012 model?)

Are there any other hardware improvements??


(Also, if there are any system improvements you think would make a big difference? I've been recommended to go to the mac store and get them to reset the system.)


Any ideas would be much appreciated (or any links, as I'm sure I'm not the first person asking this).

Thanks

Performance at doing what, exactly?

A SSD will help get things into RAM faster, once they're in RAM though, the SSD has zero effect on performance.

 

[ahhhyeah]

Performance at doing what, exactly?

A SSD will help get things into RAM faster, once they're in RAM though, the SSD has zero effect on performance.

Re Performance, I guess to get it running faster again.
It seems to be a fair bit slower than several months ago.
(I'm thinking to backup then wipe it, possibly at a mac store).

Don't know how much that will help.

It also seems to be a lot hotter these days.

Sorry it's not a more technical reply.


Thanks for replies so far.

 

[snaky69]

Re Performance, I guess to get it running faster again.
It seems to be a fair bit slower than several months ago.
(I'm thinking to backup then wipe it, possibly at a mac store).

Don't know how much that will help.

It also seems to be a lot hotter these days.

Sorry it's not a more technical reply.


Thanks for replies so far.

From the little you told us so far, your hard drive may be dying. They tend to slow to a crawl before croaking.

Keep a good backup handy and try a reinstall of OS X.

 

[ahhhyeah]

From the little you told us so far, your hard drive may be dying. They tend to slow to a crawl before croaking.

Keep a good backup handy and try a reinstall of OS X.

Hmmm, that doesn't sound good. Yeah, it's slowing a fair bit, a lot of the spinning wheel, even just browsing.

I'm backing up and will try a reinstall. But I'll get a SSD also.

Do you know if the Hybrids are worth considering?

Also, re: only telling 'a little', what other info would be beneficial (sorry, I'm not too technically minded).


Thanks for you help!!

 

[T5BRICK]

Do you know if the Hybrids are worth considering?

Not really. You can pick a 500GB SSD up for less than $200 now.

 

[ahhhyeah]

Awesome!! So, I got a 500GB Samsung Evo and now it's running about 5 times faster.

I used Carbon Copy Cloner and a Cloning Kit (or I guess the attachment to connect it via USB) to clone the HD before installing it. There were a few things... I was using a 750 HD on the mac, so had copy then delete some files to get it under 500GB.

Then when backing up, Carbon Copy found some errors. As this was the first time using it, I stopped the backup and tried to fix the errors. This took hours and didn't achieve much. So, in the end I just backed up and it worked. Took about 8 hours to clone the 480GB.

I also restarted the computer after the first (failed) backup. However I had the new HD still plugged in. I guess it had some boot files on it or something, as it started showing the grey screen with 'Prohibited sign' and broken folder. I thought I had really messed up and the old HD had gone before I'd had a chance to backup. I did 'Command R' on restart and tried the OS X Recovery and tried over internet. Let that happen. Still showed problem. Restarted. Still grey screen with prohibited. Restarted. Same thing. Freaked out. Thought about my options. When did I backup last. What have I lost. How much is a new macbook. What if I drink a bottle of whisky, will that fix it.

I think in the end, I went and watched an episode of family guy. Came back, restarted and the sucker worked.

It was at this point, I quickly got CCC doing the clone and ignored the error messages (was some files on parts of the old HD that had errors).

Anyways, it worked.

Opened the mac, switched them over... put in a new battery while at it.

Now, we're running more than 5 times faster (I used BlackMagic DiskSpeed).

Before was:
Write 91.1 Read 89.1

After was:
Write 470.2 Read 504.2


So, thanks for your help and advice. It's super fast.

Now, I'll try to clean in up even more and see if I can get it faster.