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Mac OS X 10.10.4 Supports TRIM for Third-Party SSD Hard Drives

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Earlier today Apple released OS X 10.10.4, an under-the-hood update to OS X that introduced several bug fixes and improvements. One improvement, according to Ars Technica, is support for TRIM for third-party SSD hard drives. We previously covered TRIM likely coming natively to the next version of OS X El Capitan but it appears support has already arrived.

trimforce.png
Photo via ArsTechnica​
With today's OS X 10.10.4 update, however, Apple has added a command line utility that can be used to enable TRIM on third-party SSDs without having to download and install anything. Called trimforce, the utility can be executed from the OS X terminal, and it requires a reboot to start working.
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TRIM is a system-level command that allows the operating system and the drive to communicate about which areas of the drive are considered unused and thus ready to be erased and rewritten to. In the absence of TRIM, users can see significantly slower drive writes as the drive begins to fill up. Most modern operating systems support TRIM but for Apple's OS X, it has only included support for its OEM SSDs. This means that Mac users looking to install an after-market SSD in a machine originally intended for spinning disc hard drives would run into trouble without the help of other third-party tools.

To enable TRIM, a user just has to type "sudo trimforce enable" into the Terminal window. Ars Technica points out that running TRIM prompts a "scary" message from the system, but notes it's largely because each SSD implements TRIM in a different way, with older disks sometimes acting in a way OS X would not expect.

MacRumors forum readers have been testing and discussing the update in our forums and sharing their experiences.

Article Link: Mac OS X 10.10.4 Supports TRIM for Third-Party SSD Hard Drives
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2015/07/01/os-x-trim-ssd/
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This may seem like a silly question, but if I were to enable this on an Admin account, would it still be enabled for my Standard account?
 
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AppleNewton said:
Is this a one stop fix? as in if I reinstall an OS it will keep trim supported or do you need to perform this process again?
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Typically with the 3rd party utils you had to reapply after every major or minor version of the OS.

So I would suspect 10.11.0 and 10.10.5 will require you to run the util again.
 
Nice, does this work on USB or Thunderbolt connected drives as well?

EDIT: Actually, nevermind. Looks like there's a data loss risk for this model anyway.
 
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I have 2 480GB SanDisk SSD's in RAID0 in my 2012 mac mini. I put it together using Disk Utility.

If I use this tool, will TRIM finally be enabled for my configuration?
 
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Someone over at Ars Technica posted a warning about using TRIM with certain hard drives. I'll quote it here:
Rosyna said:
HEED THE DATA LOSS WARNING!

There are a number of extremely buggy SSD models out there (like almost all the Samsung 8* and various Crucial models) that will permanently delete the wrong data when issuing TRIM commands.

The bug is not dependent on queued TRIM, it happens even when using the non-queued version.

All the Samsung SSDs beginning with a "8" (840 and 850, both EVO and Pro) are known to have the data-destroying TRIM bug and TRIM is blacklisted on those drives on other platforms.
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I haven't looked into it too heavily and I know that plenty of people use TRIM with these drives with no issues (I did in the past), but given that I use a Samsung 840, it gives me pause about enabling this feature. Just figured I'd put it out there for everyone else to see.
 
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Erm, technical knowledge challenged "Finally" crowd, for your consideration:
http://linux.slashdot.org/story/15/...linux-tread-cautiously-and-keep-backups-handy

I eagerly await your fists of rage flying into the air when your SSD that does a ****** job of implementing disk controller commands borks your data. (You see, Apple was cautious about this because they had the muscle to make hardware manufacturers do it right with Apple supplied parts. Good luck with your 840 EVO. The command comes with a disclaimer for a reason.)
 
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I hope this "• Addresses an issue that prevented some external displays from functioning properly" really works I'm sick of getting errors. I would like to shut my mbp lid without getting errors
 
jmille44 said:
Is the 960GB Mercury Electra MAX 3G SSD compatible with this Trim?
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According to OWC, you don't need to enable TRIM for their drives due to the Sandforce controller. They already have their own garbage collection in addition to over-provisioning (which is why you only have 960GB and not 1024GB of space). You can read about it here: http://blog.macsales.com/21641-with-an-owc-ssd-theres-no-need-for-trim

EDIT: Yes, I know the difference between GC and TRIM. What I was trying to say is that OWC's garbage collection compensates for the lack of TRIM, which was meant to imply that they're in fact two different things.
 
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Does anyone know?

Tucom said:
This may seem like a silly question, but if I were to enable this on an Admin account, would it still be enabled for my Standard account?
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Ofcourse I imagine it does, but still curious. I'm like 99% sure, but that one percent...
 
Think, I will avoid any possible problems and just stick with the Trim Enabler by Oskar Groth (Cindori.org), that I've been using for the past 2 plus some years. Using a 240GB Kingston Hyper-X 3K SSD. Haven't had any issues.
But, nice to know there is a built in option now.
 
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I've been manually removing the "APPLE SSD" string from the correct kext for my Crucial M4 512 GB for years. No data loss and yes, I do use my system for development. I've had less than 100GB of space remaining many times, but I usually have about half the drive free. No problems with TRIM yet.
 
Ledgem said:
I haven't looked into it too heavily and I know that plenty of people use TRIM with these drives with no issues (I did in the past), but given that I use a Samsung 840, it gives me pause about enabling this feature. Just figured I'd put it out there for everyone else to see.
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I used Trim Enabler on 3 Crucial MX100 SSDs, on a Samsung 830, 840, and 840 EVO with no problems, and with the Trim Force command in El Cap on my MBP (840 EVO) with no problems. I have just enabled this feature on all Macs I have that can use it, so I'll just make sure to keep a TM backup of each machine.
 
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kinless said:
According to OWC, you don't need to enable TRIM for their drives due to the Sandforce controller. They already have their own garbage collection in addition to over-provisioning (which is why you only have 960GB and not 1024GB of space). You can read about it here: http://blog.macsales.com/21641-with-an-owc-ssd-theres-no-need-for-trim
Click to expand...


TRIM and GC are not the same thing.

GC is not a replacement for TRIM regardless of foreground or background type. TRIM can only make the GC process more efficient and lower the write amplification
 
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