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wavymedia

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Oct 16, 2015
17
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So I upgraded my macbook pro late 2008 with a new battery, 8gb ram and an SSD drive.

After the ram upgrade I noticed a slowdown in performance which I posted a thread about on here a few weeks ago. I figured that the slowdown was due to the hdd failing and not the ram upgrade.

After that the correct caddy arrived for me to add the SSD drive, which I did. In recovery mode I used disk utility to format the SSD, then to copy the contents of the HDD onto the SSD.

After doing this the HDD and SSD shared the same name (macintosh HDD) and only one disk was avaliable to select as the startup disk, but because they both shared the same name it was impossible to tell which one it was.

Now the machine was running even slower than before I added the SSD. I formatted the HDD but I could still not work out which disk was being used as the startup disk.

But it gets worse. The computer turns itself off with an error message 'your computer has encountered a problem and needs to shut down'. Sometimes it puts itself to sleep and makes a series of loud beeping noises when you try to power it back up. Sometimes it makes these beeps when you try to turn the computer on (which I have never heard before now).

I have tried to do a tiem machine backup, and there is only 26GB of the backup left to go, but it cannot get as far as preparing the backup before it crashes.

So today I tried removing the HDD and powering up with only the SSD. Upon powering on there is a flashing folder with a '?' in it, and recovery mode cannot be accesses.

I tried powering up with only thr HDD inside and there is only a blank screen, and I heard the hdd making a loud spinning noise.

I'm not sure what my next step should be. I want to finish the time machine backup. I'm sure the HDD is almost dead, but I'm not sure what is causing these errors and crashes and beeping. Perhaps the startup disk is on the HDD, but if so, how am I able to startup off the SSD if there is only one disk that I can select?

Any advice appreciated. Thankyou
 
Which SSD?? Are there any known issues with it and apples OS??? Does it need a firmware update??? That is also a 7 year old laptop there is nothing to say that something else hasn't failed maybe the SATA cable.
 
The SSD is the samsung 850 EVO 500GB. I have tried it in both the dock where the optical drive was and the port where the HDD was. Both drives were recognised, readable and writable when the SSD was in the optical drive dock and the HDD was in the HDD dock.

Maybe it does need a firmware update. My main priority now is getting the time machine backup.

EDIT: there doesn't seem to be any firmware updates for the 850 series on the samsung website
 
Ok so I think I've worked out that the crashing and the beeping was caused by bad ram. So I put my old ram back in and I was able to enter recovery mode and the computer is staying active. I guess I will need to send this ram back.
 
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The problem that you have with the memory and the error beeps may simply be that the sticks need to be fully seated.

If you want to try another test of the new memory - seat one stick at a time in a slot (leave the other slot empty for now)
Start your MBPro.
If you get a good boot, Swap the other stick into the same slot (continue to leave the other slot empty)
If that boots OK, then add the second stick to the other slot.
That may be all you need to get a good boot. If you get the error beeps again, then SWAP the sticks between the slots, and try the boot again.
Beeps? Then by now, you may have determined which stick is giving you the issue.
I think that your MacBookPro5,1 can be finicky about RAM that is slightly out of spec.
 
its not as if the ram doesn't work at all. it does boot most of the time and is recognized by the OS as the full 8gb. But then the machine will crash and beep.

this is the ram: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0031GELDM?*Version*=1&*entries*=0

I had determined that it was the right specs when I bought it. maybe I was wrong.

I will do the test once time machine has finished
 
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its not as if the ram doesn't work at all. it does boot most of the time and is recognized by the OS as the full 8gb. But then the machine will crash and beep.
this is the ram: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0031GELDM?*Version*=1&*entries*=0
I had determined that it was the right specs when I bought it. maybe I was wrong.
I will do the test once time machine has finished
The listed specs for the RAM is correct in your link. You were right in the the correct RAM for your MBP is 204-pin PC3-8500 (1066 MHz) DDR3 SO-DIMM. The quality of that RAM may be suspect. There was one review with 2 comments that were not good. I would suspect poor quality RAM that is bad.

EDIT: Here is some better quality RAM
http://www.amazon.com/Crucial-PC3-8...cial+204-pin+PC3-8500+(1066+MHz)+DDR3+SO-DIMM
 
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