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MCE Optibay Alternative CHEAP

Just installed mine.

I was very local to NewModeUS (they are in Santa Ana, CA) so I went to pick it up and save on shipping cost. Same price as on the website, came home installed it with no problems (except I stripped a screw.) Mounting was easy, I used a piece of tape to extra secure it but, I didn't feel like it needed it. All in all, took about 10 minutes. I have a new 500GB 7200 RPM Drive and the stock 250 5400 PRM in it. 750 GB (more or less after formatting) rocks. Now I'm deciding if I should use it as a manual backup of just let time machine do the deed, anyone have any ideas on this?

C.
 
grayskyz said:
I was very local to NewModeUS (they are in Santa Ana, CA) so I went to pick it up and save on shipping cost. Same price as on the website, came home installed it with no problems (except I stripped a screw.) Mounting was easy, I used a piece of tape to extra secure it but, I didn't feel like it needed it. All in all, took about 10 minutes. I have a new 500GB 7200 RPM Drive and the stock 250 5400 PRM in it. 750 GB (more or less after formatting) rocks. Now I'm deciding if I should use it as a manual backup of just let time machine do the deed, anyone have any ideas on this?

C.
Click to expand...

Turn it into RAID0 it will give you a speed boost and get a external if you don't already have one for a time machine backup
 
Installed my newmodus

Now i just have to wait till my superdrive enclosure arrives to install windoze 7.

Btw i had to take off the black plastic trim for the fastener holes to line up
 
RAID0 with 500gb+250gb? That means two partitions altogether.

Not to mention different model of hdd and latency. But ok if you say so.
 
DoFoT9 said:
RAID0 over two different sized hard drives? i dont think so..
Click to expand...

it can easily be done....but will operate at the slowest drive speed, and of course you need matching partition sizes.

leftover drive space can be partitioned anyway you want.
 
MacModMachine said:
it can easily be done....but will operate at the slowest drive speed, and of course you need matching partition sizes.

leftover drive space can be partitioned anyway you want.
Click to expand...

Interesting idea, but I am leaning a bit towards the time machine idea until I get my second 500 "matching drive" then I'll do the RAID0

C.
 
grayskyz said:
Interesting idea, but I am leaning a bit towards the time machine idea until I get my second 500 "matching drive" then I'll do the RAID0

C.
Click to expand...

i completely agree with that decision, although make sure you shut off the sms sensor when you set up this raid0 which will remove the gforce protection but if you leave it on it will cause data loss in a raid 0.
 
MacModMachine said:
it can easily be done....but will operate at the slowest drive speed, and of course you need matching partition sizes.

leftover drive space can be partitioned anyway you want.
Click to expand...
yes im well aware of how it works and how its done, but i really would not want to risk it - especially if there was no backup!

grayskyz said:
Interesting idea, but I am leaning a bit towards the time machine idea until I get my second 500 "matching drive" then I'll do the RAID0

C.
Click to expand...
good idea.. with a 250GB + 500GB combination it would only give you 500GB of total space to use anyway.

MacModMachine said:
i completely agree with that decision, although make sure you shut off the sms sensor when you set up this raid0 which will remove the gforce protection but if you leave it on it will cause data loss in a raid 0.
Click to expand...
and if you turn it off then just make sure you dont move your computer too much! ;)

this sort of setup is not recommended in a laptop. just go out and purchase a 1TB laptop HD!
 
MacModMachine said:
boots fine from external cdroms....or memory sticks

i reccomend restoring your osx restore disc to a memory stick 8gb or more and use that to reinstall.

saves time and space
Click to expand...

So I can just go into Disk Utility, and use the "restore" function to restore the original OS X install DVD to a memory stick, then boot from that, don't have to do anything else? That would be very cool.

I thought I need a tool like Netrestore (now discontinued, sadly) for that....
 
orthorim said:
So I can just go into Disk Utility, and use the "restore" function to restore the original OS X install DVD to a memory stick, then boot from that, don't have to do anything else? That would be very cool.

I thought I need a tool like Netrestore (now discontinued, sadly) for that....
Click to expand...

i am fairly certain that this way will work. however you will first need to create an image of the disk using Disk utility :)
 
I'd recommend against RAID-0 ing two 500GB hard drives. It doubles your likelihood of failure. I have had way too many hard drives die in my laptop to attempt something like that.

It's also going to negatively affect battery life, but how much is impossible to tell - could be anywhere from a few minutes to half an hour.

I am very concerned about additional power use so I am now trying to get a toshiba 500GB drive for my "big fat media" drive which I expect to be in idle most of the time. The toshiba uses only .6 W in idle - other HD models use 1W idle and up to 2 when in use, see these amazing charts (tomshardware rocks!):

Video: http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/...rive-charts/Power-Requirement-Video,1124.html

Idle: http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/...drive-charts/Power-Requirement-Idle,1125.html
 
Two drives and MCE

Ok...back at work and I have switched the bays of my 500 GB and 128 SuperTalent SSD. I am now running 10.6 and booting from the SSD. Boot times less than 30 seconds and Office applications launch in less than 3 (I have an early 2008 Macbook Pro 2.4 with 4 GB of ram). My laptop sleeps fine after switching the drive bays. I would rather have the ssd in the optical bay, but it won't sleep correctly in 10.5 or 10.6. I also have it working in a late 2007 MBP with a Crucial SSD in the same config and I am getting ready to try it with a 13 inch 2008 MB.
 
I think the unibody's introduced the optical drive on SATA.

DoFoT9 said:
it would seem so... is this connector pata?? i have never come acros it b4

my HDD is sata so i assumed the optical drive would be similar.. (left is from MBP)
Click to expand...
 
DoFoT9 said:
thats why you get the cheap ebay ones :D
Click to expand...

Yup,

On this newmodeus one, i notice it has a black front plate that is supposed to show on laptops that have drives with trays on them. On the Macbooks would this enclosure fit entirely inside it?

OBHD9%20sml.jpg
 
rgarjr said:
Yup,

On this newmodeus one, i notice it has a black front plate that is supposed to show on laptops that have drives with trays on them. On the Macbooks would this enclosure fit entirely inside it?

OBHD9%20sml.jpg
Click to expand...

no, it wont fit. but hopefully you can take the front plate off. the ebay one that i have purchased allows you to take off the frontplate and it fits perfectly
 
ok its all installed and everything.. but it wont boot nor get recognised by disk utility. it spins up and i can head data being read. i will sleep on it. night
 
only took 2 screws to get it off if i remember

DoFoT9 said:
no, it wont fit. but hopefully you can take the front plate off. the ebay one that i have purchased allows you to take off the frontplate and it fits perfectly
Click to expand...

only took 2 screws to get it off if i remember but yea it won't fit with it on
 
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