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MCE Optibay Alternative CHEAP

2Turbo said:
That's weird cause other people can't get it to work. I don't really care about installing W7 cause I can just install before removing the dvd drive, but I need ubuntu live usb or cd to work daily after the odd's been removed. :mad:
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ok as soon as i got my MBP.. i turned it on, had a little play
wacked in my usb -sata dock and formatted and installed osx to my owc ssd

then i turned the machine off. opened the MBP up, upgraded the ram, installed the owc drive into the hdd slot and newmodeus caddy into the optical drive with the stock 500gb 7200 hdd.. patched the mbp back-up

i then inserted the superdrive into the ebay (smk312) dvd enclosure

logged into osx on owc.. played around a bit and was amazed by the speed

i formatted the 500gb hdd GUID, + hfs
attached usb superdrive

ran bootacamp assistant.. set aside 120gb for win7

bunged in win 7 install disk from usb dvd.. installed windows
pretty sure i ran win7 after i took out the odd.. it was 6am tho at this point... but i remember formatting the hdd after i did the mod

i was using an iso i burnt not the original win7, and i used my dad's in 7 serial no.. as he has win7 family pack on 2 machines... this would be the 3rd

as he is over 150miles away, i decided to burn an iso of win 7 i found, then registered with the legit family pack s/n

interesting! wonder what would happen if i used the actual win 7 disk instead of the iso on cd...

it all went really smoothly, except for the damn screws from the superdrive are so tiny!

ps i've always wanted to try ubunto.. could clone my win7 with winclone and then back-up.. i could then try to create a ubuntu iso on usb and see if it installs...

as for ubuntu... can you not find a ubuntu iso and copy it to usb drive
 
johnnyturbouk said:
2turbo>>>

i will give installing ubunto from usb a shot on mon/tues using this method

what u think?


or

to be on safe side you could run bootcamp and install and clone ubuntu before u take out the optical drive... then once you have done the mod// just copy back the ubuntu image... onto the partition set aside for it
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If it doesnt work just set up the drives as you would with partitions and put the drive you want Ubuntu or W7 on in the main HDD spot and put the ODD back in and do the install. The computer doesnt need OS X to do installs.
 
johnnyturbouk said:
2turbo>>>

i will give installing ubunto from usb a shot on mon/tues using this method

what u think?
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Thanks man! But I was talking about just booting into/running a "LIVE" CD (or usb stick). It's not installing ubuntu. It's just loading it into your ram. I use it for secure computing as everything you do is erased and not recorded once you shutdown (because everything is saved to ram and no hdd is used).

So what you do is go to: http://www.ubuntu.com/desktop/get-ubuntu/download

After dling and burning the CD or making a bootable usb flash drive, you just boot to it and select run ubuntu, not install. But everyone I've asked says this will not work via external dvd drive over usb, or a usb flash disk.

I may have to skip the optibay hdd mod if I can't get this to work. I need to use ubuntu live and cannot put back the optical drive everyday lol.
 
^^ 2Turbo - I have tried this before, and never gotten it to work, namely running something other than OS X from a USB stick. OS X on a USB stick is fine by the way, done it many times.

However - Intel once produced a firmware update for their SSD. I happen to have one installed in the optibay so I downloaded the disk image. I could not get it to install from a USB stick, but I could burn this image to a CD and boot from an external CD drive. What I was booting into did not look like OS X - I am not sure what it was, or why it worked - mysteries remain. It seemed to be linux booted from a CD on a MacBook Pro. It was all text based though, never started up a UI it just updated the SSD firmware and then stopped.
 
Okay, I contacted smk312 about which SATA version his adapters use, and he said it was SATA I or 1.5Gb/s only, no SATA II. I also asked if he plans on updating his adapters to SATA II, and am awaiting a reply. I will share it here.

I just installed a 500GB Momentus XT in my optibay, and am pretty impressed! I have about 800GB of ripped movies so my 1TB drive is dedicated for media storage, and I was already wondering what I could do if I replaced my boot drive (previously a 320GB 7200rpm drive) with a smaller SSD. A 240GB drive would have barely been able to contain all my OSX files (applications, installers, music, pictures), and in the interest of battery life I wanted to have all my music on my boot drive (so as not to spin up the 1TB drive every time I open itunes), but pictures and possibly installers I could offload to the 1TB. Still, with bootcamp partition, ubuntu partition, and a 10.7 partition, space would be really tight. Also, a 240 drive would have been a pretty big stretch of my budget.

But I have to say, the hybrid drive is working very well! Boot time is a little over 20 seconds (then 15 seconds later, all my startup apps have loaded) which is a big step up from the minute or so it previously took for the system to be ready from boot.

Overall, I think no computer should ship with a regular hard drive any longer, this very small (just 4GB, read only cache) of SLC NAND makes a very significant difference in performance. I await similar drives with a write cache too. My dream: a single platter 320GB drive combined with a 160GB SSD in a 12.5mm or under package. That would be sweet!
 
Oh, I forgot to mention: I have an OWC data doubler en route, so once I get it in my hands I'll take some detailed photos of it.

I don't think the momentus xt is limited by the SATA I of the smk312 adapter, but I've wanted to go for the OWC adapter for a while now, so now I have a bit of an excuse!

I'm also working on a video to show how to mod the MBA superdrive for use as an external drive on all computers. It might be a while, but I'll share it here when I've finished it.
 
so here's a question...

why does the external superdrive enclosure from MCE require the use of both USB ports, and the one from maxupgrades only needs one USB port?
 
blink487 said:
Oh, I forgot to mention: I have an OWC data doubler en route, so once I get it in my hands I'll take some detailed photos of it.

I don't think the momentus xt is limited by the SATA I of the smk312 adapter, but I've wanted to go for the OWC adapter for a while now, so now I have a bit of an excuse!

I'm also working on a video to show how to mod the MBA superdrive for use as an external drive on all computers. It might be a while, but I'll share it here when I've finished it.
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The one from smk312 is not sata 1....it runs at sata 3.
 
tjb1 said:
The one from smk312 is not sata 1....it runs at sata 3.
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Okay SATA 3, would be 6Gb/s, which no adapters currently support AFAIK, I assume you mean it supports SATA II at 3Gb/s.

Where did you get this info? Smk312 himself (herself) said it was SATA I @ 1.5Gb/s, were you able to get 3Gb/s throughput from yours?

I'd be very interested to hear your results
 
The Optibay is just a converter isn't it? There is no SATA 1 or 3, it's just the highest of whatever the drive and computer support.

Also, I have several of the smk312's and they ALL support SATA 3.
 
blink487 said:
Okay SATA 3, would be 6Gb/s, which no adapters currently support AFAIK, I assume you mean it supports SATA II at 3Gb/s.

Where did you get this info? Smk312 himself (herself) said it was SATA I @ 1.5Gb/s, were you able to get 3Gb/s throughput from yours?

I'd be very interested to hear your results
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smk312 told me the same thing - gotta appreciate his/her honesty

some ppl on another optibay thread claimed they had the smk caddy and it negotiated 3gbs! I have the newmodeus caddy, and i have placed the ssd in the optibay and verified that the newmodeus does support sata-2 3gb/s

on a side note the usb enclosure for the smk enclosure is actually no to bad - yes its a lil flimsy and not so pretty - but considering i use my superdrive twice since buying my 17" MBP 2011
 
Heres the proof and yes I meant Sata II - 3gigabit...
 

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johnnyturbouk said:
thats very good news.. but why would smk312 tell customers that the product only supports sata 1.5 gb/s?

ps out of interest (to tjb1) do you have u're owc ssd in the optibay - or was that just for demonstration purposes for us......:p
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Yes OWC is in optibay. And im not sure why, maybe so they dont have complaints/problems when it negotiates at 1.5? My stock 7200rpm hdd from apple only is negotiating at 1.5 so I dunno...and its in the stock hdd spot maybe because I have it set with hdapm to low power.
 
Is system profiler reliable in testing the throughput though? Could it be that it is just taking the model number of the drive and telling you its SATA capability, while ignoring the SATA limitation (if any) of the smk312 adapter?

Not trying to be pessimistic, heck, I'd love it if my adapter can go SATA II (3Gb/s), but it seems strange to me that the smk312 reports it as only SATA I (1.5Gb/s).

A conclusive test would be to run a benchmark test for a SSD that can max out the SATA I (1.5Gb/s) connection, and if it performs above SATA I (1.5Gb/s) standards then we know for sure.

Wish I had an SSD on hand to give it a whirl!
 
I have a screenshot confirming that system profiler reports SATA II (3Gb/s) for my Momentus XT in an smk312 adapter
 

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blink487 said:
Is system profiler reliable in testing the throughput though? Could it be that it is just taking the model number of the drive and telling you its SATA capability, while ignoring the SATA limitation (if any) of the smk312 adapter?

Not trying to be pessimistic, heck, I'd love it if my adapter can go SATA II (3Gb/s), but it seems strange to me that the smk312 reports it as only SATA I (1.5Gb/s).

A conclusive test would be to run a benchmark test for a SSD that can max out the SATA I (1.5Gb/s) connection, and if it performs above SATA I (1.5Gb/s) standards then we know for sure.

Wish I had an SSD on hand to give it a whirl!
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Here you go (x25-m g2 80GB in an smk312-optibay):
aja.png
 
Here is mine

OWC Mercury Extreme Pro SSD 120gb

Also activity monitor showing disk read/write speed.
 

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Wow! That's awesome guys!

So smk312 seems to be underrating his adapters (quite possibly for the above mentioned reason of no return issues for underperforming adapters, or perhaps he has switched suppliers). He just wrote me back a minute ago saying that they have no plans to stock SATA II adapters, but I guess his adapters already run at SATA II.

So for me this puts another nail in the case for the newmodeus and MCE adapters. They seem to be overpriced versions of the same adapters available on ebay.
 
Received my optibay from Ayagroup a few days ago. Had to break off the piece of plastic (took about 1.1 second) but besides that it fits pretty well. It's important to note that it's not screwed in to the body, but sort of "floats" underneath the subwoofer. But, it seems quite secure as the subwoofer keeps it in place and there is no movement as far as I can tell. I'm using it with a C300 64GB SSD with no problems whatsoever.
 
blink487 said:
Wow! That's awesome guys!

So smk312 seems to be underrating his adapters (quite possibly for the above mentioned reason of no return issues for underperforming adapters, or perhaps he has switched suppliers). He just wrote me back a minute ago saying that they have no plans to stock SATA II adapters, but I guess his adapters already run at SATA II.

So for me this puts another nail in the case for the newmodeus and MCE adapters. They seem to be overpriced versions of the same adapters available on ebay.
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yep seems like ebay smk312 is the best option atm.. when i ordered my caddy a month ago, the best option was the newmodeus, since there was so many probs reported by the smk caddies..

i might just order a cheap ebay caddy as back-up
 
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