newb - SSD upgrade suggestions?

[nsfw]

And if I do this I can still boot from my old HD until I get everything transferred over I guess?

I just want everyone considering adding a second drive to remember that you need to buy another flat sata cable. It costs about $35 on its own from ifixit, owc, or ebay but I recommend buying the kit from OWC for about $45 that includes the tools you will need as well as a printed manual and rubber bumpers for the drive cage.
I've been taking apart machines for nearly 30 years and I gotta say this is one of the trickiest installs ever. If you have wide fingers this job could be really frustrating.
I've done the second drive add about 7 times and once the power light didn't come on and i had to start over. One time one of the pins popped out. Bad luck indeed but I was moving too fast probably. You really need to take each step slowly and not try to jump ahead. I'm used to not even reading manuals.
That being said. The single drive change is simple as people have mentioned.

 

[cvaldes]

And if I do this I can still boot from my old HD until I get everything transferred over I guess?

Yes, you could if you want, although I tend to operate the other way.

By booting from the new drive, you'll quickly find out what's missing. If you continue to use the old drive as the primary boot drive, it will take you a lot longer to figure out what's missing from the new drive (e.g., fonts, screensavers, specially compiled software in /usr/local, stuff like that).

But go ahead and do it that way if you want. I just don't find it a very efficient way to migrate to a newer drive.

 

[sou1 so1di3r]

Yes, you could if you want, although I tend to operate the other way.

By booting from the new drive, you'll quickly find out what's missing. If you continue to use the old drive as the primary boot drive, it will take you a lot longer to figure out what's missing from the new drive (e.g., fonts, screensavers, specially compiled software in /usr/local, stuff like that).

But go ahead and do it that way if you want. I just don't find it a very efficient way to migrate to a newer drive.

well right, but I meant for the first time... the SSD is going to be 'empty' and I have to at least put Lion or ML on it... so I will have to be able to boot up SOMETHING to get that rolling yeah?

I feel like it will make a big improvement starting from scratch but installing ALL my apps over again might be a pain. Office 2011... I have on a disc... no longer have a CD drive.

Photshop suite... final cut pro, Lightroom and all my photo albums, all my music, photos from iPhoto, etc.