I know that the OCZ Vertex 3 was a flop for many people, but has anyone installed a Vertex 4? OCZ now has their own controller instead of using a SandForce controller. It's between this or the Crucial M4.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
OCZ Vertex 4
- Thread starter ahdickter
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I want to know this too, also I want to know if the 512GB model is compatible as I read it uses two sets of 256GB storage chips in RAID 0?
Nice thread idea. I'm looking at getting two of these 256GB Vertex 4 drives from Amazon to set them up in a striped RAID array, as well as 16GB Komputerbay RAM to make the ultimate MBP (In my opinion). I'm definitely gonna wait it out to see what everybody makes of the Vertex 4 drives, but they seem pretty solid and the 5 year warranty almost has me sold. I think once I make these upgrades my Late 2011 15" MBP will be good to go for a very long time! 
How was it a flop? Tons of people including myself are running a vertex 3 in a macbook with no problems.
Nice thread idea. I'm looking at getting two of these 256GB Vertex 4 drives from Amazon to set them up in a striped RAID array, as well as 16GB Komputerbay RAM to make the ultimate MBP (In my opinion). I'm definitely gonna wait it out to see what everybody makes of the Vertex 4 drives, but they seem pretty solid and the 5 year warranty almost has me sold. I think once I make these upgrades my Late 2011 15" MBP will be good to go for a very long time!
I was going to get an Intel 320, but haven't had the money, but I will be soon able to afford a decent 512GB SSD and the 5 year warranty has got me very interested, as well as the Vertex performance reputation! The Vertex 4 is getting vey good reviews, but I also need to wait to see if the new MacBook Pro's will take a 9.3mm drive as I'll be getting one of those in the future. If they do take the 9.3mm standard then I am going to press the buy button!
And in the UK The Samsung 830 512GB and the Vertex 4 512GB drives are the same price give or take ten pounds, yet one has the 5 year warranty, the other 3 years!
Ah, just found the official support forum on OCZ for the Vertex 4 and Mac's.
Some working, some not, but the thread only has about 10 users in it!
http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/f...please-use-this-thread-for-questions-and-news
Some working, some not, but the thread only has about 10 users in it!
http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/f...please-use-this-thread-for-questions-and-news
What SSD cannot be used with out of the box. A quick format of maybe 5 seconds and they all run on whatever OS. Only external drives come pre-formatted, which would really only take seconds.
ad Vertex 4
They got the controller now and it is fast. They can fix all the problems much easier than with sandforce. Also all those non sandforce controllers seem much simpler and fixes aren't quite so problematic. Sandforce just seems more complex considering how long it took even Intel to fix all kinks.
Now since Intel dealt with the 520 I think even Sandforce is a quite safe bet. Sooner or later all the firmware fixes make it into all other firmwares.
What I don't like about the Octane and the Vertex 4 seems no exception is the power consumption. Great drive for a desktop but for a notebook others are a better choice. Idle 1.25W is double of an M4 and most Sandforce drives. And triple of Samsung.
Yeah the 5 year warranty is what pretty much does it for me. I'm just gonna wait for any kinks to be worked out and for the price to drop a little bit before I buy since there's no way I need it yet since my computer is plenty fast. Maybe in a year or so when prices are super low I'll do that RAID setup I mentioned earlier. So excited lol.
I got my 256gb OCZ Octane for $199 last week. I absolutely would not pay any more than that for a 256gb at this point.
I have the Intel 520 180GB SSD in my Windows PC and I have not had any issues. I heard good things with Samsung 830's also. I have not heard anything positive with OCZ SSD's and kingston SSD's.
Installation was a breeze on Mid 2011 Mac mini
I installed the 256GB Vertex 4 on a Mid 2011 Mac Mini (2.7 GHz Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, AMD Radeon HD 6630M 256MB). Bought the Vertex 4 on Amazon for about $210 in July 2012.
The hardest part of this upgrade was taking apart the mac mini and putting it back together again... and even that wasn't very hard (as long as you have some mini torx screwdrivers). Upon booting, it came up saying that the drive was not recognized and it took me right into the Disk Utility - which allowed me to create a partition with no problem. No fuss no muss. No more trouble than installing a SATA drive. I rebooted using the handy dandy Lion installation usb drive I created to reinstall a fresh version of Mac OS X 10.7.4. And now I am enjoying an even faster mini!
I've got the 512GB Vertex 4 arriving soon... and that will be going in my 15" MacBook Pro (6,2) from 2010, i7 2.66 GHz, 8 GB ram. I'll post again once I've completed that installation.
I installed the 256GB Vertex 4 on a Mid 2011 Mac Mini (2.7 GHz Intel Core i7, 8GB RAM, AMD Radeon HD 6630M 256MB). Bought the Vertex 4 on Amazon for about $210 in July 2012.
The hardest part of this upgrade was taking apart the mac mini and putting it back together again... and even that wasn't very hard (as long as you have some mini torx screwdrivers). Upon booting, it came up saying that the drive was not recognized and it took me right into the Disk Utility - which allowed me to create a partition with no problem. No fuss no muss. No more trouble than installing a SATA drive. I rebooted using the handy dandy Lion installation usb drive I created to reinstall a fresh version of Mac OS X 10.7.4. And now I am enjoying an even faster mini!
I've got the 512GB Vertex 4 arriving soon... and that will be going in my 15" MacBook Pro (6,2) from 2010, i7 2.66 GHz, 8 GB ram. I'll post again once I've completed that installation.
Last edited:
Working on mid-2010 MBP
A few months ago I installed the 512gb Vertex 4 SSD into my mid-2010 MacBook Pro. I went from Snow Leopard on the old drive to Lion on the SSD drive. It was not an upgrade, I installed a fresh copy of Lion onto the SSD. Everything installed smoothly, but sometimes the machine would not boot properly. It would just sit at a blank gray screen. No spinning wheel, no apple logo... just nothing. But usually, if I booted from the old drive into Snow Leopard and then rebooted on the SSD, it would boot successfully more times than not. Although sometimes I had to do this a couple times before it would boot successfully... which was too unreliable. I almost reverted to a spinning hard drive due to this inconsistent behavior, but luckily I persisted a little bit longer. While running on the SSD the system popped up the software update which wanted to install some sort of eprom update (I didn't capture the details), but after loading that update - everything has been much more stable. I believe it hung once or twice while booting since that update, but for the past couple months I have been running (and booting) with no issues.
I'm just sad that the mid-2010 MBP doesn't support the Sata III, so I cannot take full advantage of the speed of the Vertex 4. But it still runs impressively fast.
A few months ago I installed the 512gb Vertex 4 SSD into my mid-2010 MacBook Pro. I went from Snow Leopard on the old drive to Lion on the SSD drive. It was not an upgrade, I installed a fresh copy of Lion onto the SSD. Everything installed smoothly, but sometimes the machine would not boot properly. It would just sit at a blank gray screen. No spinning wheel, no apple logo... just nothing. But usually, if I booted from the old drive into Snow Leopard and then rebooted on the SSD, it would boot successfully more times than not. Although sometimes I had to do this a couple times before it would boot successfully... which was too unreliable. I almost reverted to a spinning hard drive due to this inconsistent behavior, but luckily I persisted a little bit longer. While running on the SSD the system popped up the software update which wanted to install some sort of eprom update (I didn't capture the details), but after loading that update - everything has been much more stable. I believe it hung once or twice while booting since that update, but for the past couple months I have been running (and booting) with no issues.
I'm just sad that the mid-2010 MBP doesn't support the Sata III, so I cannot take full advantage of the speed of the Vertex 4. But it still runs impressively fast.
See my posts
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1442840/
OCZ Vertex 4 256GB SSD - $199
Write: 472.2 MB/s
Read: 429.9 MB/s
FIRMWARE: Easily updated for the Mac with their MacTools http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/forum/showthread.php?103483-MAC-ONLY-Firmware-update and can be updated via Bootcamp following these instructions http://techarcana.net/2011/11/03/updating-ssd-firmware-on-macbook-pro/
RMA: I setup my RMA via http://www.ocztechnology.com/support. Quick email response and RMA creation, OCZ did NOT ask for proof of purchase or receipt to validate product was still under warranty. OCZ offers an Advance RMA upon *request only (*please note). They took my credit/debit card info and shipped me a brand new, sealed Vertex 4, which arrived 3 business days later. Once the new drive arrived, I sent back my "defective" drive.
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1442840/
OCZ Vertex 4 256GB SSD - $199
Write: 472.2 MB/s
Read: 429.9 MB/s
FIRMWARE: Easily updated for the Mac with their MacTools http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/forum/showthread.php?103483-MAC-ONLY-Firmware-update and can be updated via Bootcamp following these instructions http://techarcana.net/2011/11/03/updating-ssd-firmware-on-macbook-pro/
RMA: I setup my RMA via http://www.ocztechnology.com/support. Quick email response and RMA creation, OCZ did NOT ask for proof of purchase or receipt to validate product was still under warranty. OCZ offers an Advance RMA upon *request only (*please note). They took my credit/debit card info and shipped me a brand new, sealed Vertex 4, which arrived 3 business days later. Once the new drive arrived, I sent back my "defective" drive.
As an Amazon Associate, MacRumors earns a commission from qualifying purchases made through links in this post.
I don't know about the vertex 4's but I've had 2 OCZ Agility 3 ssd's in 2 separate computers and they work flawlessly.
I just recently ordered this 512GB SSD Vertex 4 from Newegg for $359 but it seems that they just changed the price again...keeps fluctuating. Really looking forward to installing it.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227820
I just recently ordered this 512GB SSD Vertex 4 from Newegg for $359 but it seems that they just changed the price again...keeps fluctuating. Really looking forward to installing it.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227820