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optibay installation question

J

jshurak

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Mar 4, 2011
9
0
Hi,

New here. I have a question for the people that have installed this in the latest (or last physical revision). Step 6 in the supplied guide (under the Unibody Macbook Pro xx" (Mid 2010) section) states to "Carefully disengage the optical drive data connector from the logic board."

In step 8 you remove this connector from the optical drive and attach it to the optibay. My question is: Does this connector get reconnected to the logic board? It seems obvious that it should as this is the data connector, but it is not mentioned in the guide. Is the data connection made some other way or did MCE leave this out of the guide?
 
Must have been left out of the guide. It's pretty self explanatory once you get in there.
 
can you use any 2.5 hdd? I bought my own, but the bay doesn't sit snug, the original screws for the optical drive won't reach
 
Stupid question, I'm sure. But I'll ask anyway. For all of these people who are installing a second HDD/SSD in place of the optical drive - won't there still be a slit in the side of the MBP making it "look" like the optical drive is still there? Or do these frames come with something that will make it appear more flush against the rest of the aluminum body?
 
foulmouthedleon said:
Stupid question, I'm sure. But I'll ask anyway. For all of these people who are installing a second HDD/SSD in place of the optical drive - won't there still be a slit in the side of the MBP making it "look" like the optical drive is still there? Or do these frames come with something that will make it appear more flush against the rest of the aluminum body?
Click to expand...

No frame "plug". It still looks like there is an optical drive.
 
Here's a stupid one. Usually when it boots up, it checks if there is something in the optical drive first. If it is switched out, will it first check the new drive in the data doubler? Plus how do you change the boot order, instead having the hard drive boot before the optical drive?
 
I've been thinking about doing this, too, with the 13" 2011 MBP. I would be using an SSD for OS/applications and the original HD for more storage.

Is it difficult to program the MBP to boot with the SSD (How do you transfer the OS files and applications from the HD to SSD)?

Does it matter if the SSD is in the HD bay or the Optical Bay?

First-time Mac user here, so I don't know too much about swapping out SSD's, Mac OS, or changing preferences in MBPs.
 
aCondor said:
Is it difficult to program the MBP to boot with the SSD (How do you transfer the OS files and applications from the HD to SSD)?

Does it matter if the SSD is in the HD bay or the Optical Bay?
Click to expand...

You might want to do a bit of research on this before you dive in. I would put the SSD in the main HDD bay. However, before you do that, either install OSX to the SSD whilst it's connected to a USB port / firewire port and then use Migration Assistant to transfer any settings / apps / docs you have already made on your HDD. Or you can just use SuperDuper to clone the HDD to the SSD before swapping them.

OSX is very good at working out which drive to boot from. Let it boot from the SSD before installing the Optibay. If it's having an issue when the Optibay's installed, either erase the HDD in Disk Utility (provided it;s backed up!) or select the startup disk in System Preferences / Startup Disk. You will find everything is much easier than on Windoze!
 
Let's not forget that cloning a drive, such as the main HD to another HD or SSD, doesn't require installing third party software, such as SuperDuper or CarbonCopyCloner.

Disk Utility, in the Utilities folder, does this task quite well and easy using the Restore feature.

Of course, if you are going to buy SuperDuper anyway to automatically schedule cloning, then use whatever suites your fancy.
 
Terry Norton said:
Let's not forget that cloning a drive, such as the main HD to another HD or SSD, doesn't require installing third party software, such as SuperDuper or CarbonCopyCloner.

Disk Utility, in the Utilities folder, does this task quite well and easy using the Restore feature.

Of course, if you are going to buy SuperDuper anyway to automatically schedule cloning, then use whatever suites your fancy.
Click to expand...

I would love an explanation of this process. I have a new 17" with a factory Apple SSD installed. I plan on buying the data doubler and moving the stock SSD to the DD and a new SATA III SSD into the main drive bay. Is there a no-hassle way of moving my data over to the new SSD and then throwing that drive into the main bay and the computer booting up like nothing has ever changed? I am trying to research this process, but seeing as this conversation already exists, I thought I would ask.

Thanks

-z
 
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