Restore rMBP SSD to factory performance

[007 Junior]

Hi there,

I'd like to fully erase the internal SSD of my MacBook. After a few beta versions of Yosemite and some other stuff, the drive has become slower. That's why I want to erase and restore the SSD to factory settings and performance, before doing a clean install of OS X Mavericks.

It seems there is an option to do this with PartedMagic, but I have no experience with this software and I have no idea if this is the perfect solution.

Could you guys please help me out??
Thanks a lot in advance!

 

[Bruno09]

Hi,

you might use Internet Recovery : http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4718

(Cmd + Alt + r boot)

This will allow you to erase the whole disc (including the Yosemite recovery partition) and install the OS your Mac shipped with.

 

[007 Junior]

Hi,

you might use Internet Recovery : http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4718

(Cmd + Alt + r boot)

This will allow you to erase the whole disc (including the Yosemite recovery partition) and install the OS your Mac shipped with.

Thanks for you reply. Unfortunately, this method only erases the drive. It's not restoring the factory speed and performance of the SSD.

 

[wytwolf]

Thanks for you reply. Unfortunately, this method only erases the drive. It's not restoring the factory speed and performance of the SSD.

What are you trying to do? Internet Recovery can wipe the SSD clean and reinstall the OS. I.E. as if you just purchased the drive/laptop. It will be closest thing you will get to the factory speed/performance.

Just complete the reinstall and enable trim and then you will be as close to factory speed/performance as you will get. Or if you insist you can always purchase software that will do what internet recovery will do for free.

 

[drambuie]

One thing you can try is to erase the drive at the OS level, then let the MBP sit for a day, powered on, with no software installed, so that the SSD is idle with no external I/O. This should allow idle time for the SSD's garbage collection process to do it's thing and zero the memory cells. This method has been effective on PCs by powering on the drive with the data connector disconnected. This assumes the SSD has internal garbage collection.

The difference between HDDs and SSDs is that on HDDs the availability of individual bit locations is controlled by the OS. With an SSD, when a location is written to, it is marked as used, and stays marked even if the data is erased at the OS level. The drive will continue to use unmarked locations for writing until all have been used. After that it can still be written to, but every memory cell has to marked as available before accepting data. This process slows drive access. Trim should be taking care of this on the fly, but obviously has not worked in your case. Is it enabled?

 

[Weaselboy]

Thanks for you reply. Unfortunately, this method only erases the drive. It's not restoring the factory speed and performance of the SSD.

Erase the drive and do your clean install of Mavericks (sounds like you know how to do that?). Then when that is done and you have setup your account, do a command-s boot into single user mode. At the command prompt after it boots type in "fsck -fy" (without the quotes) then enter. This will TRIM all unused blocks on the drive and restore performance to like new. Type reboot when done.

 

[Freyqq]

You can trim and garbage collect, but it is impossible to fully reach the state it was in when it was new. The SSD wears over time and can only have so many write cycles. However, modern drives can handle a lot of cycles before any problems arise.

 

[poiihy]

One thing you can try is to erase the drive at the OS level, then let the MBP sit for a day, powered on, with no software installed, so that the SSD is idle with no external I/O. This should allow idle time for the SSD's garbage collection process to do it's thing and zero the memory cells. This method has been effective on PCs by powering on the drive with the data connector disconnected. This assumes the SSD has internal garbage collection.

The difference between HDDs and SSDs is that on HDDs the availability of individual bit locations is controlled by the OS. With an SSD, when a location is written to, it is marked as used, and stays marked even if the data is erased at the OS level. The drive will continue to use unmarked locations for writing until all have been used. After that it can still be written to, but every memory cell has to marked as available before accepting data. This process slows drive access. Trim should be taking care of this on the fly, but obviously has not worked in your case. Is it enabled?

He has rMBP so I think trim and all that jazz would all already be setup.

 

[007 Junior]

Erase the drive and do your clean install of Mavericks (sounds like you know how to do that?). Then when that is done and you have setup your account, do a command-s boot into single user mode. At the command prompt after it boots type in "fsck -fy" (without the quotes) then enter. This will TRIM all unused blocks on the drive and restore performance to like new. Type reboot when done.

I tried this, and in combination with Yosemite it's all going a lot smoother! Boot up time within 10 seconds and shutdown time 2 seconds. Thanks!!