Secondary SSD installation fail

[BeSweeet]

Well, it's not exactly a fail, but a disappointment. I went out and bought a 64GB SSD so that I can replace the optical drive with it. Little did I know that the optical drives' SATA connector isn't as big as the one required by a SATA SSD (or HDD for that matter). Attached is a picture of what I'm talking about.

I was going to use it in combination with my 500GB 7200RPM HDD (SSD for SL and Win7, HDD for games and media and other applications), but oh well.

So right now, the SSD is in place of the HDD and Snow Leopard is installing to it.

I also ordered a little caddy (from eBay, as the MCE one is rather expensive), so it'll be a while until it shows up.

Or, maybe they make a full-sized SATA connector? Or maybe I can break a little piece of the plastic off of the SATA connector for the optical drive so that I can stick it onto the SSD?

 

[Eddyisgreat]

I also ordered a little caddy (from eBay, as the MCE one is rather expensive), so it'll be a while until it shows up.

Actually, you did fail lol. Why did you think you could remove the optical drive and install the drive without a caddy?

Don't go off breaking stuff. You've already ordered the caddy (but if it comes from HK it may be a while), might as well do it the right way.

 

[BeSweeet]

Yeah. I'll pay a little extra for faster shipping. I have a lot of extra money from some things .

Overall, I'm SO FREAKING HAPPY about the SSD. I've been using it (in place of the HDD) and everything is just too fast. I have SL and Windows 7 on it and both are just blazing fast. Can't wait for the caddy to show up so I can use both at the same time. I also bought a little enclosure for the optical drive.

 

[BigBeast]

A little help.

Hey Sweet, I'm buying an optibay for my install of SL and W7.

Couple questions.
1. How much space do you have left from your install of SL and W7 on your 64GB SSD?
2.You have any info/bookmarks to help me out with creating a boot drive?

PM me if you can. Thanks.

 

[BeSweeet]

Hey Sweet, I'm buying an optibay for my install of SL and W7.

Couple questions.
1. How much space do you have left from your install of SL and W7 on your 64GB SSD?
2.You have any info/bookmarks to help me out with creating a boot drive?

PM me if you can. Thanks.

I tried to send a PM, but I got an error about some buddy list thing:

Hey,

On the Snow Leopard partition, there should be about 20GB free. I'll give you exact numbers in a bit, but there are lots of applications that are installed. The Windows 7 partition has about 14GB free.

Regarding the Optibay; did you get the name brand one from MCE, or did you get one off of eBay? I got mine off of eBay because it was MUCH cheaper for basically the same product ($19), and I also got a little slim DVD enclosure for $10.

The best thing to do is to use Disk Utility in the Snow Leopard installer so that you can format and partition it. Then, you can install Snow Leopard onto it, and then Windows later on. To boot either the SSD or the HDD, just hold ALT/Option after pushing the power button.

 

[BigBeast]

Hm. Wonder why the PM didn't work.

Anyway, I ended up picking up the OWC 120GB SSD Mercury Elite pro with the bundled bay. At the moment, their drives surpass even the Intel X-25M. Plus- OWC is a great company and has great customer service. I decided to go with 120GB to have plenty of headroom and for greater resale value if and when I get Intel's 3rd gen SSD's when they come out. With 120GB, I know I'll have plenty of space for my boot drive.

Thanks.