Serial ATA late 2008 MacBook

[hoopster]

I'm thinking about upgrading to a SSD but wanted to know if my MacBook (see sig) had a Serial ATA speed of 3 Gigabit or 1.5. The System Profiler says
Vendor: NVidia
Product: MCP79 AHCI
Link Speed: 3 Gigabit
Negotiated Link Speed: 1.5 Gigabit
Description: AHCI Version 1.20 Supported
under Serial-ATA. So I'm not sure if that means the the port is a 3 Gigabit port but the HD is only 1.5. Does that mean the SATA cable is a 1.5 Gigabit speed, and I'd need a new cable, or what? Also if it is 3 Gigabit port that means it's SATA II, right? Any help appreciated thanks.

 

[spinnerlys]

The HDD is obviously S-ATA 1.5 Gbps, but the actual S-ATA interface is S-ATA 3.0 Gbps, thus you will be able to connect an SSD and have full S-ATA 3 Gbps speed as long as the SSD can offer that.

 

[hoopster]

The HDD is obviously S-ATA 1.5 Gbps, but the actual S-ATA interface is S-ATA 3.0 Gbps, thus you will be able to connect an SSD and have full S-ATA 3 Gbps speed as long as the SSD can offer that.

So would I need to buy a new cable for use with a 3 Gbps SSD?

 

[spinnerlys]

So would I need to buy a new cable for use with a 3 Gbps SSD?

No. The interface on the MBP is S-ATA 3 Gbps, the interface on the HDD is probably S-ATA 1.5 Gbps, the interface on the SSD is S-ATA 3 Gbps.

As the HDD has another interface, the Mac "negotiated" between the MB S-ATA 3 Gbps and the HDD S-ATA 1.5 Gbps interfaces and they agreed on using S-ATA 1.5 Gbps, as that would fully suffice.

Now if you put an SSD into the MB and the SSD has a 3 Gbps interface, the Mac will "negotiate" between the two interfaces and agree on using 3 Gbps.

 

[hoopster]

No. The interface on the MBP is S-ATA 3 Gbps, the interface on the HDD is probably S-ATA 1.5 Gbps, the interface on the SSD is S-ATA 3 Gbps.

As the HDD has another interface, the Mac "negotiated" between the MB S-ATA 3 Gbps and the HDD S-ATA 1.5 Gbps interfaces and they agreed on using S-ATA 1.5 Gbps, as that would fully suffice.

Now if you put an SSD into the MB and the SSD has a 3 Gbps interface, the Mac will "negotiate" between the two interfaces and agree on using 3 Gbps.

OK. thank you for the help.