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Should an 'added' SSD be installed in the Lower slot?

davekro

davekro

macrumors regular
Original poster
Mar 31, 2011
171
53
No. Calif.
On the topic of physical location of an added SSD... Somewhere I read Upon adding an SSD to a Mini, the OEM HDD should be moved from the lower slot to the upper, and then the aftermarket SSD mounted in the lower slot. Not sure if it was because a few upgraders had problems that were fixed by this location swap or if it was to get some performance advantage. My new to me 2.6 MM has the added 512 840 Pro SSD in the upper (was empty) slot.

Is this smoke and mirrors, or is there a good reason to move the primary drive to OEM's single drive location?

How does Apple orient the drives for the OEM fusion set ups?
 
You can run either disk in either position. I think there is a "slight" thermal advantage to the lower slot since the drive is physically screwed to the perforated metal shield plate which might add some heatsink advantage.
 
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I'd put the drive most likely to break down in the upper slot since its a lot easier to access. In my setup I'll soon have a SSD as boot drive and a Samsung 2TB Pinpoint disk as storage. I'm leaning towards putting the SSD on the upper slot. Also for the reason if prices on 2,5 inch SSD satadrives drops massively in a year or too.
 
Joelburman said:
I'd put the drive most likely to break down in the upper slot since its a lot easier to access. In my setup I'll soon have a SSD as boot drive and a Samsung 2TB Pinpoint disk as storage. I'm leaning towards putting the SSD on the upper slot. Also for the reason if prices on 2,5 inch SSD satadrives drops massively in a year or too.
Click to expand...

Don't confuse people, the slot that's easier to access is technically the LOWER slot (that's how it's identified in Disk Utility). Some people only think of it as the upper slot because it's on top when the unit is inverted so it can be opened.
 
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hallux said:
Don't confuse people, the slot that's easier to access is technically the LOWER slot (that's how it's identified in Disk Utility). Some people only think of it as the upper slot because it's on top when the unit is inverted so it can be opened.
Click to expand...

Ah true! I of course mean the one you point out.
 
hallux said:
Don't confuse people, the slot that's easier to access is technically the LOWER slot (that's how it's identified in Disk Utility). Some people only think of it as the upper slot because it's on top when the unit is inverted so it can be opened.
Click to expand...
I just knew this thread would lead to the "Ole upper-lower" confusion.:)
 
One vote here for SINGLE SSD in a Mini. I base this on temperatures that can happen when a 2 drive Mini is put to hard core tasks for longer periods.
 
This lead to some confusion back in the day.
Here is a photo I posted some time ago in another controversial thread.
Think...
Top = upper
Bottom = lower

mac-mini-bays.jpg
 
phrehdd said:
One vote here for SINGLE SSD in a Mini. I base this on temperatures that can happen when a 2 drive Mini is put to hard core tasks for longer periods.
Click to expand...

Define hard-core tasks? I'm thinkiing of having a two drive setup for my 2012 i5 mini. Its mainly used as HTCP I'll do some occasional handbraking on it as well.
 
phrehdd said:
One vote here for SINGLE SSD in a Mini. I base this on temperatures that can happen when a 2 drive Mini is put to hard core tasks for longer periods.
Click to expand...

Joelburman said:
Define hard-core tasks? I'm thinkiing of having a two drive setup for my 2012 i5 mini. Its mainly used as HTCP I'll do some occasional handbraking on it as well.
Click to expand...

Uh... o_O
I say that Joelburman should not be concerned about the thermal impact of a second drive if that drive is an SSD. SSDs don't use much power so they can't make much heat. The greatest thermal impact that an SSD could have might be airflow obstruction. But Apple sold plenty of twin HDD servers. The servers did not have heat problems, did they? SSD make less heat than HDDs so...

Similarly, during tasks like handbraking video files the heat is made where the power is used. CPU/GPU temps soar during transcoding sessions. If a mini can handle this processing heat then the rest should be easy. :cool:
 
I figured out how to un fuse my 512 SSD from the HDD. Yea! :)
Now my 1 TB HDD will be just for a TimeMachine Volume and one volume for a carbon copy clone of my SSD. Would the the HDD only ever spin up each hour when TimeMachine backs up and whenever CCC is scheduled to do a clone?
 
davekro said:
I figured out how to un fuse my 512 SSD from the HDD. Yea! :)
Now my 1 TB HDD will be just for a TimeMachine Volume and one volume for a carbon copy clone of my SSD. Would the the HDD only ever spin up each hour when TimeMachine backs up and whenever CCC is scheduled to do a clone?
Click to expand...
Time Machine's default setting of hourly backups is way overkill for my use, so I reschedule the backups to twice a day using the free "TimeMachineEditor" application.
Does the job nicely and uses far less disk space.
And yes, TimeMachine does wake the HDD and spin it up.
 
Joelburman said:
Define hard-core tasks? I'm thinkiing of having a two drive setup for my 2012 i5 mini. Its mainly used as HTCP I'll do some occasional handbraking on it as well.
Click to expand...

Hard core is when perhaps you are doing an FTP, Handbrake, hitting web pages with lots of flash and so on all at the same time for fairly long duration. If you are doing a dedicated htpc, I don't see that as being really hard core or "stressing" the system.
 
jbarley said:
Time Machine's default setting of hourly backups is way overkill for my use, so I reschedule the backups to twice a day using the free "TimeMachineEditor" application.
Does the job nicely and uses far less disk space.
And yes, TimeMachine does wake the HDD and spin it up.
Click to expand...
Withe the 512 SSD running the OS, will the Mini's 1 TB HDD stay idle (not spinning) until TimeMachine backup starts?

Do external HDD's used just for storage and back up only spin when asked to do a copy or back up (manually or automatically)?
 
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