[SOLVED] Dual HD Macbook PRO 15' early 2011

[b0ris]

Hi there,

I bought a M4 128G for my macbook 15' early 2011.
I consider replacing the SuperDrive with the original HD, and put the SSD in the original HD slot.

Here are my questions :

1) Is this configuration ok? Or should I let the HD where it is, and put the SSD instead of the Superdrive ?


2) If I do so, and if I have all my Tunes, Aperture and Lightroom Libraries on the old HD located on the Superdrive slot, won't the SATA II slow down everything?

I don't want to end up with a faster system (OSX on the SSD on SATA III) and everything slowed down after then because of a storage plugged on a SATA II HD...

Or am I wrong?

PS : Sorry for my poor English

 

[heisenberg123]

Hi there,

I bought a M4 128G for my macbook 15' early 2011.
I consider replacing the SuperDrive with the original HD, and put the SSD in the original HD slot.

Here are my questions :

1) Is this configuration ok? Or should I let the HD where it is, and put the SSD instead of the Superdrive ?


2) If I do so, and if I have all my Tunes, Aperture and Lightroom Libraries on the old HD located on the Superdrive slot, won't the SATA II slow down everything?

I don't want to end up with a faster system (OSX on the SSD on SATA III) and everything slowed down after then because of a storage plugged on a SATA II HD...

Or am I wrong?

PS : Sorry for my poor English

is the SSD your looking to buy a SATA 2 or SATA 3?

 

[b0ris]

SATA 3 I guess ?

specifications :
Serial ATA 6Gb/s (SATA Revision 3.0)

 

[heisenberg123]

SATA 3 I guess ?

specifications :
Serial ATA 6Gb/s (SATA Revision 3.0)

First make sure your Optical Drive is SATA 2 or SATA 3, some early 2011 are SATA 3 in both, if its not i personally i would get a SATA 2 3GB/s SSD and put that in the optibay

 

[b0ris]

First make sure your Optical Drive is SATA 2 or SATA 3, some early 2011 are SATA 3 in both, if its not i personally i would get a SATA 2 3GB/s SSD and put that in the optibay

thank you for your answer. But why not take advantage of the sata 3 port then, rather than the SATA II ? Or is it because it has no or few impact on the system speed?

 

[heisenberg123]

thank you for your answer. But why not take advantage of the sata 3 port then, rather than the SATA II ? Or is it because it has no or few impact on the system speed?

well the SATA 2 could be less money, and everywhere ive read on this topic the majority seems to be keep HD where it is and put SSD in the optibay

i think the SSD has more shock resistance so its safer in the optibay than a regual hard drive

 

[Satnam1989]

well the SATA 2 could be less money, and everywhere ive read on this topic the majority seems to be keep HD where it is and put SSD in the optibay

i think the SSD has more shock resistance so its safer in the optibay than a regual hard drive

MACBOOK PRO's 15-17" even with SATA III in optical bay do not support SATAIII SSD's in that slot, OWC did a great article on that explaining it, I have tested their claim and its 100% True as my 2011 Macbook Pro is showing both Intel SATA III Ports rather then SATAIII Main bay and SATAII Optical Bay, As for shock, Sudden Motion Sensor works 100% in optical bay slot this too I have 100000% Verified and so has many other people. My current Configuration is SATAIII Corsair Force Series 3 180GB SSD in Main bay and my original 500GB Toshiba branded HDD in the optical Bay.


When it comes to putting what where, It all depends on what SATA your SSD is, if its SATAIII put it in main bay but if its SATAII might as well put it in optical bay and not waste your time moving your HDD for no reason as it doesn't affect the booting or anything else. Only reason you have to put SATAIII in the main bay is like i said above it doesn't work in optical bay. You will have boot errors and other issues which will make you think that there is something wrong with your MBP but its more EFI related.

ALWAYS ALWAYS LEAVE SUDDEN MOTION SENSOR ON, ITS NOT PORT DEPENDANT! Goodluck, I started this thread to provide information all in one spot as when I did my setup about 1.5 months back It was hard for me to get answers, everything posted on this thread by me has been tested 100000% and i only shared working methods:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1278494/

 

[b0ris]

Thank you!

MACBOOK PRO's 15-17" even with SATA III in optical bay do not support SATAIII SSD's in that slot,

ok, only SSD right? HDD SATA III (original 500g disk on the MB) are ok?

 

[Satnam1989]

Thank you!



ok, only SSD right? HDD SATA III are ok?

I don't know any SATAIII HDD's other than the New MomentusXT Hybrid 750GB with 8GB NAND.....which I don't have so cannot speak for. As for SSD's yes It does not Support SATAIII SSD's only SATAII SSD's. Its honestly worth getting SATAIII SSD and putting it in your main bay, moving your HDD into your optical bay....Im sure like rest of us you plan on using your HDD for storage only so you have nothing to loose in performance plus since it supports SATAII which is 3.0Gb/s your HDD also being SATAII(like all are) its perfect.

 

[b0ris]

since it supports SATAII which is 3.0Gb/s your HDD also being SATAII(like all are) its perfect.

Oh, sorry, I thought the default HD on my MB was SATA III.
if its SATA II its perfect

thank you very much!

 

[b0ris]

Huumm, wait. it IS SATA III



isnt it?

I mentionned SATA II HDD earlier but was referring to the port, not the HDD itself.

 

[JTravers]

One question I've seen multiple answers to is whether the hd will spin down if it is located in the optical bay.

Does anyone have a definitive answer on this for early-2011 MBP 15's?

Thanks.

 

[b0ris]

As said above, its ok for SATA II disks.

Personnaly, I cant figure if my default hitachi 500go is SATA II or III not written anywhere

 

[heisenberg123]

As said above, its ok for SATA II disks.

Personnaly, I cant figure if my default hitachi 500go is SATA II or III not written anywhere

check in your system profile

what does it say?

 

[b0ris]

this =)

 

[heisenberg123]

[url=http://img708.imageshack.us/img708/4475/capturedcran20111219202.png]Image[/URL]

[url=http://img859.imageshack.us/img859/4475/capturedcran20111219202.png]Image[/URL]


this =)

sata 2

you can tell by the negotiated speed at 3.0GB/s

 

[b0ris]

thanks for beiing so reactive iisforiphone

 

[Satnam1989]

thanks for beiing so reactive iisforiphone

As I stated earlier all Hard Disk Drives(HDD's) that are for laptops(2.5") are SATAII.....only HDD that I know is SATAIII is the new Seagate Momentus XT 750GB with 8GB NAND....

----------

One question I've seen multiple answers to is whether the hd will spin down if it is located in the optical bay.

Does anyone have a definitive answer on this for early-2011 MBP 15's?

Thanks.

JT there are ways to make it spin down, commands, ejecting the partitions and making sure nothing is accessing ur HDD(ex iStat Pro/menu, Spotlight etc etc) mine never spins down unless I eject the partitions since it is a storage HDD and Majority of my files that I access on daily basis are on SSD, I can afford to do this.....your case may be different....there are other ways to spin it down via commands but then again I think the simplest is just to eject the partitions and then use disk utility to remount....

 

[b0ris]

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Thank you Satnam.
I'll post the results.

...

 

[Satnam1989]

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Thank you Satnam.
I'll post the results.

I've just read Time machine ignores the 2nd disk? What a pitty...

umm....my time machine backs up my Storage HD HFS+ partition+my SSD.....just doesn't back up my bootcamp which is located on my HDD....as I wanted a backup OS incase my SSD ever were to fail....at times in life its good to try things and not go with what everyone says I did and I found out a lot and learned so much from my first mac and using mac first time ever!

Also I choose Win7 to be my "backup OS" because I use it for some school work as well and the days I miss windows a little haha so its like best of both worlds

 

[bdodds1985]

well... good thing i bought a sata II intel ssd. but even if it says it would support sata III ive read so much negative stuff on it i wouldve just stuck with sata II anyways... i mean really, going from one hd to another or an external to internal transfer... good luck getting those speeds. sata II is fast enough and reliable so thats what i bought. now i have two 120gb intel ssd's, and my external 1.5 seagate is firewire. plenty fast enough

 

[b0ris]

It's ok!

Twice some of the little screws fell under the motherboard, but i managed to get them at then end (I was sweating...)

Now I got my crucial M4 as a system SSD and the Hitachi as a Data HD.

The system is much faster. I also added 4 gigs of RAM.

Thanks a lot Satnam1989 & iisforiphone.