The Seagate Momentus Thin 320 Gb 7200 rpm 16 Mb cache is also a 7 mm and fits nicely in there. The holes are in the same location as the 9.5 mm disks and the space has been taken from the opposite side.
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SSD Buying Guide
- Thread starter Hellhammer
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The Seagate Momentus Thin 320 Gb 7200 rpm 16 Mb cache is also a 7 mm and fits nicely in there. The holes are in the same location as the 9.5 mm disks and the space has been taken from the opposite side.
Def get the Apple SSD if it's just for a boot drive. Reliable and cheap,(although other prices are coming down). Still, fast as.
Easier to format HDD for media than to clone orginal drive whilst preserving he recovery partition.
I cloned my HDD to my SSD yesterday, are you saying it doesn't copy the recovery partition?
Correct... it does not. You will need to reinstall Lion on top of the existing install to get the recovery partition.
I created an 830 thread a few days ago. The drive dropped right into my 2010 MBP, replacing a Seagate 500G I had swapped in previously.
Not sure if this is the confirmation you are looking for, but so far so good with my 256G Samsung 830
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theoretically you'll void warrenty if you replace anything outsides the memory. So I would pay the $100.- and maintain the warranty.
No, that's wrong. The hard drive is user replaceable, it's even explained in the manual how to do it. What might void the warranty is replacing the optical drive.
However also here it is not clear whether it always voids the warranty, since the applecare terms of use just state that it does not cover "Damage due to [...] unauthorized modification, [...]"
I think apple can (and will) deny service for heavily modified MBPs, and demand that you return the MBP to the state it left the factory in before performing any warranty services and repairs.
Just download again from the app store and install. Make sure you an upgrade and not a clean install.
Ah... no. You will need to try this method to get a Lion install DMG. You can try booting from the recovery partition on your old disk to use this method.
The 2011 models can boot to recovery from firmware with no drive, so it makes things pretty easy, but older models are a bit of a pain if you did not save the DL to a USB key. You mentioned your machine came with Lion... that would make it a 2011 model (?) and it should be able to boot to the firmware recovery mode.
It is not mentioned for the Mac mini and I do not have the MBP - thanks for clearing this up, I assumed wrongly then that the same applied. In that case surely save yourself the money by buying an aftermarket SSD.
I was thinking about a OCZ 120 GB Vertex 3 SATA III 2.5-Inch Solid State Drive MAX IOPS to replace my HD... what do u think?
Also what should I replace the optical drive with?
Not a suggested drive for the Macbook Pros - lots of people have had issues with Sandforce based drives.
Hell Hammer's suggested list (on page 3) for the Macbook Pro is as follows:
Crucial M4
Samsung PM830
Samsung 470 Series
Intel 320 Series
I agree with his choices overall, and so do most (informed) commentators on this forum and others. There's some disagreement on the order (some prefer Intel for reliability even though it's a bit slower, others like the Samsung's combination of reliability and performance) but all of these drives give good performance with good reliability. Having worked on Macbook Pros and other systems with just about every current controller (Sandforce, Sandforce 2, Intel 510, Intel 320, Samsung, Crucial) I can say that for most people, the performance differences are very small - so it's not worth going for a faster drive like the Vertex 3, but then having compatibility issues / micro stuttering / sleep issues / etc.
For the optical drive, are you looking for an SSD or HDD? If you are going the dual SSD route, then I would say get two of the same SSDs (makes things simpler), at the size that gives you the best value per GB that you can afford.
Edit: I see you are going dual-ssd. Well, you've got a few options, and there are a few different theories on how best to do it:
1. Get a small, quick SSD as your main drive (like one of the above), and then get whatever SSD you can get at the best dollar per GB for storage. This way you get the best overall price per SSD, while being all SSD, and having a blazing boot drive. So you might do something like a Samsung 830 120gb for your boot drive, and get something like a 300gb or 600gb Intel 320 for your storage drive (wait till they are on special - there have been some good specials for them previously), or even something cheaper (although then you start to risk compatibility issues).
2. Get identical drives - you have the option of doing raid if you want to, and you are a bit less likely to have compatibility issues.
Another thing to think about - why get two SSDs? I'd be tempted to get the biggest single SSD you can afford (300gb or 600gb Intel / 512gb M4), with the intention of getting a second drive in the future when you run out of space? This is what I did - got a 160gb Intel X25M a few years back, and now got a 120gb Intel 320 as my boot drive and moved the Intel into the optibay.
If you are putting in a HDD, then I'd just use whatever the stock drive that came with your Macbook Pro is - no need to buy another
For an adapter, you can use the MCE Optibay, or you can save money and get one from newmodeus: http://newmodeus.com/
(Have installed about 5 NewModeus adapters - no issues yet on MBPs)
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Yes - the 2.5" form factor is a standard. All 2.5" drives (7.5mm, 9mm, 12.5mm) have holes in the same place on the sides.
So any 7.5mm drive will definitely fit in your MBP
And even if (super unlikely) someone made a drive that didn't follow the spec on screw positioning, as long as it was 2.5" you could still make a plan to mount it.
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And finally, feedback on my previous sleep issue with the X25M first generation:
- This problem is caused by the X25M 160gb - it seems to not happen with every drive, but if your drive does do it, no firmware update will fix it
- If you put the drive in the secondary bay, and put the OS on a different drive in the primary slot, then it fixes the problem. I think it's because the OS is not sleeping to that particular drive.
Hope that helps anyone else with the same issue!
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opinions needed
Guys,
I have a 15" macbook pro 2ghz i7 (early 2011), 8gb ram with stock 5400 hdd . I'm a graphic designer that work on large files in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop.
Im thinking to upgrade to SSD. Am I going to see benefits while editing those illustrator and photoshop files?
Or upgrading to 7200 rpm drive (or momentus XT) is sufficient for my use?
Im looking for best value here. no point upgrading to ssd if i can't fully utilize it in my work.
Guys,
I have a 15" macbook pro 2ghz i7 (early 2011), 8gb ram with stock 5400 hdd . I'm a graphic designer that work on large files in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop.
Im thinking to upgrade to SSD. Am I going to see benefits while editing those illustrator and photoshop files?
Or upgrading to 7200 rpm drive (or momentus XT) is sufficient for my use?
Im looking for best value here. no point upgrading to ssd if i can't fully utilize it in my work.
Not a suggested drive for the Macbook Pros - lots of people have had issues with Sandforce based drives.
Hell Hammer's suggested list (on page 3) for the Macbook Pro is as follows:
Crucial M4
Samsung PM830
Samsung 470 Series
Intel 320 Series
I agree with his choices overall, and so do most (informed) commentators on this forum and others. There's some disagreement on the order (some prefer Intel for reliability even though it's a bit slower, others like the Samsung's combination of reliability and performance) but all of these drives give good performance with good reliability. Having worked on Macbook Pros and other systems with just about every current controller (Sandforce, Sandforce 2, Intel 510, Intel 320, Samsung, Crucial) I can say that for most people, the performance differences are very small - so it's not worth going for a faster drive like the Vertex 3, but then having compatibility issues / micro stuttering / sleep issues / etc.
For the optical drive, are you looking for an SSD or HDD? If you are going the dual SSD route, then I would say get two of the same SSDs (makes things simpler), at the size that gives you the best value per GB that you can afford.
Edit: I see you are going dual-ssd. Well, you've got a few options, and there are a few different theories on how best to do it:
1. Get a small, quick SSD as your main drive (like one of the above), and then get whatever SSD you can get at the best dollar per GB for storage. This way you get the best overall price per SSD, while being all SSD, and having a blazing boot drive. So you might do something like a Samsung 830 120gb for your boot drive, and get something like a 300gb or 600gb Intel 320 for your storage drive (wait till they are on special - there have been some good specials for them previously), or even something cheaper (although then you start to risk compatibility issues).
2. Get identical drives - you have the option of doing raid if you want to, and you are a bit less likely to have compatibility issues.
Another thing to think about - why get two SSDs? I'd be tempted to get the biggest single SSD you can afford (300gb or 600gb Intel / 512gb M4), with the intention of getting a second drive in the future when you run out of space? This is what I did - got a 160gb Intel X25M a few years back, and now got a 120gb Intel 320 as my boot drive and moved the Intel into the optibay.
If you are putting in a HDD, then I'd just use whatever the stock drive that came with your Macbook Pro is - no need to buy another
For an adapter, you can use the MCE Optibay, or you can save money and get one from newmodeus: http://newmodeus.com/
(Have installed about 5 NewModeus adapters - no issues yet on MBPs)
----------
Yes - the 2.5" form factor is a standard. All 2.5" drives (7.5mm, 9mm, 12.5mm) have holes in the same place on the sides.
So any 7.5mm drive will definitely fit in your MBP
And even if (super unlikely) someone made a drive that didn't follow the spec on screw positioning, as long as it was 2.5" you could still make a plan to mount it.
----------
And finally, feedback on my previous sleep issue with the X25M first generation:
- This problem is caused by the X25M 160gb - it seems to not happen with every drive, but if your drive does do it, no firmware update will fix it
- If you put the drive in the secondary bay, and put the OS on a different drive in the primary slot, then it fixes the problem. I think it's because the OS is not sleeping to that particular drive.
Hope that helps anyone else with the same issue!
Dude this is amazing help.... well i thought 2 SSD would be better because it would be faster? So would it actually be better to get like a big main drive instead of 2 smaller ones and RAID 0 it?
Btw could u tell me what your suggestion would be out of the few that u listed? Im a person who cant really decide =P
THANKS!
just asking:
i just got a new 13" mbp, and a crucial M4. should i DL 'trim enabler'?
i see trim is NOT active.
so far, everything running well. so...yes? or no??
thanx!
i just got a new 13" mbp, and a crucial M4. should i DL 'trim enabler'?
i see trim is NOT active.
so far, everything running well. so...yes? or no??
thanx!
No worries, my pleasure
Two SSDs in RAID 0 is an awesome setup, and it is faster. But, to be completely honest - a single M4 is already brutally quick, and the additional performance of the RAID is not worth it for 90% of use cases. RAID 0 increases your battery usage (roughly 10 to 15% worse compared with a single drive, depending on how often you are using the array) and it increases the risk of losing data. So I personally wouldn't go for it. I would say, if you have the money and aren't too price sensitive, get a single large Crucial M4 or Samsung 830. They are great drives, reliable, and relatively well priced. If you want to save money, or want the 600gb drive, wait and buy the Intel 320 next time it's on sale (that's what I did).
With either of the above options, you get to keep your optical drive (a small bonus, but a bonus none the less), you don't have the risk and battery issues of RAID 0, and you have an easy upgrade path - you can always add a second SSD! Obviously you sacrifice the speed increase of RAID.
This is what I chose - two years back I bought an X25M 160gb instead of 2x 80gbs in RAID, and now I've added a second SSD to the system.
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SSD will make a big difference for your needs - opening and saving files will be much quicker. 7200RPM will make a difference, but a smaller difference. I'd suggest going for a Crucial M4, Samsung 830, or Intel 320.
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Lots of people will disagree with me, but I would say no. It's a relatively untested, unsupported app, and for most people the lack of TRIM is not an issue. If you are doing a huge turnover of data every week (I'd say a thumb suck of 100gb a week) then the lack of TRIM becomes an issue, but you are most likely not in that situation. Quoting myself from earlier in the thread:
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