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SSD Buying Guide

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hatem ben arfa said:
I just bought a Vertex 3 240GB for my Mid-2009 17" MBP. It has the Negotiated Link Speed issue on Nvidia MCP79 SATAII. I just want to double check that I've got the whole process down. Don't want to miss anything vital.

1) Put it in my MBP!
2) Boot up OCZ Tools Boot Disk, update firmware if appropriate, perform Link Speed Fix to 3GB/s.
3) Install OSX
4) Perform TRIM enabler (is it preferable to use TRIM Enabler Tool, or just use the terminal scripts I found?)

Is that it? I heard stuff about resetting PRAM or some such. Is this necessary? At what point do I do this?

Thanks for humouring me. I've read many opinions on these threads, I just wanted to get the whole process down.


P.S. I'm also replacing the RAM (boosting from 4 to 8 gb).
P.P.S I was going to buy a new iMac... this is my alternative.
P.P.P.S I know people moan about OCZ and recommend Intel, but I wanted this bad boy and it was discounted.
Click to expand...

That should be all you need to do. I have a 256GB OCZ Octane in my late 2008 (same MCP79 as in yours) and it freaking flies. I didn't have the link speed issue, but I was prepared to use the toolbox if I needed to. I scored mine for less than $200 on clearance. 🙂
 
jbzcar said:
That should be all you need to do. I have a 256GB OCZ Octane in my late 2008 (same MCP79 as in yours) and it freaking flies. I didn't have the link speed issue, but I was prepared to use the toolbox if I needed to. I scored mine for less than $200 on clearance. 🙂
Click to expand...

Good stuff, thanks.

As far as the link speed thing goes - that's what my system profiler says now, with the default HDD in it. Am I to understand that this will not change when I put the SSD in?

I wasn't sure whether this negotiated link speed was controller or drive related.
 
hatem ben arfa said:
Good stuff, thanks.

As far as the link speed thing goes - that's what my system profiler says now, with the default HDD in it. Am I to understand that this will not change when I put the SSD in?

I wasn't sure whether this negotiated link speed was controller or drive related.
Click to expand...

It's a slight incompatibility between the MCP79 and the Sandforce controller used in many SSDs.
 
Alright guys, I'm thinking about upgrading the hard drive in my 2010 MacBook Pro 13, giving myself 2 options. 1) Direct replacement: Replace original 320gb hard drive with a Seagate Momentus XT 750gb (~$150). 2) Take out the DVD Optical Drive, replace it with a hard drive/SSD cradle, install a 120-180gb SSD ($100-$150) as the boot drive and application, keep the 320gb hard drive in the original spot for storage and stuff.

My concern is with 2 drives in the machine, I'm not sure how it will boot up and how I will deal with dual boot (Mac OS X Snow Leopard and Windows 7 Professional). I'm looking for storage and speed improvement for the hard drive, but not sure which route to go.

If you do recommend me to go to dual drive (SSD + HDD), tell me which SSD might be a good choice. I'm currently looking at Intel 330 Series, Samsung 830, and OCZ Vertex 3 since it's the cheapest/gb

I rarely use the DVD/optical drive that's why I'm considering taking it out and putting another hard drive. But the drive might come in handy when I actually need it, so I'm not really sure at this moment.

My current setup on the MBP 13:
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.66GHz
8gb ram
320gb hard drive
dual boot (will upgrade to Mountain Lion when it's out) Mac OS X Snow Leopard + Windows 7 Professional 64 bit
 
Dual HD's bro, u can get an optical drive caddy for $10 from eBay, slot load ones too. Once my optibay arrives ill be doing the same isntallation as you
 
runtohell121 said:
^How would dual hd work for dual booting (Mac OS X & Windows 7 Pro)
Click to expand...

Same as with 1 disk. In the bootcamp utility you choose which partition to boot from.

Btw. I just ordered the samsung 830, 256 gb today. Going to replace it with the 320 gb in my MBP 15" 2010. Keeping the optical drive even though i never use it.
 
Well, for storage such as pictures and stuff, how will I manage it? Will both OS be able to access it? I plan on using aperture for simple photo editing but want to be able to access it via Windows 7 when I'm in Windows.
 
runtohell121 said:
Well, for storage such as pictures and stuff, how will I manage it? Will both OS be able to access it? I plan on using aperture for simple photo editing but want to be able to access it via Windows 7 when I'm in Windows.
Click to expand...

Oh, you never had windows on it before?

Windows can read your mac partition just fine.
 
jiE said:
Oh, you never had windows on it before?

Windows can read your mac partition just fine.
Click to expand...

Really? I do have it in dual boot but never bother accessing the other partition before. I'm not too sure how to set up dual drive mode though if I end up getting a SSD + HDD Cradle
 
Just updated my 4 GB of ram to 8, and replaced my HHD with an SSD 😀

The speed differences are really night and day, I'm actually kind of shocked!

On another note... I can't seem to find a clear answer online if I should enable TRIM or not. I have a Crucial M4, and I realize it's not a sandforce ssd so turing TRIM on shouldn't necessarily slow down or harm the computer... right? Do I really need TRIM?
 
jiE said:
Same as with 1 disk. In the bootcamp utility you choose which partition to boot from.

Btw. I just ordered the samsung 830, 256 gb today. Going to replace it with the 320 gb in my MBP 15" 2010. Keeping the optical drive even though i never use it.
Click to expand...

I got the same drive last week from Tigerdirect for $199 plus free shipping. It's a great drive so far.

dfnj123 said:
Just updated my 4 GB of ram to 8, and replaced my HHD with an SSD 😀

The speed differences are really night and day, I'm actually kind of shocked!

On another note... I can't seem to find a clear answer online if I should enable TRIM or not. I have a Crucial M4, and I realize it's not a sandforce ssd so turing TRIM on shouldn't necessarily slow down or harm the computer... right? Do I really need TRIM?
Click to expand...

It's amazing the speed difference the 8GB RAM and the SSD make. I ended up enabling Trim on my drive because I heard it gives it a performance boost. This is my first SSD drive.
 
I did an upgrade to the Macs in the house. Got my wife 8GB of RAM and a 180GB SSD. Her machine is crazy fast now. On my machine I swapped out the 750GB HD for a 750GB Momentus XT. There is a difference in speed but nothing like what my wife sees on her Mac. Sadly I think one of the sticks of RAM that I have is bad (in my computer) I had to step down from 8GB to 6 in my Mac as I was getting KP's when installing Lion fresh.
 
I just had a great experience with a sandforce 2181 based drive, the OWC mercury electra 3g on my macbook aluminum 2008 5,1. You can read about it here to see that at least some sandforce based ssd drives work with the nvidia MCP79 drivers.
 
Please somebody help me here.
I just read Engadget's review on the new MBA and they claim to get 550MB/s for both write and read with Blackmagic Speed Test. I ran it in mine and this is what I got.

(Looks pretty good to me but too far away from Engadget's claims. Also I've seen rMBP doing around 400/450)


Thanks!

67315038.png
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Do you have the Toshiba or Samsung SSD? (You can find this out from System Profiler > Serial ATA). The Toshiba SSD is SandForce based and SandForce does not like incompressible data, which is what BlackMagic uses.
 
Hellhammer said:
Do you have the Toshiba or Samsung SSD? (You can find this out from System Profiler > Serial ATA). The Toshiba SSD is SandForce based and SandForce does not like incompressible data, which is what BlackMagic uses.
Click to expand...

Hey Hellhammer.
Checked that out but all I see is "Apple SSD" or something like that. Assuming it's the Toshiba one, do you imply that it shows less speed in Blackmagic but it does actually perform as good as a Samsung one with ordinary data transfer? (i.e. a 25GB video file)

Thanks!

EDIT: ok it's the toshiba. Apple SSD TSblahblahblah.
 
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POX said:
Great deal on Samsung SSD 830 256GB Notebook kit for £145 - Amazon.co.uk
Click to expand...
I can't decide if I should grab one now, or wait for the price to drop further. I don't need another SSD, but that's a damn-good price!

amazon.png
 
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SSD Recommendation

So I've tried reading through the thread, but I was hoping that someone would be willing to answer me directly with a recommendation based on my particular criteria.

-I have an early-2011 13in MBP, i7, 8GB RAM
-I don't want or need to remove the optical drive/go with a dual drive setup, this will be a system HDD replacement

Now, on to my priorities (in order):

-First and foremost, I want the most HASSLE-FREE SSD. To me, that means
1) not having to use a windows machine (I don't have access to one) to update firmware
2) not having to enable TRIM with any system hacks/extra pieces of software that may be broken with future OS updates (I want the drive to do it's own garbage collection and maintain performance over time)

-Reliablity/warranty/longevity. I don't have to have the FASTEST SSD, my work is not all that demanding. I'd happily trade some speed for the piece of mind of not worrying that my drive is going to die in a year.

-Power draw. A bit more than a year ago, I bought a OWC SSD and installed it in a 2010 MBP. Battery life was halved. I returned it, waiting for the tech to mature a little. Here I am. I am hoping, at the least, to get an SSD with a power draw that at least maintains the battery life that I'm seeing with my current HDD. Of course, a gain, if possible, would be even more welcome.

-Price. Of course important, but I don't want to cheap out and compromise on the above ideals just to get a bargain-basement price. If the SSD is available on Amazon, all the better, because I am a Prime member.

Given these factors, which drive should I go for? Samsung 830? Crucial m4? OWC Mercury Extreme? Intel?

Any help (and links to deals) are appreciated. Thanks.
 
@Silverstring

Given your requirements, the Samsung 830 seems like the one that most people would recommend however I cannot see any Mac support for the firmware on their support pages - I'm not saying you cannot update the fw using a Mac, just they have not listed this functionality.

Speaking from my own person experience, I went with the Sandisk Extreme which seems reliable, was a simple upgrade for me and the firmware can be updated on a Mac. The only question mark would be how good the garbage collection would be as I have Trim enabled on mine. I have also noticed an improvement in battery life since switching to the Sandisk over the stock hard drive - I can't give figures as I didn't do any kind of timings previously but it has been noticeable to me in my normal usage.
How would you describe your normal usage on the Mac as this will have a big impact on how well garbage collection would work?
 
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