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SSD Question (first time Mac user, so confused)

EricB4President

EricB4President

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 20, 2017
15
0
Canada
I have an 2015 iMac 21.5" quad core i5, 8 GB RAM that has a 1TB hard drive. Using it mainly for music production and editing.

Could I get away with a 256 GB external drive SSD? Would this one be any good? It'll work with the Mac right?
Verbatim 256GB Vx450 External SSD, USB 3.0 with mSATA Interface, Black 47681
How would it work, so would I still store my computer's data on the built in 1TB while the 256 GB SSD is plugged in to up my computer's speed. Or is it that once the SSD is plugged in, my computer now only has 256 GB of space to work in?

This is so confusing, first mac...please help
 
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Last edited:
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OP:
I second Weaselboy's recommendation above.
The Samsung t5 is perhaps the best "external USB3 SSD" out there right now.
It may cost a little more (not a lot), but I'd pay a little extra for it.

A "fact of Mac life" that few Mac users actually understand:
You can boot and run a Mac from ANY drive, internal or external, that has a good copy of the OS on it.
If the external drive is significantly faster than the internal drive, the Mac will then run much faster!

The 256gb drive would do fine for most folks (if properly set up).
Don't buy the 500gb version unless you really want (and can afford) it. It's not absolutely necessary to have this extra capacity.

You would then set up the SSD as Weaselboy suggests:
- put the OS on it (of course)
- put your apps on it
- put your account(s) on it
- you could probably keep your "active music project" on it as well.

BUT -- keep your "large libraries" of stuff (such as music, movies, pictures) on the internal drive. These libraries will work as well on the platter-based HDD as they would on the SSD.

You will now have TWO drive icons on the desktop:
- Your external SSD boot drive
- Your internal hard drive
Don't be concerned about this in any way -- managing more than one drive is a trivial matter on the Mac.
It's your Mac, and you will soon remember where things are supposed to go.

In fact, I would suggest that after you have the external boot SSD configured that you PARTITION the internal drive. Create a "second boot partition" of, say 200gb in size. Then, use either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper to clone the contents of your SSD back to the internal drive. Once you do this, you will have an IMMEDIATELY-ACCESSIBLE "second boot source" if needed.
Use the remaining partition of the internal drive for the large libraries mentioned above, and you can also create "archival folders" for your COMPLETED music projects (so they don't "clog up" the SSD).

SPECIAL NOTE about buying an external SSD:
The drive may come already formatted, but the formatting will almost certainly be "for windows".
You don't want that.
BEFORE you begin to set it up, you need to connect the drive to your iMac, then open Disk Utility and re-initialize it (erase it) to HFS+ with journaling enabled (use the GUID partition map).

More tips:
IF you have not used too much of your existing internal drive space yet, you could also download CarbonCopyCloner from here:
http://www.bombich.com/download.html
CCC is FREE to download and use for 30 days.
Then, you can use CCC to "clone" the contents of the internal HDD to the SSD.
But this depends on how much space you have already used up on the internal drive.

This may look like a lot of info to absorb, but it's not really that "confusing" once you try it.

Another tip:
Use a piece of velcro to attach the SSD to the back of the iMac's stand.
It will then be safely up out-of-the-way and out-of-sight.
It will become "a part of the iMac".
And the iMac will run better than you've ever seen it run before!
 
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Fishrrman said:
OP:
I second Weaselboy's recommendation above.
The Samsung t5 is perhaps the best "external USB3 SSD" out there right now.
It may cost a little more (not a lot), but I'd pay a little extra for it.

A "fact of Mac life" that few Mac users actually understand:
You can boot and run a Mac from ANY drive, internal or external, that has a good copy of the OS on it.
If the external drive is significantly faster than the internal drive, the Mac will then run much faster!

The 256gb drive would do fine for most folks (if properly set up).
Don't buy the 500gb version unless you really want (and can afford) it. It's not absolutely necessary to have this extra capacity.

You would then set up the SSD as Weaselboy suggests:
- put the OS on it (of course)
- put your apps on it
- put your account(s) on it
- you could probably keep your "active music project" on it as well.

BUT -- keep your "large libraries" of stuff (such as music, movies, pictures) on the internal drive. These libraries will work as well on the platter-based HDD as they would on the SSD.

You will now have TWO drive icons on the desktop:
- Your external SSD boot drive
- Your internal hard drive
Don't be concerned about this in any way -- managing more than one drive is a trivial matter on the Mac.
It's your Mac, and you will soon remember where things are supposed to go.

In fact, I would suggest that after you have the external boot SSD configured that you PARTITION the internal drive. Create a "second boot partition" of, say 200gb in size. Then, use either CarbonCopyCloner or SuperDuper to clone the contents of your SSD back to the internal drive. Once you do this, you will have an IMMEDIATELY-ACCESSIBLE "second boot source" if needed.
Use the remaining partition of the internal drive for the large libraries mentioned above, and you can also create "archival folders" for your COMPLETED music projects (so they don't "clog up" the SSD).

SPECIAL NOTE about buying an external SSD:
The drive may come already formatted, but the formatting will almost certainly be "for windows".
You don't want that.
BEFORE you begin to set it up, you need to connect the drive to your iMac, then open Disk Utility and re-initialize it (erase it) to HFS+ with journaling enabled (use the GUID partition map).

More tips:
IF you have not used too much of your existing internal drive space yet, you could also download CarbonCopyCloner from here:
http://www.bombich.com/download.html
CCC is FREE to download and use for 30 days.
Then, you can use CCC to "clone" the contents of the internal HDD to the SSD.
But this depends on how much space you have already used up on the internal drive.

This may look like a lot of info to absorb, but it's not really that "confusing" once you try it.

Another tip:
Use a piece of velcro to attach the SSD to the back of the iMac's stand.
It will then be safely up out-of-the-way and out-of-sight.
It will become "a part of the iMac".
And the iMac will run better than you've ever seen it run before!
Click to expand...
I appreciate you both, I will definitely purchase this item.

Thank you for in the depth step by step way of going about it. You are the best!
 
Weaselboy said:
https://www.amazon.com/Samsung-T5-Portable-SSD-MU-PA250B/dp/B073H552FK/ref=dp_ob_title_ce

That one will work, but for about the same price you may be better off with this Samsung that is a bit faster.

What most people do in this scenario is install the OS and apps on the external SSD, then boot and operate from that. Then keep your large data files on the internal hard drive. The system will see this as two different drives.
Click to expand...


Since Eric was successful. Can I ask you once again help with my T3 Samsung external USB3 256g. This is on a 2013 late 21.5" IMAC

After 8 1/2 hours of great Apple support over the last two days, the upgrade to HS is now fixed. I hope.

My question is I think they moved the OS from my ssd boot to the HD
I have 5Xg on SSD and 19Xg available. I have 8Xg on the HD. My backup to a 2T TimeCapsule.

How to check which is boot? And how to move if on the HD to the ssd? In disk utility neither shows any obvious , to me, indication of OS.

Thanks
 
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With the drive attached, run this command in Terminal and tell me what it says. This should show us how things are setup.

Code: 
diskutil list

Also, look in System Prefs in the startup disk panel and see what drive is selected there.
 
sys prefs they changed it to the HD
Weaselboy said:
With the drive attached, run this command in Terminal and tell me what it says. This should show us how things are setup.

Code: 
diskutil list

Also, look in System Prefs in the startup disk panel and see what drive is selected there.
Terminal shows the SSD highlighted so they changed it
Click to expand...
#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER

0: GUID_partition_scheme *1.0 TB disk0

1: EFI EFI 209.7 MB disk0s1

2: Apple_HFS Macintosh HD 999.3 GB disk0s2

3: Apple_Boot Recovery HD 650.0 MB disk0s3


/dev/disk1 (external, physical):

#: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER

0: GUID_partition_scheme *250.1 GB disk1

1: EFI EFI 209.7 MB disk1s1

2: Apple_HFS ssd 249.1 GB disk1s2

3: Apple_Boot Recovery HD 650.0 MB disk1s3
 
drummer5645 said:
sys prefs they changed it to the HD
Click to expand...
Yep... looks like everything is running off the HDD. Is there anything on the SSD you need to save? How much space is being used on the hard drive now? If it is less that 240GB or so, we can just copy Macintosh HD over to the SSD with Disk Utility.
 
HD is around 85g and the SSD has 52g with another 190g available. My guess is there is some duplicate on the hd and SSD. I assume we copy to the SSD and then highlight as the prime???
 
drummer5645 said:
HD is around 85g and the SSD has 52g with another 190g available. My guess is there is some duplicate on the hd and SSD. I assume we copy to the SSD and then highlight as the prime???
Click to expand...
Okay good... we can work with this. I assume there is nothing on the SSD you need to keep then.

First start Disk Utility and shrink the Macintosh HD partition down to around 200GB or so. Then in Disk Util go to the restore tab and restore the Macintosh HD volume from the HDD over to the SSD. That will essentially clone it over. Now go to System Prefs and set the startup disk to the SSD. Then restart and you should be all set.

Once you are running off the SSD and everything looks okay, you can format the HDD.
 
before I do anything. The partition changed/ created "untitled" disk. When I highlight Mac HD there is nothing allowed for restore. When I highlight he new Untitled which has 640.7 mb, it will let me but apparently only from the SSD. This has the bad potential so I am asking first
 
Just to add a couple of things to the good advice given by Weaselboy and Fishrrman.

You can identify the Startup drive by clicking on the Apple menu ( extreme left of the menu bar) and then on "About This Mac"

Another good use of partitioning your HD for a clone of your startup drive is that when a new OS is announced or you want to try a new app, make a copy of your startup drive onto that partition. Then if things go pear shaped with the new OS or app you can copy the backup back onto your startup drive. Myself, I have a 2nd external SSD for this purpose.
 
drummer5645 said:
before I do anything. The partition changed/ created "untitled" disk. When I highlight Mac HD there is nothing allowed for restore. When I highlight he new Untitled which has 640.7 mb, it will let me but apparently only from the SSD. This has the bad potential so I am asking first
Click to expand...
It is a little confusing the way restore works. First select the destination in the left column (the SSD volume).. the click the restore button and you will see a dropdown where you select the source. Are you able to do that?

Were you able to resize the Macintosh HD volume. This part is important as Disk Util will not let you restore a larger volume to a smaller one, no matter how much space is unused.
 
Now the "from-to" makes sense. Do I ignore the "untitled" internal with 641MB that the partitioning produced? As far as volume transfer from the HD is "used" 87.2gb and therefore have plenty of space on the SSD?
 
Yes... just ignore the untitled. This restore process is going to clone the HDD to the SSD, so anything previously on the SSD will be gone.
 
ok that makes sense. doing a just "in case" backup to time machine right at the moment
[doublepost=1511456803][/doublepost]Ok the ssd highlighted and picked the HD, hit restore from Mac HD got "failed".

"source volume is read-write and can not be unmounted, so it can't be copied"
 
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Ok while the turkey is cooking, its done. Weaselboy once again your help was beyond great. The missing pice was the missed "unlock" part. I also saw in Disk Utility that both drives had 10.13.1 in each. Backup to the time capsule and let it rip. No need to restore as before my little two day problem it was always on the SSD. It just got changed by Support.
Thanks again ever so much. Back to 45 sec to full start
 
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