Using an SSD and a HDD in a MacBook Pro

[dannyp1996]

Hi everyone,

I have been looking recently into upgrading my MacBook Pro 13" Mid 2010 and installing an SSD. However the size of the SSDs in my price range makes this a bit of a worry. Currently in the machine is a nearly full Seagate Momentus XT 500GB, and it has the full compliment of 8GB of memory.

My questions are the following:

1. Is it easy to manage OS X booting off a different drive to that which is the main storage drive?

2. Should I place the SSD in the optical bay, or move the current HDD to this location?

3. Any other advice or suggestions regarding this matter?

Thanks in advance for any help you can offer!

 

[nepalisherpa]

Hi everyone,

I have been looking recently into upgrading my MacBook Pro 13" Mid 2010 and installing an SSD. However the size of the SSDs in my price range makes this a bit of a worry. Currently in the machine is a nearly full Seagate Momentus XT 500GB, and it has the full compliment of 8GB of memory.

My questions are the following:

1. Is it easy to manage OS X booting off a different drive to that which is the main storage drive?

2. Should I place the SSD in the optical bay, or move the current HDD to this location?

3. Any other advice or suggestions regarding this matter?

Thanks in advance for any help you can offer!

I have the exact same laptop and this is what I did. I installed a Crucial M4 128GB SSD as my main hard drive. Installed the OS and all the applications there. I moved my stock 250GB HDD to the optical-bay. All my data will be on the 250GB HDD.

 

[jcastillo20059]

Hi everyone,

I have been looking recently into upgrading my MacBook Pro 13" Mid 2010 and installing an SSD. However the size of the SSDs in my price range makes this a bit of a worry. Currently in the machine is a nearly full Seagate Momentus XT 500GB, and it has the full compliment of 8GB of memory.

My questions are the following:

1. Is it easy to manage OS X booting off a different drive to that which is the main storage drive?

2. Should I place the SSD in the optical bay, or move the current HDD to this location?

3. Any other advice or suggestions regarding this matter?

Thanks in advance for any help you can offer!

I just bought an Intel 80 gb SSD its on sale,
http://slickdeals.net/permadeal/854...nternal-solid-state-drive-ssd-ssdsa2mj080g2c1
I am going to move my momentus xt drive to the optical drive and run itunes, iphoto etc. from there and use the ssd to boot up my MBP
I am going to use this method.
http://macintoshhowto.com/hardware/how-to-speed-up-your-mac-with-a-ssd-drive.html
I hope this helps.

 

[rev.b]

Put the SSD in the hdd place and move hdd to optibay.
For easy boot management, install http://refit.sourceforge.net/

 

[CocoSS]

I am currently using a SSD as my main drive. I am running out of space and think about using my former HDD with an optibay enclosure.

Any recommendations for a good optibay ? I just want to run fine, the price is not a problem (although I don't want to spend more than 100 $ on it )

Thanks !

 

[nepalisherpa]

I am currently using a SSD as my main drive. I am running out of space and think about using my former HDD with an optibay enclosure.

Any recommendations for a good optibay ? I just want to run fine, the price is not a problem (although I don't want to spend more than 100 $ on it )

Thanks !

$100??? Just get this for $10: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0058AH2US/

 

[dannyp1996]

I hope this helps.

Thanks for your suggestions and the link to the article. I am considering this drive http://www.ebuyer.com/386373-crucial-256gb-v4-ssd-with-easy-laptop-install-kit-ct256v4ssd2cca for this which should easily be large enough to house the OS, apps, and most app data. I plan to rely on the HDD very little for nothing more than iTunes and my iMovie YouTube Channel Projects.

Any thoughts, or is this a good way to go in your opinion?

 

[rev.b]

Thanks for your suggestions and the link to the article. I am considering this drive http://www.ebuyer.com/386373-crucial-256gb-v4-ssd-with-easy-laptop-install-kit-ct256v4ssd2cca for this which should easily be large enough to house the OS, apps, and most app data. I plan to rely on the HDD very little for nothing more than iTunes and my iMovie YouTube Channel Projects.

Any thoughts, or is this a good way to go in your opinion?

That's perfect and that is what I did with my 17" MBP '11.
I have OS, apps, pictures, documents and a windows 7 virtual machine (You won't believe how fast is a virtual machine running from a SSD) on a Sandisk 240 Gb SSD and everything else (including a 100 Gb windows 7 bootcamp partition) on a 750 Gb 7200 rpm hdd.

It's a must, if you use your MBP as your primary machine, as I do.

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$100??? Just get this for $10: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0058AH2US/

Just my experience: I had one of those, but I bought the original optibay one, because, for some reason, my hdd NEVER went into sleep, constantly spinning. Very annoying.

Also, the "real" optibay comes with a nice enclosure to use your superdrive as an external usb DVD device.

 

[Orlandoech]

$10 Optibay review. https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1441576/