I want to install two X25-M SSD's in my second optical bay. I have already modified an old, empty drive case to mount both SSDs so I just need to know what cables I would need.
View 24 RepliesRecently I revamped my computer. I bought an Areca 1680 with 2GB of cache and 3 120GB Vertex 2 SSDs.
I have the 3 SSDs striped in RAID 0 on the RAID card and my old 4x 300GB VRs in RAID 5 on the same RAID card. The old drives in RAID 5 on the new card seems faster, probably due to the extra cache, but the SSDs are weirdly slow.
With Quickbench, I can't seem to push past 500MB/s for reads and 450MB/s for writes.
I'm pretty sure 2 drives can push those numbers. I know it's not a south bridge issue and the RAID card is in the second PCIe slot.
Could it be my stripe size? Right now I have it set at 64KB. Write back cache is enabled and TCQ is disabled.
(For reference my RAID 5 gets 205MB/s read and 370MB/s write for a 4GB file)
I'm wondering if SSDs are compatible with the Mac Pro3,1 (08)?
And are all SSDs the same, or are some faster? and where should I get them, I'm googling atm.
I have a quick noob query about SSDs vs. HDs in the MBP
Pretty much, what are the advantages of having a solid-state drive over a normal 5400 or 7200 rpm drive? Is it just speed vs. space?
I mentioned to someone that I was thinking of buying the optional 128 or 256SSD on the MBP I intend to buy, and perhaps in a couple of years buying an SSD of greater capacity. (The 512 is beyond my budget at present.)
The person I spoke to didn't think this was a good idea because the 128 and even the 256 would soon fill up with photos, and that I would then want a larger drive.
(Backing up an external drive is of course highly recommended, but it's pretty neat to have all one's photo collection on the computer's own drive.)
Replacing an SSD with another, he said, was a "dickens of a job" as the existing (factory) SSD is built into the mother board.
So I'm considering a new boot volume for my Mac Pro revolving around this RAID controller, since I have had great experience with 3ware's products in my Linux boxen and it really seems like $700 for the Mac raid controller is a bit much. My workflow revolves very heavily around virtualization. I've been thinking about a variety of options for SSDs and hybrid drives and even just fast laptop HDs. Am I crazy for considering 2.5" drives other than SSDs? I'm thinking of 2.5" drives because I put a pair of them in the lower optical bay without issue. The amount of storage needed on the boot volume is probably in the range of 150-200GB. Getting SSDs that size may not be in the budget. Thus, I am currently considering either a pair of 320GB WD Scorpio Blacks or a pair of 250GB Seagate Momentus XTs. I'm not sure the hybrid Momentus drives are worth it. Additionally, I know that a lot of SSDs don't fully support RAID in their firmware. Thus, I am reluctant to buy one, let alone a pair, since a lot of places don't seem to have terribly generous return conditions for SSDs. Is this a fool's errand? Should I just relegate my VMs to other storage and get a smaller SSD for the OS + apps?
View 6 Replies View RelatedDifficulty deciding between 1 or 2. Unsure about real world performance gain of 2. No experience with SSDs or RAID 0. Worried about alignment and sleep/hibernate issues. Stock 5400rpm 320GB will go inside eSATA enclosure. Does anybody have a good eSATA ExpressCard/34 to recommend? I don't care about the SuperDrive. But I'll keep it for Care warranty purposes.
View 1 Replies View RelatedJust found this when I was browsing through some stuff.That's the controller that can be found from Toshiba HG2 SSDs that are used in at least 2010 MBPs. Here's a pic of the MBA's SSD:Original pic by iFixit (full size)As you can see, both are using Toshiba's T6UG1XBG Solid State Drive controller
View 2 Replies View RelatedI am checking out the market on SSDs for my Macbook Pro and I've found a few manufacturers differentiate their product lines as "regular" SSDs and Raid-Ready SSDs. The raid ready's being more expensive and having a little less space. I'm not as tech savvy as I should probably be, so I don't know what Raid or Raid-Ready means and what value it might have.
View 11 Replies View RelatedAs we discussed in other threads it could be particularly advantageous to use SSD RAID0 arrays for dual or even multiple booting. With a decent amount of striped SSDs the idea is to run all your operating systems and applications with high speed. At least that is the theory. To test the idea I have decided to use two Maxtor 160 GB HDD in a very basic dual RAID0 array configuration for booting OS X and Vista-64 in AHCI mode.
Here we go:
First thing I learned is that you have to partition the HDDs prior to building your array.
Second thing I learned is that you have to keep it all in HFS+ to make it work.
So now I have used disk utility to create two equal size partitions in HFS+ with GPT on both HDDs.
Next I fused the two lower partions together for a first RAID0 array named 2R-Leo. Format is still set to HFS+ and RAID0 mode is selected.
Then I fused the two upper partitions together for a second RAID0 array named 2R-Vista. Here format is also set to HFS+ and RAID0 mode is selected.
With that done I exited the disk utility to get a fresh start on it. I then entered disk utility again.
I've been surfing the web for hours now to find the right SSD for me. I have an ExpressCard SSD which unfortunately is having too many problems so I am planning on buying the MCE OptiBay to replace the SuperDrive with a second hard drive.
So my intention is to buy a cheap/small SSD to install OS X on it and to keep the home folder on the internal drive. There seem to be two SSDs which fit into that category. I need some advice whether those two products even work on my MacBook Pro Early 2008 2,4GHz, or if there are any other incompatibilities & problems.So the two candidates are Intel X25-V 40GB or OCZ Vertex 30GB.
The OCZ offers less space and costs slightly more but neither of them are really significant as they are in my price range. The OCZ ("Read: Up to 230 MB/s & Write: Up to 135 MB/s") seems to be much faster then the Intel one ("Read: up to 170MB/s & Write: up to 35MB/s"). Especially the writing speed of the Intel X25-V is really poor, even when compared to normal HDDs.
My friend is looking into buying the new 27" iMac Core i7 to replace his PC desktop. The only thing holding him back is that he has an analog surround sound system he uses for his speakers. I am having a hard time myself finding a converter that can make his speakers work in the iMac's optical digital output port. Any products out there that will do that?
View 12 Replies View Relatedvery new to SSDs here so need your confirmation -- are the updated second generation Intel SSDs officially called Postville ?
I ask because I'm finding this Intel SSD on Amazon Germany but it doesn't say "G2" anywhere. Just wanna make sure its the right thing.
I recently purchased a Mac Pro and am breaking down my old Windows Xp replacement that this is replacing. I kept the nicest of the two DVD Rewritable drives I had in it.
I want to put this as a second drive in the Mac Pro. My question, I got drive replacement information off of Apple's web site but this is an addition, not a replacement.
This information should still help me a lot but most of all, how do I set the connector in the back? Do I put it to slave/primary, or cable select?
Is there anything else I have to do such as when I boot up the Mac Pro or will it simply just recognize it?
I've been searching all over trying to figure out exactly what cables I need to install a X25-M in my MP 2.8's spare optical bay. Can anyone who's done this give me some advice? I think I know what SATA cable I need, but I'm confused as to how to power the drive.
View 7 Replies View Relatedis there a "hard" 4 HD limit? (In other words: by putting a SSD in the 2nd optical bay, would the Mac Pro only recognize 3 of the 4 internal bays?)
View 24 Replies View RelatedI have the Pioneer DVR-112D in my Mac Pro Classic, and I'm a little irritated that it won't burn DL-DVDs at any higher than 2x.
I recently did a crossflash with DVRFlash to update the firmware on the drive hoping that doing so would improve DL-DVD write speeds. No dice.
SO... I am looking for a newer, better, faster optical drive.
I know it needs to be ATA to work in my antique mac pro.
Does it need to be some kind of mac specific drive? Can you give me any recommendations?
I haven't really dug around much inside my 2009 Pro. I currently have Hd's in all 4 3.5" drive bays, but I only have the single optical bay filled. I was wondering, since I've seen people talk about a 2 SSD into 1 Optical bay bracket, can you run 2 SSD's off that single bay in the 2009? Where are you getting the 2nd SATA connector into that bay?
Optical
SSD1, SSD2
HD1
HD2
HD3
HD4
Do-able? And can the SSD's be bootable in that sort of setup?
Since I have no plans to add a second Optical Drive to my Mac Pro in the Second Optical Drive bay, I was wondering if I could put an SSD in that bay using a 2.5' to 3.5" drive carriage. Is this possible? Would it work? Would I be able to use it as my boot drive? Never tried this, so not sure if it would work.
Info:
Mac Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.3), Quad-Core 2010 Model
Just bought a mid-2012 MacPro. Also purchased a Crucial 512GB SSD drive, which I intend to use for a boot drive. I know that I can install the drive in one of the four slide out drive bays. From what I can gather, it doesn't matter which bay I use, Mac will boot equally well from any of them. My question is: What about the second optical bay? Is there any advantage to putting the SSD there? (other than keeping another slot open for HDD?) Have tried to research this a bit, but the model is brand-new, not a lot of info out there..
Info:
Mac Pro (Mid 2012), Mac OS X (10.7)
What if any are the downsides of using the 2nd Optical bay to house an SSD?
Is the SATA port independent like the 4 drive bays in terms of the bandwidth available to the port?
Can a SSD in an optical drive slot be a boot drive in a 2010 mac pro.
I'm debating getting a 2010 mac pro (probably 3.2 quad) to upgrade from my 1,1 mac pro. I'd like a SSD for apps, and to boot from. But I'd also like the four bays to raid for larger capacity. I have tons of photos, and nearly a 2GB iTunes library.
I just upgraded to the most recent itunes. It seems that my airport express setup no longer works. I have an older (a/g) airport express, and to that I use the optical out to my DAC. Currently when I try to play from my express it tells me that there are no speakers hooked up to it!
View 1 Replies View Relatedafter I get a bad burn (it's very rare, but it does happen), I get a stuck DVD. I can't open the DVD tray unless I either restart the computer or wait a &$?# long time before it gets done trying to read an unreadable DVD. Even the terminal won't allow me to open it. Is there a way to get the DVD tray opened "immediately"? Sucks to think that we don't have control over that.
View 14 Replies View RelatedOk, so I've got a Philips DVD R/RW drive and I want to put it in my Mac Pro. I put it in, hooked everything up, but it won't open for me (opt. + Eject, I know). It's set on cable select, but I've also tried it on slave with the stock on master. Anyone have any ideas? I'd like to get this working as soon as I can.
PS, when I wake the MP from sleep, the light on the second drive blinks, but nothing else.
i added a newer dvd-r drive today and used the original one as a back up when i press the eject button, the top one opens. how do i access the 2nd optical drive?
View 3 Replies View RelatedI just bought (as in 2 weeks ago) the new Mac Pro. I have a logitech 5.1 surround system with digital audio input. But it won't receive, or my mac is not sending, a digital audio signal. I think I've got everything set correctly in system preferences.
View 1 Replies View RelatedI'm trying to play videos through my macbook (with mini dvi + optical)I've checked the midi player settings and under system preferences it says optical output etc. etc.. there IS light coming out of the end of the optical cable (from monoprice)However no signal is getting to my amp, I've trippled checked all the settings on the amp (we'll say 99% sure everything is correct )
View 7 Replies View RelatedI have a MacbookPro. The factory fitted DVD/CD drive plays dvds fine but spits out CDs [even originals]. I have Windows XP installed via bootcamp which doesn't cause me any problems.
View 6 Replies View RelatedI have a 2 * 2.8ghz quad Mac Pro
I have dvds from Region 1 but my daughter has sent me some work of hers from the Uk. I only have 5 times to change the region and therefore my question is should i buy a 2nd optical drive and use that for region 2 and the original for region 1.
