2019 iMac 21.5” SSD Upgrade - Samsung 1tb 970 Evo Plus NVME Upgrade - SUCCESSFUL

[Voidity]

Hi all….

I have spent a considerable amount of time researching upgrading the standard SSD In my iMac to a 1 TB Samsung 970 Evo Plus NVME. What I learnt is that there is very little and often conflicting information on the subject. I took the plunge and did the upgrade and thought I would share my learnings.

You absolutely CAN upgrade the SSD part of your iMac’s fusion drive to a Samsung 970 EvoPlus despite lots of sites saying you can’t. I bought a new one from Amazon which already has the latest Firmware update on it (This apparently solves the issue of iMacs crashing or not hibernating when using this ssd)

Amazon Link - https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07MBQPQ62?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share

it’s worth noting that apple use a different interface than the standard M.2 NVME interface and so an adaptor is needed. After viewing many many reviews online I bought one from Amazon branded Sintech. This one was said to be most compatable with this SSD. Worth noting this says it’s for a 2013-2017 MacBook but I can say it 100% works on the 2019 iMac 21.5”

Amazon link - https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01CWWAENG?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share


Couple of other things I learnt along the way is that in the uk it’s almost impossible to find iMac screen adhesive strips advertised as compatible with a 2019 21.5” iMac. I managed to find one on eBay and is almost 100% compatible. You need to make a very small adjustment to one of the strips at the bottom to prevent it from covering a microphone hole but other than that it works great.

eBay link - https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Genuine-...-/324033893063?_trksid=p2349624.m46890.l49286


I used the following guide to open to iMac to access both the SSD and ram (Which I upgraded at the same time) excellent step by step guide.

Once I followed the guide above and installed the SSD I simply booted into recovery mode, formatted the SSD to APFS file system and then did a clean install of macOS Catalina from a usb drive I already had laying about (Will obviously upgrade to macOS BigSur)

what I found prior to the upgrade is that the standard Fusion drive is poor. It’s made up of a tiny 24gb SSD and a 1tb mechanical
HD. The way it works is that data is originally stored and processed on the fast SSD apart of the fusion drive and then when the computer is not being used it moved the data to the slower mechanical hard drive in the background. This means that in theory it should perform Quicker. In reality as you load up your hard drive
With more and more data the whole
Operating system constantly needs to access data on the slow mechanical part of the HD which makes the system
Run SOOOOOOO SLOW. By doing this upgrade it essentially gives you 1tb of lightning fast SSD storage and a 1tb mechanical hard drive space as a second drive. I chose to use these as separate drives and not configure them as a new fusion drive. The ends result is the computer feels like it’s been turbo charge. It’s snappy and responsive and feels like a huge upgrade to performance.

I hope I’ve explained that ok and my experience is limited to this specific 2019 iMac 21.5 inch.

Feel free to ask me any other questions and I’ll do my beat to help.

 

[Voidity]

Disk speed Before the upgrade - Shocking….

Disk Speed After upgrade - ?

 

[Ckronus]

Hi there,
I'm looking at doing the same thing to my 27 inch 2019 iMac with the Fusion drive and had a couple questions for you. Am I correct in saying you just left the mechanical part of the Fusion drive where it was? Did that cause any issues for you or were you able to just reformat it and use it alongside your new SSD? Also, did the Samsung EVO Plus firmware come updated or did you have to do that yourself? Was it difficult to update? Thanks in advance!

 

[Voidity]

Hi,

In answer to your question in I left the old mechanical hard drive in there to save cost. The Samsung ssd was 1tb which was more than enough for my needs and it works absolutely fine. After you upgrade the SSD and leave the old HD in there, the system doesn’t make them a fusion drive by default. They appear as 2 Separate drives..a main drive (SSD) and a 2nd drive. There is a code you can run in terminal to make them work as a fusion drive again but I chose not to as it’s a slow drive and yes both drives were formatted in Recovery mode prior to reinstalling macOS. I bought my Samsung ssd new from Amazon and thankfully it came with a manufacture date of March 2021 and had the latest “fixed” firmware already on it. There is a way you can upgrade the firmware if you have an samsung ssd with the old firmware on it but requires a windows PC and samsung magician software to complete. Not difficult at all but I didn’t have access to a windows pc so I was pleased when I found out I had the updated firmware. I believe you just pop the ssd into a windows PC, Boot up, run Samsung magician, the software displays the ssd’s firmware and offers and upgrade with a single click. Hope that helps.

 

[marzer]

Hi there,
I'm looking at doing the same thing to my 27 inch 2019 iMac with the Fusion drive and had a couple questions for you. Am I correct in saying you just left the mechanical part of the Fusion drive where it was? Did that cause any issues for you or were you able to just reformat it and use it alongside your new SSD? Also, did the Samsung EVO Plus firmware come updated or did you have to do that yourself? Was it difficult to update? Thanks in advance!

Another thing to consider...if you go through the hassle of opening the iMac to swap the NVME, its also a good time to consider replacing the mechanical HDD with a SATA SSD for additional fast storage.

 

[Hawk269]

Does anyone knows which NVMe standards are on iMac 27 2019? 3.0 or 4.0. The reason I'm asking is for the fact there are some options with NVMe 4.0 with read/write speed of 6000MB/s + out there. But if Apple bus doesn't support such speeds makes no sense the extra $$.

 

[rpmurray]

Does anyone knows which NVMe standards are on iMac 27 2019? 3.0 or 4.0?

As far as I know Apple doesn't use PCIe 4.0 in any of their Macs. Go with the 3.0.

 

[Hawk269]

Thanks! I found no documentation about the interface specs. So thanks for answering. Any way have any one tried Samsung NVMe 980 or WD_BLACK SN850 NVMe on iMac?

 

[Mariosknl]

Thanks! I found no documentation about the interface specs. So thanks for answering. Any way have any one tried Samsung NVMe 980 or WD_BLACK SN850 NVMe on iMac?

Hi Hawk269 I’m also thinking of using Samsung NVMe 980 for my iMac 27’ 2019. Did you try it?

 

[viske]

Thank you for the post, very helpful. How stable is it now ?
I'm considering an update of my 2019 Retina 5K imac but I've read on other mac fora that the EVO plus is not stable in the long run. In an Apple that is. Mac refuses to boot, while the drive is fine once you get it out again (or reinstall OSX). I have installed several PCIe blades already in this model imac, with the proper Apple format 16+12 pins, and just one with an adapter and a (pc) M2 connector (not a Samsung but a Transcend ssd - photo). That particular one died on me after a couple of months: first no wifi (?), and then no osx to be found. Right after PRAM reset. I reinstalled Catalina (I must admit it had a Big Sur patch running, and it is a Late 2012 model) and it works fine again (including the wifi), but I'll still have to find out for how long. So bottem line, stick with an OWC without adapter at 230 euro or an M2 Samsung or WD Black + adapter at half the price ? My 2019 model is running Monterey on the original (tiny) fusion drive and it's slower than the Late 2012 (already so since Big Sur), so I'm going 100% SSD without fusion.

EDIT : I just found out in another post in this forum - thank you dobrink - the SSD on an adapter should work just fine now :
quote "The iMacs before 2017 have issues with the drive's power states after upgrading the blade SSD with a non-Apple NVMe."

 

[viske]

As far as I know Apple doesn't use PCIe 4.0 in any of their Macs. Go with the 3.0.

Does anyone knows which NVMe standards are on iMac 27 2019? 3.0 or 4.0. The reason I'm asking is for the fact there are some options with NVMe 4.0 with read/write speed of 6000MB/s + out there. But if Apple bus doesn't support such speeds makes no sense the extra $$.

Mactracker has the answer. And rpmurray is correct.

 

[Alpha Centauri]

Disk speed Before the upgrade - Shocking….

View attachment 1767609

Disk Speed After upgrade - ?

View attachment 1767614

Have to say, I'm totally blown away at your initial speed test. Surely there was something systematically wrong?

I run a Catalina patched 2009 MBP (3,06GHz) with a 850 Evo SSD that writes 180MB/s and reads 260MB/s. For me it's quite slow, but really can't have expectations from a 13 year old CPU.

 

[TechMedia UK]

First post on this forum so firstly, Hi to everyone.
I have two 2019 27" iMac's both needing storage upgrades.

The one I'm working on at the moment was factory supplied with just a 256gb SSPOLARIS drive, it's very fast but too small for everyday use and I don't want the unreliability of having a USB drive plugged in.
I chose a 500gb Samsung 970EVO Plus but for some reason it simply doesn't work at all.
I know others have used this exact drive in the same model iMac with no issues, some have trim issues, some have power management issues and some of the adaptor sellers simply say it's not compatible.

The adaptor I have was supplied by a seller who says both the adaptor and drive are 100% compatible, he is actually running the same model iMac, adaptor and NVMe in his own system.

Currently mine isn't recognised by the iMac at all, doesn't show up in Disk Utility or System Information so either the disk is DOA (It was brand new) or it's simply not supported by this model iMac.
Unfortunately I don't have any other hardware to check if the disk actually works at all.

So far I've tried, boot from USB stick with OSX Ventura, Internet Recovery, both Ventura and Mojave, Installed Ventura on an external USB and booted from that.
None of these solutions have been able to even see that the NVMe is even plugged into the mainboard.
Obviously I've double checked my installation work with another strip down to double check it's firmly installed correctly, I guess if it wasn't then the screw wouldn't go in anyway.

I've read about the drive needing a firmware upgrade but haven't been able to perform this either, I made a bootable stick with the Samsung firmware upgrade and this won't even boot either, I just get a little grey cursor.

I've ordered a Kingston 500gb NVMe but thought I'd post these findings in the meantime if anyone can shed light on what may be wrong??

 

[Hombre53]

First post on this forum so firstly, Hi to everyone.
I have two 2019 27" iMac's both needing storage upgrades.

The one I'm working on at the moment was factory supplied with just a 256gb SSPOLARIS drive, it's very fast but too small for everyday use and I don't want the unreliability of having a USB drive plugged in.
I chose a 500gb Samsung 970EVO Plus but for some reason it simply doesn't work at all.
I know others have used this exact drive in the same model iMac with no issues, some have trim issues, some have power management issues and some of the adaptor sellers simply say it's not compatible.

The adaptor I have was supplied by a seller who says both the adaptor and drive are 100% compatible, he is actually running the same model iMac, adaptor and NVMe in his own system.

Currently mine isn't recognised by the iMac at all, doesn't show up in Disk Utility or System Information so either the disk is DOA (It was brand new) or it's simply not supported by this model iMac.
Unfortunately I don't have any other hardware to check if the disk actually works at all.

So far I've tried, boot from USB stick with OSX Ventura, Internet Recovery, both Ventura and Mojave, Installed Ventura on an external USB and booted from that.
None of these solutions have been able to even see that the NVMe is even plugged into the mainboard.
Obviously I've double checked my installation work with another strip down to double check it's firmly installed correctly, I guess if it wasn't then the screw wouldn't go in anyway.

I've read about the drive needing a firmware upgrade but haven't been able to perform this either, I made a bootable stick with the Samsung firmware upgrade and this won't even boot either, I just get a little grey cursor.

I've ordered a Kingston 500gb NVMe but thought I'd post these findings in the meantime if anyone can shed light on what may be wrong??

Post your question with it's own separate thread, you will get more responses. Otherwise, you are "hijacking" this tread with a question not related to the original.

 

[TechMedia UK]

Thanks for the welcome.

 

[Emil Harrys]

Hi all….

I have spent a considerable amount of time researching upgrading the standard SSD In my iMac to a 1 TB Samsung 970 Evo Plus NVME. What I learnt is that there is very little and often conflicting information on the subject. I took the plunge and did the upgrade and thought I would share my learnings.

You absolutely CAN upgrade the SSD part of your iMac’s fusion drive to a Samsung 970 EvoPlus despite lots of sites saying you can’t. I bought a new one from Amazon which already has the latest Firmware update on it (This apparently solves the issue of iMacs crashing or not hibernating when using this ssd)

Amazon Link - https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07MBQPQ62?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share

it’s worth noting that apple use a different interface than the standard M.2 NVME interface and so an adaptor is needed. After viewing many many reviews online I bought one from Amazon branded Sintech. This one was said to be most compatable with this SSD. Worth noting this says it’s for a 2013-2017 MacBook but I can say it 100% works on the 2019 iMac 21.5”

Amazon link - https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01CWWAENG?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share


Couple of other things I learnt along the way is that in the uk it’s almost impossible to find iMac screen adhesive strips advertised as compatible with a 2019 21.5” iMac. I managed to find one on eBay and is almost 100% compatible. You need to make a very small adjustment to one of the strips at the bottom to prevent it from covering a microphone hole but other than that it works great.

eBay link - https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Genuine-...-/324033893063?_trksid=p2349624.m46890.l49286


I used the following guide to open to iMac to access both the SSD and ram (Which I upgraded at the same time) excellent step by step guide.

Once I followed the guide above and installed the SSD I simply booted into recovery mode, formatted the SSD to APFS file system and then did a clean install of macOS Catalina from a usb drive I already had laying about (Will obviously upgrade to macOS BigSur)

what I found prior to the upgrade is that the standard Fusion drive is poor. It’s made up of a tiny 24gb SSD and a 1tb mechanical
HD. The way it works is that data is originally stored and processed on the fast SSD apart of the fusion drive and then when the computer is not being used it moved the data to the slower mechanical hard drive in the background. This means that in theory it should perform Quicker. In reality as you load up your hard drive
With more and more data the whole
Operating system constantly needs to access data on the slow mechanical part of the HD which makes the system
Run SOOOOOOO SLOW. By doing this upgrade it essentially gives you 1tb of lightning fast SSD storage and a 1tb mechanical hard drive space as a second drive. I chose to use these as separate drives and not configure them as a new fusion drive. The ends result is the computer feels like it’s been turbo charge. It’s snappy and responsive and feels like a huge upgrade to performance.

I hope I’ve explained that ok and my experience is limited to this specific 2019 iMac 21.5 inch.

Feel free to ask me any other questions and I’ll do my beat to help.

Hello, i saw your post and i am also trying to upgrade my iMac 2019 21.5, now i have a few questions :

1) Does the NVME of Samsung 970 Evo plus also work in Bootcamp (Windows 10/11) without problems?

2) Does the performance or quality of the Samsung 970 Evo plus deteriorate because of the adapter or does the speed remain the same?

Thank you for your input I hope for an answer.

 

[milleron]

It's a little difficult for me to believe that the cost saving of buying a Samsung 970 and the adapter, then scrounging all over for the adhesive strips, and possibly the special tools needed, is worth the hassle. I did my 2019 iMac upgrade with an OWC 1TB Aura Pro that does not require an adapter and clearly works with the iMac. The task of opening a late-model iMac and getting it back together is almost unbelievably tedious. It requires literally completely disassembling the entire computer to get to the M.2 connector and then reassembling its interior just to get to the most nerve-wracking part of all, installing the adhesive strips and getting the screen closed on the first try. Mess up on that and there's no trying it a second time until after you've gotten an entire new set of strips, which would leave you without use of your computer for several days. For no amount of money would I try to jury-rig any SSD requiring an adapter, because that always carries an increased risk of having to take the iMac apart again. Speaking personally, I'd rather be tied to a post and bullwhipped than to do that job a second time, especially if I had to do it myself; I find that reattaching the screen is best accomplished by two people working together. If someone is in a household with a cuss jar that requires dropping a dollar into it for every profanity that slips one's lips, he would go broke trying to do this part of the job without an assistant.
If you've done it several times, it's a bit of a different story, but for anyone cracking open a 2019 iMac for the first time, it ain't for sissies.

Once done, the replacement of the 1TB Fusion drive with a PCIe NVMe SSD is marvelously gratifying, but God help me if I had to repeat that process because problems were encountered with a Samsung drive.

 

[TechMedia UK]

It's a little difficult for me to believe that the cost saving of buying a Samsung 970 and the adapter, then scrounging all over for the adhesive strips, and possibly the special tools needed, is worth the hassle. I did my 2019 iMac upgrade with an OWC 1TB Aura Pro that does not require an adapter and clearly works with the iMac. The task of opening a late-model iMac and getting it back together is almost unbelievably tedious. It requires literally completely disassembling the entire computer to get to the M.2 connector and then reassembling its interior just to get to the most nerve-wracking part of all, installing the adhesive strips and getting the screen closed on the first try. Mess up on that and there's no trying it a second time until after you've gotten an entire new set of strips, which would leave you without use of your computer for several days. For no amount of money would I try to jury-rig any SSD requiring an adapter, because that always carries an increased risk of having to take the iMac apart again. Speaking personally, I'd rather be tied to a post and bullwhipped than to do that job a second time, especially if I had to do it myself; I find that reattaching the screen is best accomplished by two people working together. If someone is in a household with a cuss jar that requires dropping a dollar into it for every profanity that slips one's lips, he would go broke trying to do this part of the job without an assistant.
If you've done it several times, it's a bit of a different story, but for anyone cracking open a 2019 iMac for the first time, it ain't for sissies.

Once done, the replacement of the 1TB Fusion drive with a PCIe NVMe SSD is marvelously gratifying, but God help me if I had to repeat that process because problems were encountered with a Samsung drive.

I remember the stress of doing the first one but each of the required parts and special tools are very cheap making the whole job very worthwhile, well worth getting a couple of sets of adhesive for how little they cost.

As noted with my first post I did have some problems with the Samsung 970EVO Plus but all straightened out now and working great. IMO although it is one of the fastest NVMe's available I do think there are some compatibility issues and I wouldn't choose another one, I've done three 2019 27" iMac's last week and although all systems were identical one of them simply would not work with the Samsung drive but was perfectly fine with a Kingston one.

I'm sure it's obvious to everyone that running the system for a little while at least before sealing up screen is a very good idea. There's no problem at all in running the system with a little masking tape around the screen until you're happy its all working properly.

 

[Johnny Jackhammer]

Does anyone knows which NVMe standards are on iMac 27 2019? 3.0 or 4.0. The reason I'm asking is for the fact there are some options with NVMe 4.0 with read/write speed of 6000MB/s + out there. But if Apple bus doesn't support such speeds makes no sense the extra $$.

Very late, but for posterity... NVMe 4.0 is backwards compatible with 3.0

 

[Johnny Jackhammer]

I remember the stress of doing the first one but each of the required parts and special tools are very cheap making the whole job very worthwhile, well worth getting a couple of sets of adhesive for how little they cost.

As noted with my first post I did have some problems with the Samsung 970EVO Plus but all straightened out now and working great. IMO although it is one of the fastest NVMe's available I do think there are some compatibility issues and I wouldn't choose another one, I've done three 2019 27" iMac's last week and although all systems were identical one of them simply would not work with the Samsung drive but was perfectly fine with a Kingston one.

I'm sure it's obvious to everyone that running the system for a little while at least before sealing up screen is a very good idea. There's no problem at all in running the system with a little masking tape around the screen until you're happy its all working properly.

I bought the Sintech NGFF adapter and the Samsung 980 Pro SSD. My boot times are 4- 5 minutes and I am getting random system file crashes. It boots... and runs but something is just not right. Going back to the Apple/Samsung SSD that came with the computer and it boots in one minute flat and no random beachballing or processes crashing.