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has anyone tried a SSD as your boot drive?

R

rassoodock

macrumors member
Original poster
Jan 22, 2007
77
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Has anyone tried a SSD as your boot drive? I hear that they are MUCH faster, but perhaps do not have as long a lifespan. Solid State drives are completely new to me, so I'm hoping someone with a history with them can speak from experience.

Any insight most appreciated. Thanks!
 
Hey man! It's great your in the market for an SSD and I totally understand your concern on the life span. As it turns out SSD has a smaller chance of failing on you due to the fact that there are no moving parts inside. An SSD depending on the use you give it, can last you around 5 + years :)

I have 4 SSDs and I have had them for about 3 years now and I havent had any problems whatsoever. I myself, use these just to boot operating systems. Not for storage due to the smaller capacity. But a mechanical drive has a much higher chance to die or fail on you much sooner than an SSD. I say if you have the $$$, go for it. I personally use Toshiba,Samsung, and OWC SSDs.

Hope this helped you,
Feel free to hit me up if you have any questions. I'd be more than happy to discuss a little more :):apple:
 
I think just about everyone but you has at this point. 3 years ago this was a normal question. Today, well you're behind the times.

Just but one, you'll be astounded.
 
Had a 2Tb drive in my 2009 Mac Pro for everything. Recently bought a 240Gb SSD, which is now the boot drive. Bit of a hassle having things on two drives now, but the Mac is running LOTS faster.

It's worth doing. A 240Gb SSD is getting close to $200 these days. Do a search on Amazon for 240 SSD and you'll see a bunch of options. Buy from there, or whatever other place that you choose.

Mounting in the Mac is an issue - you'll need a suitable bracket. If you have a 2009 or 2010 Mac Pro then you can get one from OWC.
 
So I'm guessing that the way to go is to have the OS, applications and supporting files on the SSD and all data on others drives? That sounds about right to me, but perhaps I'm missing something.

Not sure what year my Mac is. I know that what I have is a MacPro1,1 with Dual-Core Intel Xeon and 2.66 GHz.

I'll check out OWC and see what I can find.
 
OWC is a total ripoff in my opinion. Presenting themselves as Apple SSD's.

The most reliable SSD's are Intel's and Crucial's.

But whatever you do, do not buy OCZ.
 
Fitting guide

Hey rassoodock,

I've not fitted an SSD in my 2006 Mac Pro as I'm saving up for a 2012 model (hopefully) but there are fitting guides here:

http://macperformanceguide.com/Mac-InstallingSSD.html

I think 2006 - 2008 model owners have a slightly trickier time fitting an SSD and as the guide says,

"The Mac Pro models prior to the March 2009 Nehalem are not pre-wired in the optical bay for SATA. You’ll need to route a SATA cable from the motherboard into the lower optical bay, and also use a power splitter/adapter cable for the right plug to provide power to the drive."

So you'll need to check inside but I have a feeling there isn't a spare SATA cable and power supply, so you may need to look at ordering these also once you've opened the case for a quick nose around.

As for which SSD to order - tricky. Remember this is a SATA II (3Gbit) based system so if you buy a SATA III (6Gbit) SSD you can't run it at full speed, thus you might find buying a SATA II based SSD saves you some money.

Whatever SSD you end up thinking of buying, go for a quick Google search for reviews, reliability, etc... before adding it to the basket.

All the best.
 
I got one for my 15" MBP and planning on upgrading my other macs.
Boot up is very fast, 20 seconds, wheel spins 3/4 of a turn, instead of 10-15 times, at the grey boot screen.
Applications open in a flash and its completely quiet. A real pleasure. I also get an extra hour of battery life which is awesome :)
Its definetly worth it.
As others have pointed out a HDD has a much higher chance of failing then an SSD especially in laptops.
 
rassoodock said:
So I'm guessing that the way to go is to have the OS, applications and supporting files on the SSD and all data on others drives? That sounds about right to me, but perhaps I'm missing something.
Click to expand...
You are missing something. All your files would be as slow to open or save as they are now, and you would only gain on application opening, which usually only happens once per reboot.
 
The SSD is one of the best purchases I made.

Right now, Crucial M4 SSD just dropped in price, it's a good time to buy.
 
I bought my SSD from crucial (from UK - took 2 weeks but no tax paid - they probably opened it up and couldnt be bothered - i did pay for season 7 24 from amazon uk tax so maybe they have a data base of how much import tax one pays and let people off!).

Anyhoo - i bought same time as the mac pro and never used the MP with the supplied 1tb boot drive - so havent been able to compare speed difference, however, comparing it to my 5200rpm mbp drive / load time, it is super quick - around 5-10 secs to boot up, apps open within 2 seconds, bar final cut, adobe apps (upto 10 secs - this IS NOT GOOD ENOUGH!:mad:)

The only thing you have to keep an eye on, is sometimes ive found Final cut writing render files and other apps writing to the boot when ive set the home directory on the 1tb stock drive - not really major issue (fcp needed its prefs trashed).

go for it - the great thing about having the mp, is that you can have a cheap ssd thats used for READING and a cheap 3.5 drive for WRITING / data etc..
 
no question the the owc pcie is fast. but it is 879 for 480gb.

the crucial would allow you to raid0 2x 512gb ssds total of 1tb for 800. vs 480 gb for 879. speeds would be close i know many say raid0 is risky but he could do a

{(ssd + ssd raid0) + ( 1tb hdd ) } raid 1
 
philipma1957 said:
no question the the owc pcie is fast. but it is 879 for 480gb.

the crucial would allow you to raid0 2x 512gb ssds total of 1tb for 800. vs 480 gb for 879. speeds would be close i know many say raid0 is risky but he could do a

{(ssd + ssd raid0) + ( 1tb hdd ) } raid 1
Click to expand...

That would be extremely stupid. Never combine HDD and SSD in a RAID.

Better solution:
2 512 SSD's in RAID-0, and a Time Machine (1TB HDD) as backup.

Same results, but no HDD+SSD-RAID
 
Muldert said:
That would be extremely stupid. Never combine HDD and SSD in a RAID.

Better solution:
2 512 SSD's in RAID-0, and a Time Machine (1TB HDD) as backup.

Same results, but no HDD+SSD-RAID
Click to expand...

not to argue why is it stupid?

it is a nested software raid. I am thinking it should maintain ssd speeds when reading but I may be wrong.




if it works lousy he can do your method and run a clone schedule each night of the raid0.
 
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