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otosan

macrumors 6502
Aug 9, 2010
303
187
Perhaps this one:

With the adapter I showed you before, be my best choice?

It's half price right now, compared to everwhere else in Denmark.
Yes, that exactly the one am talking about.

350Kr should be a good price as well.
 
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otosan

macrumors 6502
Aug 9, 2010
303
187
Mate you are the best ... wow ... thank you 🙏🏻

My old machine was a 2014, I bought it with the higher drive spec (but lower ram spec, medium cpu specs) - yes :)
It's this drive that I'm thinking of swapping over into the 2015.

I can open it up monday / tuesday when the 2015 arrives :)

This is the data I have for it now, running on the 2014.
I'm shocked how slow it seems to be compared to what I remembered:
w:107 r:150 in black magic 😱

I seem to remember it running around w:780 r:720

It does not FEEL that slow:
Can it be a catalina thing?
Or can the drive be worn out?

Then I def rather stay on the 250 gb that is in or get a new drive.

Ohh man if I could get that NVME here in Denmark at that price it would def be worth considering if the speed is much higher :) ... 60 usd is 440 DDK yes ...
107 & 150 ?? Wow, that is practically an SSHD, not SSD level of performance. Even SATA drive are averaging around 400 - 550. Haha

either your drive is full, or it really reach it's age already. Although a full wipe and clean install might refresh it's performance
 
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otosan

macrumors 6502
Aug 9, 2010
303
187
Mate you are the best ... wow ... thank you 🙏🏻

My old machine was a 2014, I bought it with the higher drive spec (but lower ram spec, medium cpu specs) - yes :)
It's this drive that I'm thinking of swapping over into the 2015.

I can open it up monday / tuesday when the 2015 arrives :)

This is the data I have for it now, running on the 2014.
I'm shocked how slow it seems to be compared to what I remembered:
w:107 r:150 in black magic 😱

I seem to remember it running around w:780 r:720

It does not FEEL that slow:
Can it be a catalina thing?
Or can the drive be worn out?

Then I def rather stay on the 250 gb that is in or get a new drive.

Ohh man if I could get that NVME here in Denmark at that price it would def be worth considering if the speed is much higher :) ... 60 usd is 440 DDK yes ...
Btw,

based on the serial,

Yould 2014 drive is :

Apple Gen.3A
Either SSUAX - Samsung or Marvell Controller
That's an AHCI Protocol drive
Run on PCI 2.0x2 Interface

with theoritical max speed around 750
 
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Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
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34
The drive is only half full ...

I have the same problem with my late 2013 imac.
Here i boot from an external thunderbolt ssd.
It's a 250 gb Transcend StoreJet 500.

It only scores W 315,5 R:331.6
I'm sure this was around 5 - 600 as well.

None of the machines feels slower than they used to be though.
Can it be a software reading error somehow?

Or what can be going on? ... both machines feel snappy and fast enough ... does not feel like they have become slower over time.
 

Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
34
If I can run the 2015 macbook around 750 that might be okay ... but if it runs at 107 / 150; then I'm def buying this new drive.

I might anyways, I guess 1500/1400 will be a nice upgrade no matter what I do.

Should I find a new drive for the late 2013 imac as well?

Perhaps they are both worn out?
 

otosan

macrumors 6502
Aug 9, 2010
303
187
The drive is only half full ...

I have the same problem with my late 2013 imac.
Here i boot from an external thunderbolt ssd.
It's a 250 gb Transcend StoreJet 500.

It only scores W 315,5 R:331.6
I'm sure this was around 5 - 600 as well.

None of the machines feels slower than they used to be though.
Can it be a software reading error somehow?

Or what can be going on? ... both machines feel snappy and fast enough ... does not feel like they have become slower over time.
I guess it's due for a clean install, hahaha.

Especially if you've been updating from much older OS version, up until latest version. Sometimes something just messed up.

When you downgrading from BigSur, did you wipe the drive clean ? Because installing older OS on top of BigSur and Monterey is a big no no. Even when you wipe, wiping only volumes (instead of full disk) also a big no no.

Btw, here's the average performance comparison between your old 512GB drive with the Exceria 500GB : https://ssd.userbenchmark.com/Compa...-500GB-vs-Apple-SM0512F-500GB/m1220387vsm9630

and here's the estimated comparison with the 256GB from the 2015 model :

the exceria result in that page is lower than what i normally get on my customers macbook btw
 
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otosan

macrumors 6502
Aug 9, 2010
303
187
The drive is only half full ...

I have the same problem with my late 2013 imac.
Here i boot from an external thunderbolt ssd.
It's a 250 gb Transcend StoreJet 500.

It only scores W 315,5 R:331.6
I'm sure this was around 5 - 600 as well.

None of the machines feels slower than they used to be though.
Can it be a software reading error somehow?

Or what can be going on? ... both machines feel snappy and fast enough ... does not feel like they have become slower over time.
Your late 2013 iMac, was it bought with fusion drive ? or pure HDD ?

if it was fusion drive, it can use the very same drive as your 2014 and 2015 macbook pro,

but if it was on HDD only, just bought a SATA III SSD (like Samsung EVO 870, or Crucial PX500 or any other brand available for good price in Denmark)
 
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Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
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I guess it's due for a clean install, hahaha.

Especially if you've been updating from much older OS version, up until latest version. Sometimes something just messed up.

When you downgrading from BigSur, did you wipe the drive clean ? Because installing older OS on top of BigSur and Monterey is a big no no. Even when you wipe, wiping only volumes (instead of full disk) also a big no no.

Btw, here's the average performance comparison between your old 512GB drive with the Exceria 500GB : https://ssd.userbenchmark.com/Compa...-500GB-vs-Apple-SM0512F-500GB/m1220387vsm9630

and here's the estimated comparison with the 256GB from the 2015 model :

the exceria result in that page is lower than what i normally get on my customers macbook btw
I think I wiped the drive clean and reinstalled, but I might just have wiped the volume actually.
The wierd thing is that it does not feel slower than it used to.

Same with the imac.

I could also consider just living with the new 250 gb, that seems almost as fastast as the Kioxia (25% slower).

Then again I could also upgrade to a 1GB then it would really be worth it.

Is this the same just bigger and will it work the same?
 
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Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
34
Your late 2013 iMac, was it bought with fusion drive ? or pure HDD ?

if it was fusion drive, it can use the very same drive as your 2014 and 2015 macbook pro,

but if it was on HDD only, just bought a SATA III SSD (like Samsung EVO 870, or Crucial PX500 or any other brand available for good price in Denmark)
It had a fusion drive, and then the ssd part of it died (like really died, apple could not get it back).

So I bought an extern thunderbolt SSD (transend) and have been booting of that ever since.
This made it much faster than the fusion drive actually ... and it still feels as fast... even though it has a slow thunderbolt bus (PCI speed not PCIe)... Perhaps I should look after a newer imac as well soon.

I guess I could also risk open it up at this point, since it so old I'm not risking that much if it breaks.
And put in etc. the 250 gb ssd from the 2015 or the 500 gb from the 2014 ...

I still have the 1000 gb internal hd from the fusion and that functions fine.
So I don't need as much space on the imac as on the macbook.
 

Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
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Btw I have just run an update and mac cleaner on both machines can that effect the test?
 

otosan

macrumors 6502
Aug 9, 2010
303
187
I think I wiped the drive clean and reinstalled, but I might just have wiped the volume actually.
The wierd thing is that it does not feel slower than it used to.

Same with the imac.

I could also consider just living with the new 250 gb, that seems almost as fastast as the Kioxia (25% slower).

Then again I could also upgrade to a 1GB then it would really be worth it.

Is this the same just bigger and will it work the same?
Yes, that's same drive, just bigger capacity.

Fusion drive will always slower than the pure ssd, it bottlenecked by the slow HDD. Your iMac will be much faster is you format the ssd and the HDD separately instead of fusing it together.

2013 drive have higher tendency of failure btw (especially the 128GB one, and one made by sandisk), most of 2013 and 2014 air and pro that come to my place are due to dead SSD.

So, if you are indeed purchasing the new NVME drive, you can plug one of the old drive to your iMac and set it as a boot drive, while the HDD can act as data/document storage.

And, if you just run an update, YES, that would explain the slower speed, because your mac might still doing the indexing process (spotlight) , that process use a lot of cpu and disk IO.

You might want to check again after like, half an hour.
 
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otosan

macrumors 6502
Aug 9, 2010
303
187
This is what inside your Transcend Storejet 500 btw :

EnON71WRgvNdbD3m.jpeg

RtztPnV1k61Ds0Oh.jpeg

ihJYPH0L10GWZaOS.jpeg

basically a SATAIII SSD (a good one, because it's using MLC NAND, that has higher durability, and DRAM cache), without it's 2,5 inch case. Combined with a thunderbolt/USB 3.0 bridge.

the maximum speed of it should be around 400Mb/s , so you getting 300ish is good enough

You can even disassembly it and plug it inside your iMac on the HDD slot, hahaha. But that would render your 1TB HDD useless. So, no, am not suggesting it. Hahaha
 
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Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
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Yes, that's same drive, just bigger capacity.

Fusion drive will always slower than the pure ssd, it bottlenecked by the slow HDD. Your iMac will be much faster is you format the ssd and the HDD separately instead of fusing it together.

2013 drive have higher tendency of failure btw (especially the 128GB one, and one made by sandisk), most of 2013 and 2014 air and pro that come to my place are due to dead SSD.

So, if you are indeed purchasing the new NVME drive, you can plug one of the old drive to your iMac and set it as a boot drive, while the HDD can act as data/document storage.

And, if you just run an update, YES, that would explain the slower speed, because your mac might still doing the indexing process (spotlight) , that process use a lot of cpu and disk IO.

You might want to check again after like, half an hour.

You are really an amazing and helpful person, thank you so insanely much 🙏🏻
Fusion drive = yes i did that back in the days but then the SSD part died (apple could not fix it) the HDD part of the fusion still goes strong, I use that 1 tb for data.

I'm not sure what to do with the imac, perhaps just replace it with a faster imac in half a year and live with the speed it has now until.

It's not like it feels all that slow to me really.

If I plugged in one of the old drive to my iMac, would that be faster than the external Thunderbolt SSD I boot from now?

Is it worth opening it up myself to put in a diffrent disk? the pcie part of the fusion drive is hidden way deep inside that machine right? ... it's only the SATAIII port that is easy to get to ...

I never dared opening it up myself before ... but at this time where it's so old: "if it breaks it breaks" 😳

----

A more important question:

I think I will buy that 1tb NVME drive and the Adapter.

But I read that the cpu on the 2015 might not work as well with the NVME drive as the original.
Something with the original apple drive being optimized for the cpu?
Is that true and what effect will it have?
 

Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
34
This is what inside your Transcend Storejet 500 btw :

View attachment 2039440
View attachment 2039441
View attachment 2039442
basically a SATAIII SSD (a good one, because it's using MLC NAND, that has higher durability, and DRAM cache), without it's 2,5 inch case. Combined with a thunderbolt/USB 3.0 bridge.

the maximum speed of it should be around 400Mb/s , so you getting 300ish is good enough

You can even disassembly it and plug it inside your iMac on the HDD slot, hahaha. But that would render your 1TB HDD useless. So, no, am not suggesting it. Hahaha
Well I guess I could throw out the old 1 TB HDD and then have this 500 gb and the 500 gb from the 2014 macbook.
That would sort of be enough data...

Then again, the 1000 TB hdd has worked supricingly good as my archive drive :)
It holds everything I'm not working on ... and then it gets backed up to backblaze in case it do die soon.
 

Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
34
Ohh btw I made a mistake it's a Trenscend Store jet 250 not 500 ... it's only 250 gb!

Can I replace the SSD disk inside the Transcend Storejet case with the macbook 500 GB?

What drive is fastest of the two?
 

Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
34
And yeah I'm getting like 325 write / 350 read on the Transend jet right now.
So guess that's good enough.

It does not really feel that slow ... though it's wild to think off the the NVME will be 5 times as fast 😱

This is Quad core CPU though and 16 gb ram imac late 2013 ... guess it should still be faster than the 2015 macbook.
 

otosan

macrumors 6502
Aug 9, 2010
303
187
You are really an amazing and helpful person, thank you so insanely much 🙏🏻
Fusion drive = yes i did that back in the days but then the SSD part died (apple could not fix it) the HDD part of the fusion still goes strong, I use that 1 tb for data.

I'm not sure what to do with the imac, perhaps just replace it with a faster imac in half a year and live with the speed it has now until.

It's not like it feels all that slow to me really.

If I plugged in one of the old drive to my iMac, would that be faster than the external Thunderbolt SSD I boot from now?

Is it worth opening it up myself to put in a diffrent disk? the pcie part of the fusion drive is hidden way deep inside that machine right? ... it's only the SATAIII port that is easy to get to ...

I never dared opening it up myself before ... but at this time where it's so old: "if it breaks it breaks" 😳

----

A more important question:

I think I will buy that 1tb NVME drive and the Adapter.

But I read that the cpu on the 2015 might not work as well with the NVME drive as the original.
Something with the original apple drive being optimized for the cpu?
Is that true and what effect will it have?
mBP 2015 has no issue whatsoever with NVME drive, especially when the BootRom was updated to BigSur/newer version as well.

mBP 2013 & 2014 used to have hibernation/sleep issue with NVME, but that as well, was solved after the BootRom update.

as for your iMac. Since it using PCI 2.0 x 2 Lane, one of the best option is to plug your old 500GB SSD from the mBP 2014,

You will get around 750Mb speed, which is 2x compared to the external solution.

You can also plug another NVME inside, but the performance will still capped around 750Mb (since it only has 2x PCI Lanes) , thus the old macbook SSD is the one most suitable.for the spec.
 
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otosan

macrumors 6502
Aug 9, 2010
303
187
Ohh btw I made a mistake it's a Trenscend Store jet 250 not 500 ... it's only 250 gb!

Can I replace the SSD disk inside the Transcend Storejet case with the macbook 500 GB?

What drive is fastest of the two?
You can't. It use different interface and protocol. You can change it to any other SATA III SSD though, but i dont see any point in doing so. Hahaha
 

otosan

macrumors 6502
Aug 9, 2010
303
187
You are really an amazing and helpful person, thank you so insanely much 🙏🏻
Fusion drive = yes i did that back in the days but then the SSD part died (apple could not fix it) the HDD part of the fusion still goes strong, I use that 1 tb for data.

I'm not sure what to do with the imac, perhaps just replace it with a faster imac in half a year and live with the speed it has now until.

It's not like it feels all that slow to me really.

If I plugged in one of the old drive to my iMac, would that be faster than the external Thunderbolt SSD I boot from now?

Is it worth opening it up myself to put in a diffrent disk? the pcie part of the fusion drive is hidden way deep inside that machine right? ... it's only the SATAIII port that is easy to get to ...

I never dared opening it up myself before ... but at this time where it's so old: "if it breaks it breaks" 😳

----

A more important question:

I think I will buy that 1tb NVME drive and the Adapter.

But I read that the cpu on the 2015 might not work as well with the NVME drive as the original.
Something with the original apple drive being optimized for the cpu?
Is that true and what effect will it have?
The PCI SSD slot is positioned quite deep indeed, facing the backside of the iMac, if you decide to open it, might as well do the cleaning job, and changing the thermal paste of the CPU. Hahaha

Here's the illustration from another forum user (ssdaytona) . He upgrade his iMac using Samsung 970 Pro NVME. And since his iMac is 2015 (the layout is the same though) , he able to get around 2250MBish speed, because 2015 model has PCI 3.0x4 (compared to PCI 2.0x2 in 2013)

imacnvme.jpg


And this is the speed on 2013 iMac using same NVME drive (also from another forum user)

DiskSpeedTest.jpg
 

Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
34
mBP 2015 has no issue whatsoever with NVME drive, especially when the BootRom was updated to BigSur/newer version as well.

mBP 2013 & 2014 used to have hibernation/sleep issue with NVME, but that as well, was solved after the BootRom update.

as for your iMac. Since it using PCI 2.0 x 2 Lane, one of the best option is to plug your old 500GB SSD from the mBP 2014,

You will get around 750Mb speed, which is 2x compared to the external solution.

You can also plug another NVME inside, but the performance will still capped around 750Mb (since it only has 2x PCI Lanes) , thus the old macbook SSD is the one most suitable.for the spec.
Is it hard for myself to open it up and do that.
Sounds like it would be a great solution.

It will give me 2x as fast a boot drive and 2x as much space for os and apps.
 

Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
34
You can't. It use different interface and protocol. You can change it to any other SATA III SSD though, but i dont see any point in doing so. Hahaha
The point could be to create a new data drive to replace the 1000 gb hdd currently inside the imac.

I have a few 1000 gb hdd usb 3 drives but they all make the macbook blackout.
This thunderbolt just run perfect ...
 

Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
34
Hard is a relative term, hahaha. You need right tool though

this guide will got you covered : https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/iMac+Intel+27-Inch+EMC+2639+Blade+SSD+Replacement/20256
😱 not sure that is realistic ... would be easier to replace the HHD part, with an SSD right?

Think I have to stick with it a year or two more, but perhaps it's fine as it is.
Any little thing I can do though to get a little extra power or speed 😅

EDIT: I don't think I will cut it open myself ... so perhaps I'm already running it as well as it can run without being cut open as I am now from the Transend drive ?


Another option could be to just use the imac as a display with the display port.
Could even do that on the broken imac 2014 ...
But I still think it's quad core is way, way stronger than the dual one in the macbook 2015.. not to mention the dedicated graphic card.
 
Last edited:

Heliotropen

macrumors regular
Original poster
Feb 23, 2016
224
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