That's great news. Thanks for reporting back.
Make sure that the drive is seen as x4 in system report/nvme and trim is enabled. Other than that, nothing else to do.
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Macbook air 2017 SSD Compatibility with Samsung SSD
- Thread starter enarida
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Make sure that the drive is seen as x4 in system report/nvme and trim is enabled. Other than that, nothing else to do.
You're good to go. No additional steps are required. I have the same bootrom on my early2015 MBA.
I want to upgrade the wife's 256gb MBA 2015 to 1tb. She's been taking a lot of photos 
Thinking of going Intel660p (cheap and low power). Only thing I'm confused about is which exact converter to get??
Kind of of a lot of options out there (multiple sintech versions too).
Thinking of going Intel660p (cheap and low power). Only thing I'm confused about is which exact converter to get??
Kind of of a lot of options out there (multiple sintech versions too).
Get the short black Sintech. I use the same adapter in a MacBook Air 2017 with no issues.I want to upgrade the wife's 256gb MBA 2015 to 1tb. She's been taking a lot of photos
Thinking of going Intel660p (cheap and low power). Only thing I'm confused about is which exact converter to get??
Kind of of a lot of options out there (multiple sintech versions too).
Hi all.
I have an MBA of 2015, I would like to go from 128 to 500 GB.
After reading this and other threads of this site, I am between buying the "ADATA SX8200" or the "Samsung 970 Evo".
I consider myself capable of following an installation tutorial, but before any eventuality, it would be me and not the machine that would panic.
I would like to ask you which of these devices would be more user friendly (plug and play), when installing and which adapter sintech would be appropriate.
Thank you very much, and forgive my poor English.
I have an MBA of 2015, I would like to go from 128 to 500 GB.
After reading this and other threads of this site, I am between buying the "ADATA SX8200" or the "Samsung 970 Evo".
I consider myself capable of following an installation tutorial, but before any eventuality, it would be me and not the machine that would panic.
I would like to ask you which of these devices would be more user friendly (plug and play), when installing and which adapter sintech would be appropriate.
Thank you very much, and forgive my poor English.
Thank you
In the end I opted for the Adata sx8200 pro, although it does not arrive until the end of the month, as soon as I mount it I will report results ...
Well after days of reading and researching what SSD/adapter combination to put into both my MacBook Air 2017 (13 inch, bootrom 182.0.0.0.0) and my MacBook Air 2014 (11 inch, bootrom 110.0.0.0.0), and weighing up the issues of battery life, i've decided to have an aneurysm.
But seriously, it is quite confusing. I'm a 38yo career software developer, so I shouldn't have trouble with these sorts of things, but apart from the information on the first post of that infamous 160+ page thread about upgrading, it's difficult to isolate a consensus.
It seems the best option is to go with Sintech adapters, but all of their listings (website and ebay) don't mention compatibility with 2017 MBA. Also, between the short black one, the short green one, and the long black one, I think it's the short black one that sucks? Throughout different posts I have seen different people endorsing ALL of them, and different people saying each of them has issues.
As far as the SSDs are concerned, it seems to be either get a fast one that sucks battery, or a slower one that doesn't. I'm looking at the ADATA SX8200 Pro, since that is what a bunch of MBA 2017 owners have said they are using. For the MBA 2014 I am looking at something that will perhaps be friendlier to the battery.
And regarding the bootrom issue for earlier models, and the associated sleep/hibernate/etc issue, and how to overcome that, i'm not sure what to do. The link at the bottom of the first post in that big 160+ page thread goes to a post that says there are 4 options, one of which is software based, and that it does not work on the MBA 2014.
After everything, I just have to say I have a lot of respect for you guys that continue to work with this issue and help people out. I'm used to rabbit holes when working with technology (flashing roms, rootkits, jailbreaking, etc) but i guess getting older my brain starts losing control when I have 40 chrome tabs open cross referencing information and product listings.
Anyway, if there's any general consensus you can give for my two laptops specifically, where the battery life will not be too bad, please let me know.
But seriously, it is quite confusing. I'm a 38yo career software developer, so I shouldn't have trouble with these sorts of things, but apart from the information on the first post of that infamous 160+ page thread about upgrading, it's difficult to isolate a consensus.
It seems the best option is to go with Sintech adapters, but all of their listings (website and ebay) don't mention compatibility with 2017 MBA. Also, between the short black one, the short green one, and the long black one, I think it's the short black one that sucks? Throughout different posts I have seen different people endorsing ALL of them, and different people saying each of them has issues.
As far as the SSDs are concerned, it seems to be either get a fast one that sucks battery, or a slower one that doesn't. I'm looking at the ADATA SX8200 Pro, since that is what a bunch of MBA 2017 owners have said they are using. For the MBA 2014 I am looking at something that will perhaps be friendlier to the battery.
And regarding the bootrom issue for earlier models, and the associated sleep/hibernate/etc issue, and how to overcome that, i'm not sure what to do. The link at the bottom of the first post in that big 160+ page thread goes to a post that says there are 4 options, one of which is software based, and that it does not work on the MBA 2014.
After everything, I just have to say I have a lot of respect for you guys that continue to work with this issue and help people out. I'm used to rabbit holes when working with technology (flashing roms, rootkits, jailbreaking, etc) but i guess getting older my brain starts losing control when I have 40 chrome tabs open cross referencing information and product listings.
Anyway, if there's any general consensus you can give for my two laptops specifically, where the battery life will not be too bad, please let me know.
In MBP thread page #1, it has been updated with clear info. See the link below.
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/upgrading-2013-2014-macbook-pro-ssd-to-m-2-nvme.2034976/
The Sintech adapter (green, short black, long black) with work in any Air from mid-2013 to 2017 and Pro from late 2013 to 2015. The earlier short, black adapters had issues but the latest revisions do not.
Every nvme drive will have more battery drain than an original Apple SSD.
You could look at the Intel 660p or Crucial P1 for lower battery drain but you'll get slower read/write speeds.
You will need a bootrom programmer in order to flash a modded bios with the updated nvme driver for any pre-2015 Air or Pro. There is no way to flash a modded bootrom using software to any MacBook.
Okay I am going to pull the trigger for my two MBA: MacBook Air 2017 (13 inch, bootrom 182.0.0.0.0) and my MacBook Air 2014 (11 inch, bootrom 110.0.0.0.0).
Going with the ASX8200NP-480GT-C for both as per link here:
https://www.amazon.com.au/gp/product/B07BLMP9ZT/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=A2HTUOACWL5U51&psc=1
and the ST-NGFF2013 Sintech adapter in the link here:
http://eshop.sintech.cn/ngff-m2-pcie-ssd-card-as-2013-2014-2015-macbook-ssd-p-1139.html
I've done a Blackmagic Speet Test on both laptops with current SSD's which are attached, and will post results along with results for the new SSD's when it's ready.
Could take a while for the adapters to be delivered to Australia.
Going with the ASX8200NP-480GT-C for both as per link here:
https://www.amazon.com.au/gp/product/B07BLMP9ZT/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=A2HTUOACWL5U51&psc=1
and the ST-NGFF2013 Sintech adapter in the link here:
http://eshop.sintech.cn/ngff-m2-pcie-ssd-card-as-2013-2014-2015-macbook-ssd-p-1139.html
I've done a Blackmagic Speet Test on both laptops with current SSD's which are attached, and will post results along with results for the new SSD's when it's ready.
Could take a while for the adapters to be delivered to Australia.
Just wanted to post an update to my last report about using a Sintech adapter and an Intel 760p. It's still going strong with no kernel panics or issues with sleep. Power consumption does seem to be up a bit, but I haven't done extensive testing on battery life. For the most part, I'm usually tethered to a wall outlet (~80% of the time) so it's hard to judge. And it's hard to ensure consistent power usage across multiple uses.
But I'm very happy with the upgrade. The ability to upgrade the SSD is one of the primary reasons I went with a 2017 MBA instead of the 2018 model, along with keyboard concerns. I only wish I could also upgrade to 16GB of RAM.
But I'm very happy with the upgrade. The ability to upgrade the SSD is one of the primary reasons I went with a 2017 MBA instead of the 2018 model, along with keyboard concerns. I only wish I could also upgrade to 16GB of RAM.
Well I put the SX8200 into the 2017 MacBook Air 13inch and started up with USB bootable drive, and it found the disk in Disk Utilities, and so I erased it and formatted as MacOS Extended (Journaled), and then went to installation. Upon restarting it just went to the screen with options for installation, disk util, restore from time machine, etc, and when looking for the drive in disk util it now no longer exists.
Restarting either loops back to this same screen with the four options, or shows an error screen saying to press a button to restart.
The latest installation on the Air was Mojave 10.14.5, and so is the USB. The boot loader was 186.0.0.0.0
I cannot find any advice on when this happens, most of the google searches say the drive is dead, but it's brand new and is more likely an issue with format not being recognised and therefore not showing up in disk util.
Any suggestions?
Restarting either loops back to this same screen with the four options, or shows an error screen saying to press a button to restart.
The latest installation on the Air was Mojave 10.14.5, and so is the USB. The boot loader was 186.0.0.0.0
I cannot find any advice on when this happens, most of the google searches say the drive is dead, but it's brand new and is more likely an issue with format not being recognised and therefore not showing up in disk util.
Any suggestions?
Okay quick follow up, the USB i was using was formatted as MacOS Extended (Journaled) but it appears that the NVME drive was formatted as APFS. When restarting with the USB bootable in the machine, it would take me to the menu with four options, and when I selected Disk Utility, it would not display the drive, and restarting would have error loops, as mentioned previously.
When I removed the USB and rebooted holding Command+R it took me to the same four options, but this time looking in Disk Utility showed me the drive and that it's format was APFS. From there I erased it and reformatted as APFS again, and then went back to the main four options menu and selected Reinstall MacOS.
It now has the proper installation screen and is progressing. So, I guess It is installing from the local version of Mojave, which is stored permanently on the machine.
I believe the issue was trying to install onto Mac's new APFS format from a USB that had MacOS Extended (Journaled). This is evident also because when the screen with the four options would pop up starting from the USB, the background of the four options was temporarily black and had rainbow artefacts, before going to the normal grey. When restarting with Command+Q without the USB in, it did not.
Fingers crossed this was the issue. I will report back.
[doublepost=1559461137][/doublepost]For anyone in the future reading this also, i'd like to point out that the small green sintech adapter did not line up with the screw hole at first. You have to make sure the adapter is firmly all the way into the port on the motherboard. To do this I inserted the adapter first, without the new nvme drive, and then put the drive in after. For reference I used this one: http://eshop.sintech.cn/ngff-m2-pcie-ssd-card-as-2013-2014-2015-macbook-ssd-p-1143.html
Some keywords for people searching this thread: adata sx8200 ASX8200NP-480GT-C sintech adapter screw hole align misaligned nvme doesn't fit ssd apfs macos extended journaled missing hard not found drive disk util utility
When I removed the USB and rebooted holding Command+R it took me to the same four options, but this time looking in Disk Utility showed me the drive and that it's format was APFS. From there I erased it and reformatted as APFS again, and then went back to the main four options menu and selected Reinstall MacOS.
It now has the proper installation screen and is progressing. So, I guess It is installing from the local version of Mojave, which is stored permanently on the machine.
I believe the issue was trying to install onto Mac's new APFS format from a USB that had MacOS Extended (Journaled). This is evident also because when the screen with the four options would pop up starting from the USB, the background of the four options was temporarily black and had rainbow artefacts, before going to the normal grey. When restarting with Command+Q without the USB in, it did not.
Fingers crossed this was the issue. I will report back.
[doublepost=1559461137][/doublepost]For anyone in the future reading this also, i'd like to point out that the small green sintech adapter did not line up with the screw hole at first. You have to make sure the adapter is firmly all the way into the port on the motherboard. To do this I inserted the adapter first, without the new nvme drive, and then put the drive in after. For reference I used this one: http://eshop.sintech.cn/ngff-m2-pcie-ssd-card-as-2013-2014-2015-macbook-ssd-p-1143.html
Some keywords for people searching this thread: adata sx8200 ASX8200NP-480GT-C sintech adapter screw hole align misaligned nvme doesn't fit ssd apfs macos extended journaled missing hard not found drive disk util utility
Well looks like the issue is still there. It seems intermittent, but when it gets to the restart part of the installation it reboots and comes up with a black screen with multiple languages saying that it had to restart because of a problem.
This time the drive is there and it says it has 11.74gb space used so i guess it's getting part way through the installation each time and failing at some point. I'll give it another go and see how far it gets.
This time the drive is there and it says it has 11.74gb space used so i guess it's getting part way through the installation each time and failing at some point. I'll give it another go and see how far it gets.
The place where I bought my MBA is an official Apple Reseller and they themselves offered to upgrade my SSD, I can just purchase it myself and pay some insignificant amount for them to assemble it. At least the warranty won't be void.
Hi All!
I've recently replaced my original Samsung 128Gb SSD on MacBook Air 13' (Early 2015) with Sabrent Rocket 512Gb via Sintech adapter green. Honestly, I've really expected something more with performance. I don't know what to say else...I little bit disappointed. Hope, my battery life and degradation will remain at the same level.
I've recently replaced my original Samsung 128Gb SSD on MacBook Air 13' (Early 2015) with Sabrent Rocket 512Gb via Sintech adapter green. Honestly, I've really expected something more with performance. I don't know what to say else...I little bit disappointed. Hope, my battery life and degradation will remain at the same level.
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