TRIM question

[Peter Franks]

A couple of questions please

If my 500GB SSD is already at 430GB full, is setting TRIM now a waste of time, Should it be done when drive is fairly empty?

Secondly is it risky to set TRIM on the Samsung Evo 860 SATA now, while it is so full, can it damage anything on the drive?

Reason I’m asking all this is because the SSD was a huge breath of fresh air a couple of years ago, but doesn’t seem so immediate to me now. It's not awful but doesn't seem as smooth and quick as it once was.

Thanks for any help

 

[Weaselboy]

There is no harm in turning on TRIM now and it won't hurt a thing. Of the hundreds and hundreds of posts here from people turning on TRIM, I cannot remember even one where that caused a problem.

I would turn on TRIM then run Disk Utility first aid and that will TRIM the drive (assuming you are on a newer macOS version).

 

[Peter Franks]

Thanks Weasel, I've gone back to Sierra, from High Sierra. But older MBP
Should I notice a difference or ...

 

[Weaselboy]

Thanks Weasel, I've gone back to Sierra, from High Sierra. But older MBP
Should I notice a difference or ...

You may notice an increase in write speeds after you turn on TRIM. Running without TRIM can over time cause write speeds to drop.

 

[S.B.G]

Just as an example of what happens when TRIM isn't enabled....

I had a 2010 iMac where I took the HDD out and put in a Samsung SSD. Back then we had to use third-party TRIM utilities to enable it since Apple didn't support it on non-Apple SSD's. After a few years Apple finally allowed us to enable TRIM from OS X.

sudo trimforce enable

Fast-forward a few years from there and I gave that iMac to my parents and I still maintain it with updates and backups when I visit them. A few months ago my dad called and told me that the iMac was running at a snail's pace and wasn't sure why. I recalled I did a macOS update the last time I was there and forgot to re-enable TRIM afterwards. So I initiated a remote session with my dad on the iMac and I launched a terminal, entered the command and rebooted.

I called him a day or two later and asked how the iMac was running and he told me it was back to normal again.

Moral of the story is on older Mac's with non-Apple SSD's, you have to remember to re-enable TRIM after performing OS updates or it will eventually slow down until it's unusable.

 

[Peter Franks]

You may notice an increase in write speeds after you turn on TRIM. Running without TRIM can over time cause write speeds to drop.

Thank you. I wonder how much longer it will take without it! Must sort

Just as an example of what happens when TRIM isn't enabled....

I had a 2010 iMac where I took the HDD out and put in a Samsung SSD. Back then we had to use third-party TRIM utilities to enable it since Apple didn't support it on non-Apple SSD's. After a few years Apple finally allowed us to enable TRIM from OS X.

sudo trimforce enable

Fast-forward a few years from there and I gave that iMac to my parents and I still maintain it with updates and backups when I visit them. A few months ago my dad called and told me that the iMac was running at a snail's pace and wasn't sure why. I recalled I did a macOS update the last time I was there and forgot to re-enable TRIM afterwards. So I initiated a remote session with my dad on the iMac and I launched a terminal, entered the command and rebooted.

I called him a day or two later and asked how the iMac was running and he told me it was back to normal again.

Moral of the story is on older Mac's with non-Apple SSD's, you have to remember to re-enable TRIM after performing OS updates or it will eventually slow down until it's unusable.

Wow, I didn't realise it had that much of an effect on it, My SSD must be couple of years without it by now, Is that coding good to just put in terminal on 'Sierra'. I still see a lot of that 3rd party stuff for TRIM, but that code will work OK?

Thanks for that. So TRIM is not a permanent thing on an SSD then, it gets wiped.

 

[S.B.G]

Thank you. I wonder how much longer it will take without it! Must sort



Wow, I didn't realise it had that much of an effect on it, My SSD must be couple of years without it by now, Is that coding good to just put in terminal on 'Sierra'. I still see a lot of that 3rd party stuff for TRIM, but that code will work OK?

Thanks for that. So TRIM is not a permanent thing on an SSD then, it gets wiped.

Yeah, that's the Apple command to turn TRIM on or off. Third-party apps will still work just fine too.

Of course this only affects non-Apple SSD's. If you ever have a Mac with an SSD that came from Apple, you will never have to go through this process as they take care of it automatically in the OS.

 

[Peter Franks]

Yeah, that's the Apple command to turn TRIM on or off. Third-party apps will still work just fine too.

Of course this only affects non-Apple SSD's. If you ever have a Mac with an SSD that came from Apple, you will never have to go through this process as they take care of it automatically in the OS.

Thank you, I will do that this weekend, and see if I notice a change, I gather it would probably be a couple of days after before you would notice. They say some of these drives from 3rd party come with TRIM, but I assume if you overwrite with an OS it would wipe it anyway so don't get why those do?

 

[Weaselboy]

I gather it would probably be a couple of days after before you would notice.

Like I mentioned, after you enable TRIM, do a Disk Util disk repair (first aid) and on newer versions of macOS, that will TRIM the drive.

On older versions you can do it from single user mode by booting with command-s. This will boot to a command line where you can enter "fsck -fy" (without the quotes). That will TRIM the drive. Then type reboot to restart.

 

[Peter Franks]

Thank you.