Upgrading 2013-2015 Macbook Pro SSD to M.2 NVMe

[GaatGaat]

Upgraded my Mac with a much larger size SSD. Original I have a 256GB but running out of space. Read this thread and hours of YouTube videos to have this done but worth it. Thanks for this post and those contributed to this post.

MacOS version: Big Sur 11.6.1
Mac: MacBook Pro Mid 2014 15"
Processor: Intel Core i7 2.2 GHz Quad-Core
Boot ROM Version: 432.40.8.0.1
SSD: Samsung SSD 980 1TB + Sintech long adapter (direct purchase from Sintech, waited for 28 days to arrive)
SSD speeds in BlackMagic benchmark Read 940 MB/s , Write 1150 MB/s
SSD temperatures - very steady around 37-38 C

 

[xanderx007]

That´s not thunderbolt . That´s USB. In our laptops , USB is just 3.0. I meant that maybe would be faster a thunderbolt with a Thunderbolt 3 to 2 adapter.

Yes, I know, but just to clarify, 2015 15" laptops do have thunderbolt 2.0, but we don't have anything for it for data transfer (I did try doing a TB network connection between two MBPs, my current one and an older 2011, which had the dreaded dGPU meltdown issue).

Even if you use a TB enclosure on a 2015, the data transfer speed would still be just USB 3.0.

 

[seyyah]

I run my macbookPro12,1 with wd sn550 as daily driver almost 10 months without issue. I am using ssdpmenabler (thanks to kvic): idle energy assumption is 0,17 to 0,20. Stability is primary for me, so juice is secondary. I read a lot of message in this thread now I'm confused about to update to monterey.

What is your suggestions about to update?

 

[xanderx007]

Upgraded my Mac with a much larger size SSD. Original I have a 256GB but running out of space. Read this thread and hours of YouTube videos to have this done but worth it. Thanks for this post and those contributed to this post.

MacOS version: Big Sur 11.6.1
Mac: MacBook Pro Mid 2014 15"
Processor: Intel Core i7 2.2 GHz Quad-Core
Boot ROM Version: 432.40.8.0.1
SSD: Samsung SSD 980 1TB + Sintech long adapter (direct purchase from Sintech, waited for 28 days to arrive)
SSD speeds in BlackMagic benchmark Read & Write around 800 to 980MB/s
SSD temperatures - very steady around 37-38 C

That's rather <slow>.

 

[GaatGaat]

That's rather <slow>.

Yes is slower than other SSD. Just ran a few tests. Slightly increased, updated my post to show the current speed.

 

[xanderx007]

I run my macbookPro12,1 with wd sn550 as daily driver almost 10 months without issue. I am using ssdpmenabler (thanks to kvic): idle energy assumption is 0,17 to 0,20. Stability is primary for me, so juice is secondary. I read a lot of message in this thread now I'm confused about to update to monterey.

What is your suggestions about to update?

Rule of Thumb: If it ain't broken, don't fix it.

 

[0134168]

Rule of Thumb: If it ain't broken, don't fix it.

+1

 

[0134168]

I run my macbookPro12,1 with wd sn550 as daily driver almost 10 months without issue. I am using ssdpmenabler (thanks to kvic): idle energy assumption is 0,17 to 0,20. Stability is primary for me, so juice is secondary. I read a lot of message in this thread now I'm confused about to update to monterey.

What is your suggestions about to update?

Really Monterey is a pain in the ass for now. Too many problems. I suppose all will be fixed in next future.

 

[jknechtl]

Battery discharge when lid is closed
Hey, I swapped Kingston KC2500 for A2000 in my early 2015 MBP 13" because of huge battery drain when lid is closed (about 30 % during night) and I have A2000 in my other MBP with no issues.

Installed clean BigSur, Sintech long adaptor (since this combination A2000+Sintech works well). Speeds are still okay, no kext installed, idle ~ 0,19A (sometimes iStat menus shows 0). (no I am downloading some updates about 20MB/s writing on SSD and iStat menus shows still 0A - don't know what should I thing about iStat accuracy)

Now, lid was closed for 3hrs and lost 8-9 %. So I checked pmset -g log | grep due and found that laptop was awake after ten and twenty minutes (due to SPIT|UserActivity and ARPT|Network) and then nothing untill lid was open. I have Wake for lan disabled.

The last line states Wake from Deep Idle (CONVA) : due to EC.LidOpen/UserActivity Assertion Using BATT (Charge:72 %) = so the moment I opened the lid. But when I opened lid and checked battery, there was about 64 %.

What should help me to do? Try different SSD? I don't want to disable Wifi or Bluetooth every time closing the mac, I cant update FW in SSD (since I have no Windows machine and Kingston is not updateable in USB enclosures, moreover the FW listed in system report is higher number than Kingston has listed on its website).

 

[0134168]

Well, really you have a perfect Windows Machine...

 

[herb2k]

Battery discharge when lid is closed
Hey, I swapped Kingston KC2500 for A2000 in my early 2015 MBP 13" because of huge battery drain when lid is closed (about 30 % during night) and I have A2000 in my other MBP with no issues.

Installed clean BigSur, Sintech long adaptor (since this combination A2000+Sintech works well). Speeds are still okay, no kext installed, idle ~ 0,19A (sometimes iStat menus shows 0). (no I am downloading some updates about 20MB/s writing on SSD and iStat menus shows still 0A - don't know what should I thing about iStat accuracy)

Now, lid was closed for 3hrs and lost 8-9 %. So I checked pmset -g log | grep due and found that laptop was awake after ten and twenty minutes (due to SPIT|UserActivity and ARPT|Network) and then nothing untill lid was open. I have Wake for lan disabled.

The last line states Wake from Deep Idle (CONVA) : due to EC.LidOpen/UserActivity Assertion Using BATT (Charge:72 %) = so the moment I opened the lid. But when I opened lid and checked battery, there was about 64 %.

What should help me to do? Try different SSD? I don't want to disable Wifi or Bluetooth every time closing the mac, I cant update FW in SSD (since I have no Windows machine and Kingston is not updateable in USB enclosures, moreover the FW listed in system report is higher number than Kingston has listed on its website).

The DarkWakes have nothing to do with your SSD.

Turn off things such as find my mac and tcpkeepalive (see post #1) and that will stop most of the APRT type wakes.

Also, depending what applications you have running, those may account for the SPIT|UserActivity wakes which prevent your machine from fully sleeping or hibernating.

 

[xanderx007]

Macbook Pro 15" Mid-2014
Big Sur
Kingston A2000 1TB
M3 Full Stick Generic Adapter

Battery state before sleep (I'm using Charge Limiter script)

Battery State on Wake (6~ hours later)

I'll test it again tonight with a few apps open (Firefox, Safari, AI).

 

[terrazoids]

Does this mean by installing Nvmefix on a macbook 11,1 we also get the ssdpmenabler installed indirectly? Because from what i know, installing the independent ssdpmenabler kext would render typical macbook 11,1 unusable

Yes, but you need to activate the Aspm boot argument per the nvmefix instructions. Also you may have to activate the keepsyms=1 boot argument (please read nvmefix posts in this thread about how to get that working).

So a little more involved than ssdpmenabler, but not hard and nvmefix does a lot more. For instance on my ssd (intel 660p), using ssdpmenabler I got the idle down from .17A to .06. Using nvmefix with aspm enabled, I went down to lower than .01A idling.

Nvmefix attempts to correct apples lack of support for modern ssds and allows them to work as intended. Some will benefit dramatically from this.

 

[0134168]

Yes, but you need to activate the Aspm boot argument per the nvmefix instructions. Also you may have to activate the keepsyms=0 boot argument (please read nvmefix posts in this thread about how to get that working).

So a little more involved than ssdpmenabler, but not hard and nvmefix does a lot more. For instance on my ssd (intel 660p), using ssdpmenabler I got the idle down from .17A to .06. Using nvmefix with aspm enabled, I went down to lower than .01A idling.

Nvmefix attempts to correct apples lack of support for modern ssds and allows them to work as intended. Some will benefit dramatically from this.

I really can´t see how my Crucial P2 with ssdpmenabler can improve. 0,00 in idle.

 

[terrazoids]

I really can´t see how my Crucial P2 with ssdpmenabler can improve. 0,00 in idle.

Yeah, then for that ssd the extension you're using is a great solution. It is best to use the simplest means possible when searching for a solution.

 

[jimbo34]

I've just "upgraded" to a Crucial P2 25O GB SSD. It's apparently one of the newer models which can suffer from the QLC flash but even so, the write speeds are very poor compared to other results posted here. I've tried re-seating which has no effect. Also, in windows 10 via bootcamp, write speeds are similar to the read speeds so it looks like its a mac issue. Any other ideas of settings I should change running monterey?

 

[enplaned]

Anyone knows if the Phison E18 E16 controller present in the new line of Sabrent rocket SSDs will work as good as previous generation?

Thanks for input if anyone did try!

//GF

This article says that the Phison E16 is simply an E12 with so-called PHY chip upgraded from PCIE 3.0 to 4.0. That being the case, there's good reason to expect NVMEs based on the E16 to work based on similarity to E12.

Phison’s PS5016-E16 & PS5019-E19: The First PCIe 4.0 Client SSD Controllers

www.anandtech.com

Same thing is true of E19 - E19 is apparently based on the E13 with the PHY upgraded to handle PCIE 4.0.

As I understand it, the PHY is the module responsible for dealing with the physical layer of PCIE.

Anyone get an E16 (or E19) based card working?

 

[0134168]

I've just "upgraded" to a Crucial P2 25O GB SSD. It's apparently one of the newer models which can suffer from the QLC flash but even so, the write speeds are very poor compared to other results posted here. I've tried re-seating which has no effect. Also, in windows 10 via bootcamp, write speeds are similar to the read speeds so it looks like its a mac issue. Any other ideas of settings I should change running monterey?

View attachment 1914543

That´s too bad.

 

[Adelima]

Hello. I've been recently planning an upgrade to my SSD. The WD sn550 has caught my eye (mainly because of the price), however from what I've noticed the power draw is a bit higher than the original apple ones. I've had a look round this thread, but I can't find any talk of how much it actually affects battery life.
So what is the battery life like using a SN550 compared to the orignal apple ssd?

The reason I ask is, if it only affects it by ~30min (or something ridiculously low like that) I'd go for it, but if it's something ridicoulous like halfing my battery life, I'd be willing to cough up more money for a more power efficient ssd.

Battery power isn't so important to me to min-max it loads, but I'd want something similar to what I have now (4-5 hours not using much). What I don't want is to be tied to a power brick all the time. I'm running a MBP mid 2014, macos 10.14.6 (updated security patch so the boot rom won't be a problem). I'd also run ssdpmEnabler when I upgrade (would I need it if I did NVMEfix aswell?)

Thanks in advance!

 

[0134168]

Hello. I've been recently planning an upgrade to my SSD. The WD sn550 has caught my eye (mainly because of the price), however from what I've noticed the power draw is a bit higher than the original apple ones. I've had a look round this thread, but I can't find any talk of how much it actually affects battery life.
So what is the battery life like using a SN550 compared to the orignal apple ssd?

The reason I ask is, if it only affects it by ~30min (or something ridiculously low like that) I'd go for it, but if it's something ridicoulous like halfing my battery life, I'd be willing to cough up more money for a more power efficient ssd.

Battery power isn't so important to me to min-max it loads, but I'd want something similar to what I have now (4-5 hours not using much). What I don't want is to be tied to a power brick all the time. I'm running a MBP mid 2014, macos 10.14.6 (updated security patch so the boot rom won't be a problem). I'd also run ssdpmEnabler when I upgrade (would I need it if I did NVMEfix aswell?)

Thanks in advance!

I tried the WD SN750 few days ago, as I wrote. And an Aura pro, similar comsuptions. Battery dropped from 8 hours to 5 hours, more o less. Unacceptable. I ended up in the P2, as wrote before. Can´t be happier.

 

[Adelima]

I tried the WD SN750 few days ago, as I wrote. And an Aura pro, similar comsuptions. Battery dropped from 8 hours to 5 hours, more o less. Unacceptable. I ended up in the P2, as wrote before. Can´t be happier.

But I've also seen something about the p2 being unreliable (I don't remember the specifics, I think it was Kvic mentioned it to not be that great.) Any comments?

EDIT: Literally the post above mine lol.

 

[0134168]

Can´t be happier with it, as I said. Fast, 0,00A in iddle state, ast he Apple one. Nice price.

 

[Adelima]

Can´t be happier with it, as I said. Fast, 0,00A in iddle state, ast he Apple one. Nice price.

Do you have one of the old TLC drives, or one of the new QLC ones? I've read there was some controversy with Crucial downgrading their drives recently.
I also noticed you tried the SN750. I'm looking at the SN550, which is a bit more power efficient.

 

[0134168]

Do you have one of the old TLC drives, or one of the new QLC ones? I've read there was some controversy with Crucial downgrading their drives recently.
I also noticed you tried the SN750. I'm looking at the SN550, which is a bit more power efficient.

Everything that you are asking is few posts above.

 

[shafez]

Everything that you are asking is few posts above.

So you sacrificed the performance for the sake of battery life, 5 hours battery life is not bad with good performance.
I am not happy with Crucial P2 500gb with QLC flash and thinking of replacing it with the EVO 970 Plus, good performer with less battery life.