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

[Silencio]

I actually have to jog my memory to try to remember when the Loss of MMIO spaces kernel panics started on my 2015 rMBP. I upgraded it to Monterey and ran with that for a couple of weeks, then I got a new battery from OWC and attempted to install it, but it was DOA and I had to put the original, swollen battery back in temporarily. This may have been when the kernel panic trouble started. OWC replaced the defective NewerTech battery, I installed it last night and confirmed it to be working, so now we'll see if system stability is reattained.

 

[MrAverigeUser]

I actually have to jog my memory to try to remember when the Loss of MMIO spaces kernel panics started on my 2015 rMBP. I upgraded it to Monterey and ran with that for a couple of weeks, then I got a new battery from OWC and attempted to install it, but it was DOA and I had to put the original, swollen battery back in temporarily. This may have been when the kernel panic trouble started. OWC replaced the defective NewerTech battery, I installed it last night and confirmed it to be working, so now we'll see if system stability is reattained.

would be very interesting to see if the defective battery at least *seems* to be cause of the problems. And would be very interesting if the failing battery was coincident with your problems.

If this is the case one should inform the hackintosh-guys that their thesis could be right indeed…

BTW time from beep to readiness of my upgraded MBP A1398 2015 15“ Monterey is still fast.

Cheers

 

[newmacmechanic]

Hi everyone,

I would like thank everyone for this very informative and rich thread. I found it about 1.5 years ago. I bought the adapter and the SSD to upgrade my mid-2015 rMBP 15" (11,4) last year, but only finally got around to doing the switch this past weekend. So, I wanted to add one more data point.

Here are the details:

MacOS version: Catalina 10.15.7
Mac: MacBookPro 11,4 (Retina mid-2015, 15")
Processor: Intel Core i7 2.2 GHz
Boot ROM Version: 428.60.3.0.0
SSD: Seagate Barracuda 510 1TB (purchased on Amazon.ca) + Sintec short adapter (purchased from Sintec directly)

https://www.seagate.com/www-content/datasheets/pdfs/barracuda-510-ssd-DS2000-5-2005US-en_CA.pdf

For those curious about the Barracuda 510, the revision version is: STPSC014. Also, the System reports the link width as: x4 and the link speed as: 8.0 GT/s.

After swapping the SSDs, I formatted the Barracuda 510 (APFS) in Disk Utility from a Catalina Installer USB, I used a Time Machine backup of my data from the original 512GB Apple SSD to setup the new 1TB SSD.

iStat at first showed .200A with no KEXTs loaded (but I had just switched the SSD in so there was probably substantial background activity like indexing going on). I then loaded up SsdPmEnabler (thanks to @kvic-z) which then decreased the reading to 0.014A on idle. I then used the Hackintool (thanks to @herb2k) to install LiLu and NVMeFix. Now, when idling, I routinely observe in iStat 0.03A and I have seen 0.02A a few times. These last two readings are in the neighbourhood of the original Apple SSD. I have uploaded the iStat menu graph and the before and after BlackMagic tests.

I downloaded the latest version of the kexts:

GitHub - kvic-z/SsdPmEnabler

Contribute to kvic-z/SsdPmEnabler development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

GitHub - acidanthera/Lilu: Arbitrary kext and process patching on macOS

Arbitrary kext and process patching on macOS. Contribute to acidanthera/Lilu development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

GitHub - acidanthera/NVMeFix

Contribute to acidanthera/NVMeFix development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

Hackintool link:

GitHub - benbaker76/Hackintool: The Swiss army knife of vanilla Hackintoshing

The Swiss army knife of vanilla Hackintoshing. Contribute to benbaker76/Hackintool development by creating an account on GitHub.

github.com

For some instructions on using the Hackintool to load kext, use this link:

[GUIDE] Installing 3rd Party Kexts - El Capitan, Sierra, High Sierra, Mojave, Catalina

Installing 3rd Party Kexts in /Library/Extensions Note: This guide was originally written to support MacOS Mojave and older versions (< r5200) of the Clover boot-loader. The methods detailed here are now considered legacy methods and should only used with older versions of MacOS as detailed...

www.tonymacx86.com

Thanks again for all of the testing and all of the great advice/hints especially with respect to SSDs with the Phison E12 controller like the Seagate Barracuda 510.

 

[MrAverigeUser]

I actually have to jog my memory to try to remember when the Loss of MMIO spaces kernel panics started on my 2015 rMBP. I upgraded it to Monterey and ran with that for a couple of weeks, then I got a new battery from OWC and attempted to install it, but it was DOA and I had to put the original, swollen battery back in temporarily. This may have been when the kernel panic trouble started. OWC replaced the defective NewerTech battery, I installed it last night and confirmed it to be working, so now we'll see if system stability is reattained.

just for information:

Although both batteries of my (same as yours) MBP are in good condition, I had a look at fixit.Com to know what will be to do some day to exchange battery.

hope you read that there is a method without being forced to make all the nearly 80 steps to change the battery.

But what might be important:

in one of the many comments there is a note that one should do a SMC reset if there are problems appearing after changing the battery! maybe not only the exhausted battery might be a Problem, but also a simple exchange might cause problems.
In your case it might even be both since you were forced to put out_and_and_back_in a bad battery.

Perhaps it might be better to do a SMC reset to prevent further encounter of problems…. And quickly done as well.

Cheers

 

[a-maxime]

Hi everyone,

I haven't read this topic for a while but lately my Pro Retina 15' Late 2013 got stolen. I used to have 2 TB Sabrent SSD on it and I was rather happy unless for the battery efficiency. So I bought back a Mid-2015 because I needed a huge SSD and Windows (x86) virtualisation for car manufacturer diagnostic programs.

Well, it seems to me that the 2015 was the best idea, as I won't have to modifiy Bootrom and it should support PCIe 3.0 with 4 lines. I found one which had his battery, top case and trackpad replaced 2 months ago at an Apple Store. I'm now planning to changed its 256 GB SSD to a 2 TB one.

I'm just wondering which SSD is the better in matter of power consumption and "value for money". I'd like to have at least a TLC SSD even though MLC is way better. And of course not a DRAMless SSD.

Which reference do you advise ? Is it known to work great with my Pro 15' Mid 2015 ?


Thanks,
Max

 

[Silencio]

just for information:

Although both batteries of my (same as yours) MBP are in good condition, I had a look at fixit.Com to know what will be to do some day to exchange battery.

hope you read that there is a method without being forced to make all the nearly 80 steps to change the battery.

But what might be important:

in one of the many comments there is a note that one should do a SMC reset if there are problems appearing after changing the battery! maybe not only the exhausted battery might be a Problem, but also a simple exchange might cause problems.
In your case it might even be both since you were forced to put out_and_and_back_in a bad battery.

Perhaps it might be better to do a SMC reset to prevent further encounter of problems…. And quickly done as well.

Cheers

The first time I removed the original battery, I did use the exhaustive, 80+ step method, as taking all those parts out provided enough space to wedge in the flat, plastic card to pry the adhesive off the bottom of the battery, with the help of the solvent to break it down. For subsequent battery swaps, I used the quicker method as the battery wasn't adhered as strongly to the laptop chassis anymore. I've done battery swaps on a few 15" MacBook Pros over the years — hopefully never again.

Yes, I did an SMC reset immediately after every time I exchange batteries. The strange behavior of the first DOA battery is somewhat off-topic and deserves its own thread — it was very frustrating to diagnose, but in the end it was pretty clear the new battery wasn't working properly. When I reinstalled the original battery, an SMC reset didn't fix the kernel panic issue. The original battery was at around 990 cycles; even though it could hold a charge for 30 minutes or so, it was clearly toast.

As for the second replacement battery: I was able to charge it to 100%, and then run it back down to 0% without any kernel panics occurring.

 

[MrAverigeUser]

The first time I removed the original battery, I did use the exhaustive, 80+ step method, as taking all those parts out provided enough space to wedge in the flat, plastic card to pry the adhesive off the bottom of the battery, with the help of the solvent to break it down. For subsequent battery swaps, I used the quicker method as the battery wasn't adhered as strongly to the laptop chassis anymore. I've done battery swaps on a few 15" MacBook Pros over the years — hopefully never again.

Yes, I did an SMC reset immediately after every time I exchange batteries. The strange behavior of the first DOA battery is somewhat off-topic and deserves its own thread — it was very frustrating to diagnose, but in the end it was pretty clear the new battery wasn't working properly. When I reinstalled the original battery, an SMC reset didn't fix the kernel panic issue. The original battery was at around 990 cycles; even though it could hold a charge for 30 minutes or so, it was clearly toast.

As for the second replacement battery: I was able to charge it to 100%, and then run it back down to 0% without any kernel panics occurring.

sounds like your problem has been solved…. Hopefully.

 

[SnackyD]

Is the SK Hynix P31 still king as of Feb 2022?

I know the P41 is coming out soon but I don't think I can wait. I would just like to pop the P31 in and forget about it. According to AmorphousDiskMark, my current speeds are 500/200 so this P31 would be a jet in comparison.

I was going to buy a specc'd out M1 but I think I will just upgrade the SSD on my current one to hold off on the big purchase.

 

[mmmgl]

For those of you on Big Sur and who want to try enabling NVMeFix again - I did a bit of research and found the Kernel Panics were due to the Lilu kext having a compatibility issue on Big Sur.

You need to add "keepsyms=1" to boot-args, after loading in the kext, before your first boot.

To do this:
Download and install Lilu.kext and NVMeFix.kext
Reboot in recovery mode (CMD + R)
Open up terminal

Type in:

nvram boot-args="keepsyms=1"

Reboot and you should enter macOS normally.

That does the trick. Thank you

 

[SnackyD]

So I did put in the SK Hynix P31 on my 2014 Macbook Pro with the black short Sintech adapter.
SsdPmEnabler enabled. Everything is running well except when I try to install bootcamp. I run into the bluescreen that is documented in front page. I cannot even hit shift+f10 because it bootloops so fast after reaching the blue screen. I was able to get into regedit one time but the directory I was supposed to navigate into does not exist. It only went up to "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\Setup"

The full directory should've been "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\Setup\Status\ChildCompletion" but i'm missing the Status folder for some reason.

Anyone know what to do? I've tried to reinstall Windows 10 via Bootcamp Assistant three times already. Do I just use Parallels from now on? I've tried everything I could. I'm not sure if I'm missing something. All drives are formatted correctly.

EDIT: Bootcamp is not possible with the SK Hynix P31, At least not right now.

 

[nopk73]

edit - huh, well, I'd discounted the cable issue as it was on bootup that it wouldnt work and then you could force it back on with a usb cycle. Saw a note about when it happens, to press down on top case in area between trackpad and keyboard.. and sure enough, it started working. So trackpad cable it is.

---

Hi all,

Great thread, Ive trawled through a lot of it for info before doing a few upgrades here.. Ive just upgraded 3 machines here: a mid-2015 15" retina-MBP, a mid-2013 MB Air and an early-2015 13" retina-MBP with 250gb Crucial P2s and Sintech short adapters.

The 15" and the MBA have both, so far, worked great. Ive run into an annoying issue with the 13" I hope someone can offer a suggestion on. Its currently on a fresh install of Monterey and I've confirmed it has the current Mac firmware. Intermittently, and I *think* its when it goes into hibernate, I'll boot to the login screen and the trackpad cursor will be stuck in the top left and the keyboard wont work.

If I plug anything into a USB port, wait a second or two, then unplug it, everything works again. For a bit I would plug a mouse or keyboard in, the other day I had a spare Logitech wireless dongle (unpaired with anything..) lying around, slapped it in for a sec, pulled it out and everything works great. Once I login, I get a message that "you shut your machine down because of a problem" yada, yada.. (Im very experienced with Windows, new to Macs.. is that message a result of a "kernel panic"?)

I've just gone through the 10 step process in the 1st post in this thread and have now disabled hibernate and sleep and all that.. so will see if I can make the fault reoccur now. Anyone else run into this and know a fix?

 

[rdcoulthard]

Interesting catching up on this. I bought a Crucial P2 2TB for the lower power consumption and it turns out to be the UK/CA logo version. I'm happy with the performance on writes, which average about 1700 MB/s on Blackmagic speed test, but read performance usually only gets up to 1300 MB/s. this seems odd. I don't think indexing is a problem here. Everytime I test it, I get roughly the same results. Crucial refused to address it because I'm using the P2 in an "unsupported device", so I ordered a new sintech adapter just in case. I have the same issue with the 2nd adapter so it seems to be something with the SSD. Has anyone else had this experience?

So following up on my experience with my 2TB QLC-version Crucial P2. It's installed in my 2015 15" rMBP running Big Sur. It shows up in System Information as x4 speed and 8 GT/s as per PCIe 3.0 so everything checks out generally. There are no issues identified on Apple Diagnostics.

The issue is that Write speed is typically higher, and sometimes much higher than read speed, typically by over 10% on Blackmagic Speed Test.

I downloaded AmorphousDiskMark to get more information on the drive speed. I've tried it with 2 different Sintech adapters, one ordered from Amazon, and the other directly from Sintech, with the same results, even after cleaning with isopropyl alcohol. I'm including one of the typical results here.

I tried running the benchmarks with various delays between tests up to 5 minutes between each, then I ran them invidivually with even longer gaps between tests and they are about the same every time ±~5%.

So I bought a 2TB Sabrent Rocket TLC drive and it shows the same pattern of write speed faster than read speed, but overall faster speeds than the Crucial P2. I tried this with both of my Sintech adapters as well with no meaningful change between adapters.

Lastly, I re-installed the original Apple 1TB AHCI drive. This gave more typical results with Read speed faster than Write speed. I'm actually impressed how fast the stock Apple AHCI drive is.

Has anyone else has seen similar results with Crucial P2, Sabrent Rocket, or other drives on 2015 15" rMBP?

 

[MrAverigeUser]

@rdcoulthard

Upgrading 2013/2014 Macbook Pro SSD to M.2 NVMe

Upgraded my 2.2 MHz 16 GB Mid-2015 MBP 11,4. 15“ (A1398) running a clean-installed Monterey 12.2 today without any problems, using the Sintech Adapter (Long Version). The adapter came with a little piece of plastic (only about 5x5 mm) fixed in the middle of the long adapter to assure some...

forums.macrumors.com

 

[a_morgenst]

Hello all,

So I've read through this article but could not catch up everything, but I hope that someone can help me:

My stock apple SSD in MBP 12.1 13" from 2015 died recently and I'm looking for an alternative.

However, I think I now have a serious chicken-egg problem: while trying to repair the mac, I did a firmware reset, so the firmware is now genuine from 2015 with no support for NVMe.

I haven't bought a NVMe yet, but I guess that I first have to install a original apple ssd (or an AHCI-alternative) to do the firmware update before I can install a NVMe, right?

Or does anybody know of an alternative solution?

Thanks

Andreas

 

[J@ffa]

Hello all,

So I've read through this article but could not catch up everything, but I hope that someone can help me:

My stock apple SSD in MBP 12.1 13" from 2015 died recently and I'm looking for an alternative.

However, I think I now have a serious chicken-egg problem: while trying to repair the mac, I did a firmware reset, so the firmware is now genuine from 2015 with no support for NVMe.

I haven't bought a NVMe yet, but I guess that I first have to install a original apple ssd (or an AHCI-alternative) to do the firmware update before I can install a NVMe, right?

Or does anybody know of an alternative solution?

Thanks

Andreas

When you say you did a ‘firmware reset’, what do you mean?

 

[a_morgenst]

Sorry,

thanks for coming back to me.

I did SMC reset, PRAM reset, thought that this did also reset EFI firmware (this might be wrong, though)

Anyway, I guess the important thing is that my Macbook is now running on EFI firmware/bootrom 192.0.0.

Is this EFI firmware sufficient to run NVMe-SSDs?

Andreas

 

[herb2k]

Sorry,

thanks for coming back to me.

I did SMC reset, PRAM reset, thought that this did also reset EFI firmware (this might be wrong, though)

Anyway, I guess the important thing is that my Macbook is now running on EFI firmware/bootrom 192.0.0.

Is this EFI firmware sufficient to run NVMe-SSDs?

Andreas

Those keystrokes don't change your EFI version, just resets values to default.

Your should be fine on 192.x.x, the newest are 4xx.x.x and may have other improvements but not required to run an NVMe.

 

[luiz4472]

Hello all,

I have a Macbook Air Early 2015 and i am looking to upgrade my stock apple 128gb ssd with a third party 500gb unit.

Here in Brazil, the best options (price) are WD Blue SN550 or Crucial P2, which one are better right now?

Thanks!

 

[Silencio]

Yet another twist has developed in the ongoing odyssey of my 2015 15" MacBook Pro running macOS Monterey with a 2TB Sabrent Rocket and a Sintech long adapter. After changing the battery, it looked like my issues went away. However, now after putting the laptop to sleep and leaving it connected to the charger overnight, the laptop is kernel panicking, with an error I haven't seen before and found very few results when searching on it:

panic(cpu 0 caller 0xffffff800fd3b836): nvme: "3rd party NVMe controller. PCI link down. Write. fBuiltIn=1 MODEL=Sabrent FW=ECFM12.3 CSTS=0xffffffff US[1]=0x0 US[0]=0x2b VID=0xffff DID=0xffff CRITICAL_WARNING=0x0.\n" @IONVMeController.cpp:6053
Panicked task 0xffffff99c48fb670: 169 threads: pid 0: kernel_task

About the only suggestion I could find was to disable Power Nap, which I did, but the same panic occurred a couple of days later.

I do have a space Sintech long adapter I can try. Another thing I should consider is applying a thermal pad to the top of the Sabrent Rocket, but I don't have any definitive history of thermal readings I can apply at the moment. I am going to install my copy of iStat Menus and give that a shot, as well. Anything else I should try before springing for a different 2TB NVMe... or a 16" M1 Max?

 

[a_morgenst]

just wanted to drop by with a quick update on my 2015 13" MacBook Pro set up with a Samsung 970 Evo Plus ?Recently installed a brand new battery, applied fresh thermal paste, and clean installed Monterey, and have been getting about ~15-16 hours battery life on average ? Only kexts I've been using are SsdPmEnabler, Lilu and NVMeFix.

For anyone still unsure about the 970 Evo Plus , I'd definitely recommend it. There are no heating issues, and the power consumption is 0.03Ma on idle according to iStat Menus. I'll note I got the "2BE" version of the back in 2020, so I don't know anything about this '3' variation with the new chip and whatever. But I'm glad I didn't go for those other random brands, especially since I got this SSD new at a great price. Good luck y'all

Hello all,

I have a Macbook Air Early 2015 and i am looking to upgrade my stock apple 128gb ssd with a third party 500gb unit.

Here in Brazil, the best options (price) are WD Blue SN550 or Crucial P2, which one are better right now?

Thanks!

Have a look at the first page with the comparison of the different SSDs. From that, I would say pick the Crucial, but others might have a different opinion.

 

[a_morgenst]

Hello all,

I have a Macbook Air Early 2015 and i am looking to upgrade my stock apple 128gb ssd with a third party 500gb unit.

Here in Brazil, the best options (price) are WD Blue SN550 or Crucial P2, which one are better right now?

Thanks!

Please have look at the first page of this thread with the comparisons of the different SSDs. From these, I would say pick the Crucial, but others might have a different opinion.

 

[xboxbml]

Hello all,

I have a Macbook Air Early 2015 and i am looking to upgrade my stock apple 128gb ssd with a third party 500gb unit.

Here in Brazil, the best options (price) are WD Blue SN550 or Crucial P2, which one are better right now?

Thanks!

I have same machine as you.. Those may be cheaper and possibly better power wise than what I have. I have the ADATA 2TB.. I like it for the storage size but uses a little more power than others. As someone else said, check the chart for comparison data.

 

[Bladiko]

Hey guys, I recently got a 13” Retina MBP Model MacBookPro11,1 I’m wondering which is the best NVMe drive for this model?

 

[Bladiko]

Hey guys, I recently got a 13” Retina MBP Model MacBookPro11,1 I’m wondering which is the best NVMe drive for this model?

 

[SnackyD]

Hey guys, I recently got a 13” Retina MBP Model MacBookPro11,1 I’m wondering which is the best NVMe drive for this model?

SK Hynix P31 so your laptop won't drain your battery while idling.