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Got a new SSD for my 2011 macbook pro!

M

Minerva

Platinum Member
What should I expect?

It's a 256GB Crucial M4. I'm reading its firmware needs to be updated BEFORE installing in the MBP.

It should be faster than the 5400 rpm stock drive! Hopefully worth 400 clams. 😱
 
loving my patriot wildfire in my 2011 mbp 🙂 literally the best thing ive ever done - every other computer i use now feels way too slow 😛
 
I'm coming into a 2008 MBP. it had a 320GB drive in it prior... 5400 rpm I believe. i replaced it with a 64GB SSDNOW from Kingston because it was laying around the office and i would MUCH prefer the speed to the space. i don't use my laptop for movie storage or music storage, its mostly web surfing when used for recreation, and VM's when used for work... the VM I use is an XP machine with like a 12GB HDD, so 64GB should be plenty for me. The Air that its replacing had a 128GB SSD in it and i barely used 30GB of it in almost a year.

but I would expect much snappier response from programs starting up, faster installs for stuff you saved locally, etc.
 
How hard to replace drive in a 2009 13" MBP? The online instructions always sound moderately easy, but for my iBook it was a major PITA to replace the drive.

I was planning to just tough it out for now though with it, and then get an 11" MBA in 2012... hoping for a better battery. I'm not convinced it will get a better battery though so I've been considering getting the $1199 model now, with 4 GB and 128 GB SSD.
 
Eug said:
How hard to replace drive in a 2009 13" MBP? The online instructions always sound moderately easy, but for my iBook it was a major PITA to replace the drive.

I was planning to just tough it out for now though with it, and then get an 11" MBA in 2012... hoping for a better battery. I'm not convinced it will get a better battery though so I've been considering getting the $1199 model now, with 4 GB and 128 GB SSD.
Click to expand...

very easy. unscrew the bottom panel, unscrew the hard drive, put in new ssd, screw everything back in, reinstall snow leopard/lion, done. 🙂
 
xanis said:
Thinking about doing the same thing. I want a ~64GB SSD for the OS and applications and to make my current 7200RPM 250GB drive file storage.
Click to expand...

I bought a $20 adapter off of ebay to hold a drive. It fit my friends MBP perfectly. It did take a couple weeks to come in from china...

They are $10 now
Search for "9.5mm Serial ATA Optical Bay Hard Drive Adapter/cadd"

iFixit has them for $60
http://www.ifixit.com/Apple-Parts/9-5-mm-SATA-Optical-Bay-SATA-Hard-Drive-Enclosure/IF107-080
 
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alfa147x said:
I bought a $20 adapter off of ebay to hold a drive. It fit my friends MBP perfectly. It did take a couple weeks to come in from china...

They are $10 now
Search for "9.5mm Serial ATA Optical Bay Hard Drive Adapter/cadd"

iFixit has them for $60
http://www.ifixit.com/Apple-Parts/9-5-mm-SATA-Optical-Bay-SATA-Hard-Drive-Enclosure/IF107-080
Click to expand...

I did this. I had to rip off a piece of plastic from the adapter (not the laptop) to make it fit. Other than that, it was easy!
 
Not sure whats "good" for boot times, but this 2008 MBP loaded with Lion boots in 30 seconds flat. From dead off to on the desktop ready to go in 30.0 seconds. Not that i usually turn off my laptops, i usually just shut the lid, but thats not bad in my opinion. Sporting that 64GB SSD.
 
Paperlantern said:
Not sure whats "good" for boot times, but this 2008 MBP loaded with Lion boots in 30 seconds flat. From dead off to on the desktop ready to go in 30.0 seconds. Not that i usually turn off my laptops, i usually just shut the lid, but thats not bad in my opinion. Sporting that 64GB SSD.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure what the specs of the 2008 MBP were, but the 2011 MBP w/ Lion and an SSD boots in about 13 seconds (from completely off to ready to use). An SSD really is quite noticeable.
 
So, Minerva: How is the SSD?

secretanchitman said:
very easy. unscrew the bottom panel, unscrew the hard drive, put in new ssd, screw everything back in, reinstall snow leopard/lion, done. 🙂
Click to expand...
Arggh... Reinstall. I'm not sure I'm totally liking this hidden restore partition business.

However, as you said, it really does look easy to install.

http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook-Pro-13-Inch-Unibody-Mid-2009-Teardown/814/1

I'll have to pick myself up an inexpensive SSD soon. Hopefully it won't suck too much with just 2 GB RAM. I'm spoiled though since I have 12 GB in my iMac, and 8 GB in my Windows 7 box.

EDIT:

It's a Philips screwdriver for the back. What screwdriver for the hard drive? I have the Philips and torx, but no tri-wing.
 
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Red Storm said:
I'm not sure what the specs of the 2008 MBP were, but the 2011 MBP w/ Lion and an SSD boots in about 13 seconds (from completely off to ready to use). An SSD really is quite noticeable.
Click to expand...

Best damned upgrade I ever did to my MBP. Also, best damned upgrade I ever did to my main Windows computer. Also, best damned upgrade ever did to my file sharing box.

SSDs are great.
 
Eug said:
I'll have to pick myself up an inexpensive SSD soon. Hopefully it won't suck too much with just 2 GB RAM. I'm spoiled though since I have 12 GB in my iMac, and 8 GB in my Windows 7 box.
Click to expand...
I didn't realize just how cheap 2 x 2 GB DDR1067 is now. $27 for Crucial RAM. Nice.
 
Eug said:
So, Minerva: How is the SSD?


Arggh... Reinstall. I'm not sure I'm totally liking this hidden restore partition business.

However, as you said, it really does look easy to install.

http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook-Pro-13-Inch-Unibody-Mid-2009-Teardown/814/1

I'll have to pick myself up an inexpensive SSD soon. Hopefully it won't suck too much with just 2 GB RAM. I'm spoiled though since I have 12 GB in my iMac, and 8 GB in my Windows 7 box.

EDIT:

It's a Philips screwdriver for the back. What screwdriver for the hard drive? I have the Philips and torx, but no tri-wing.
Click to expand...

I think that the hard drive screw is phillips as well, so you should be good.

My 2010 Air cold boots to usable state in about 15 seconds.
 
Will OSX lion support trim properly now for all SSDs and not just apple-branded toshiba junk?

Also, how does one make sure NCQ is enabled, considering there's no bios setup to fiddle in on a mac?
 
Red Storm said:
I'm not sure what the specs of the 2008 MBP were, but the 2011 MBP w/ Lion and an SSD boots in about 13 seconds (from completely off to ready to use). An SSD really is quite noticeable.
Click to expand...

Core 2 Duo 2.53GHz with 4GB RAM, 1066 Bus I believe.

I also put 2 64GB SSD drives in my tower workstation. The workstation is old, certainly not new running a Pentium D 3.0GHz, 3GB of DDR2 RAM at a 566MHz FSB? Somewhere in there? Somewhere in the neighborhood of 5 - 6 years old, but with those two in RAID 0... still tops out the Windows Experience Index at 7.9 for the HDD category. They really are a HUGE performance increase to ANY system.
 
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What about speed? I see some "285 MB/s" 80-90 GB units in the same ballpark price range of later generation "500 MB/s" 60 GB units. I'm leaning towards the slower 90 GB units, since 60 GB is a little cramped.

I'm guessing the 90 GB will be fine, because what will really speed things up is the extremely low seek time.
 
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