Dual hard drives in macbook pro query (if you have this set up please answer)

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Hello,
I've been posting a few questions with regards to the wonderful act of swapping the super drive for a hard drive, and so i have a few final questions.
1) if you use the second drive (in the super drive space) to boot is it as fast as swapping the main drive for the solid state and putting the old 500gb in the super drive slot?
2) How does it appear in your finder etc, for example i would like to keep the solid state for programs, osx and windows 7 boot camp. Does this mean that all the folders like my documents, and my desktop will be on the ssd or can i put my desktop on the main hard drive separate from the osx on the ssd?

Thats all for now, any insight from current users would be greatly appreciated, also any british users who have found a caddy in the uk can you please post a link to where you got it from.
Regards Josh
 
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1. I have my SSD in the superdrive slot and it is also my boot drive. It is still incredibly fast, and has a SATA II connection like the main HDD, although I do believe the 2011 MBPs have a SATA III connection that is even faster.

2. Your computer shows it as 2 drives. I have mine configured so that the OS and apps are on the SSD and my home folder is on the HDD.
 
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@Stretch, thanks for the help, will it be faster if i place the ssd in the main slot as its 6g rather then the 3g i think the superdrive slot is?
Also how did you find the installation process?
 
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I put the SSD in the optical drive slot because its not a "cushioned" slot. The HDD is held in place with rubber mounts, the optical drive is just screwed to the chassis. 6G speed is only going to matter if you buy a 6G drive, and both bays support 6G speeds.

Installation is easy. I had my MBP back together in under 30 minutes, including install time.
 
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The drive i'm using is the crucial 400 which i think is 6g.
What hard drive enclosure / caddy did you go for?
 
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1. If you have a 2011 MacBook the hdd bay is sata 3 and the optical bay is sata 2 so the hdd slot will be faster if you have a Sata3 drive. Otherwise they should be the same unless you go back a few more years and I think the optical bay is only sata1. Also people have had problems with the computer sleeping properly if the system drive is in the optical bay. People with better optical bay enclosures haven't had this problem though.

2. It will appear as two different drives but you make the folders on the system drive pass through to the other drive so that you can use it as one drive but store your desktop downloads ect on the other hdd. I can't remember exactly how to do this but I will find out and throw it up here. I only did it for my steam apps because I dident know about it when I set up my computer. Luckily I will be doing a reformat when lion comes out. :)

EDIT:

Here we go. Creating a Symbolic Link

This is a gui program which will help you do it.

This is a terminal tutorial if that is more your style.

Either way if you just create symbolic links between your system drive and your HDD for folders which you dont need on the SSD then it should seamlessly integrate. Do it once and forget it.
 
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Should work but if you go cheap make sure to put the system drive in the main bay
I plan on putting the 128gb curical ssd in the main bay and the seagate hybrid in the other bay. :)
do you need anything in particular to do the job, e.g. specific screw driver etc? as my old MBP had really odd hdd case screws.
 
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You need torx and phillips screw drivers
 
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1. If you have a 2011 MacBook the hdd bay is sata 3 and the optical bay is sata 2 so the hdd slot will be faster if you have a Sata3 drive. Otherwise they should be the same unless you go back a few more years and I think the optical bay is only sata1. Also people have had problems with the computer sleeping properly if the system drive is in the optical bay. People with better optical bay enclosures haven't had this problem though.

The MacBooks might be different, but the 2011 MBP, the Thunderbolt models have SATA III (6Gbs) in both bays.
 
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The MacBooks might be different, but the 2011 MBP, the Thunderbolt models have SATA III (6Gbs) in both bays.

Really my 13in says Link Speed: 3 Gigabit
Negotiated Link Speed: 3 Gigabit
 
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attachment.php


Both bays are 6 Series chipsets and the OWC drive is in the Optical Bay. Maybe the 13in is different.

sysprof.jpg
 
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Both bays are 6 Series chipsets and the OWC drive is in the Optical Bay. Maybe the 13in is different.

I guess? I can ss if you care to see it. There was another thread about it as well because some one was worried it would be subject to slowing over time since it was only 3gb that were affected.

Here is the thread... its on a 17incher though... Weird

Mac-rumors
 
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Way... way too many specs to list.
Well here's another early 2011 Thunderbolt 15" mbp and..

superdrive
Code:
Intel 6 Series Chipset:

  Vendor:	Intel
  Product:	6 Series Chipset
  Link Speed:	6 Gigabit
  Negotiated Link Speed:	1.5 Gigabit
  Description:	AHCI Version 1.30 Supported

HDD
Code:
Intel 6 Series Chipset:

  Vendor:	Intel
  Product:	6 Series Chipset
  Link Speed:	6 Gigabit
  Negotiated Link Speed:	3 Gigabit
  Description:	AHCI Version 1.30 Supported

Looks like both are SATA III ports to me, although the disk's negotiated down to SATA II specs.
 
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Maybe they changed them at some point? Mine is a release date, bought it feb 11? How about yall?
 
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Way... way too many specs to list.
This one should have been built on May 18th
 

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I've read that the very first ones didn't have SATA III in both bays but evidently Apple changed that relatively quickly. Unfortunately - I seem to have one of the ones that do not have this enabled.

bydefault2011-05-25at45718PM.png
 
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I've read that the very first ones didn't have SATA III in both bays but evidently Apple changed that relatively quickly. Unfortunately - I seem to have one of the ones that do not have this enabled.

Good to know, thanks.
 
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I've read that the very first ones didn't have SATA III in both bays but evidently Apple changed that relatively quickly. Unfortunately - I seem to have one of the ones that do not have this enabled.

That would explain it then. I've had mine for about a month now. Wonder when the switch-over happened.
 

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