Latest 3rd-Party SSD Optimization Tips

Joined
Dec 4, 2007
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Your Mac's Specs
Retina MacBook Pro (15")
Hey all,

Looking for some collective advice from the community here. I am finally venturing into the SSD world for my Early-2011 MBP. Picked up an OCZ 512GB Vertex 4 and will be installing myself.

My other relevant system specs are: 2.3 GHz i7-quad proc, 16GB DDR3 RAM. The SSD will be my ONLY drive in the machine (I am not using a drive-doubler; I prefer to keep my SuperDrive).

I have read in the past about the arguments as to whether or not to perform certain tweaks afterwards, such as:

  1. Enabling Apple's TRIM support (using the TRIM enabler hack since it is a 3rd-party SSD)
  2. Changing the "noatime" flag to be off
  3. Turning off the sudden-motion sensor
  4. Turning off hard drive sleep
  5. Turning off hibernation
  6. Turning off Time Machine local snapshots
  7. Creating a RAMdisk for temp files
  8. Deleting/Disabling the SWAP file
  9. Etc...

Some of this info I find online was written 1 - 2 years ago. I have found some conflicting blogs that say not all of this info is still relevant to the latest SSD's on the market, while others say some of it still is. Some say new controllers have their own better TRIM support, and to skip enabling Apple's, etc...

So, my question is, for those of you who actually have modern SSD's in your MBP, or know a thing or two about them, what are your thoughts for getting the best performance and life out of a new SSD?
 
Joined
Jan 13, 2007
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Central New York
Your Mac's Specs
15in i7 MacBook Pro, 8GB RAM, 120GB SSD, 500GB HD
Plug it in and use it. the only "optimization" thing I did was turn off the local Time Machine snapshots as I initially had a 60GB SSD and didn't want the snapshots taking up all my space. I've since upgraded to a 120GB, but still have the snapshots disabled.
 
Joined
Oct 7, 2010
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Virginia, USA
Your Mac's Specs
15" MB Pro, 2.66 i7 ; 11” MBA 1.8GZ i7; 13"MBA 2GZ i7 8 GB mem 512GB SSD, 2 iPad3s, 1 iPad Mini
Just put it in and enjoy it. I carbon copy cloned mine drive to the new SSD externally, shut down, and switched them out. About a 3 minute process to switch drives. With the right tools (macsales.com tells you what you need and offers fine, correct, and priceworthy service).

My disk speed is now a touch faster than 3x what it was with a 7200 RPM 500 GB HDD.
 

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