Fesm13

Q: I need some advice on how to upgrade my MBP mid 2010 HDD to SDD without using clone software

Sadly I had resisted upgrading the OS and kept my Snow Leopard running up to a few weeks ago when the incompatibility of various things became a nuisance I took the plunge and upgraded to OS El Capitan. This pretty much killed my Hard drive. It kept failing to fully boot and eventually when it did, any function took an eternity to action. I took it to the Genius Bar and after a bit of testing it came up with hard drive failure. Based on the advice given to me - I was told I should purchase a Samsung EVO 850 and it would take me 10 minutes to install it and simply use time machine to get my data across.

 

I can happily operate on people, but machines seem way more complex.

I decided to do a fair bit of reading, and now am getting somewhat stuck and confused as clearly it is not that simple.

 

I have a SATA-USB cable. I think I know how to mount the SSD via the SATA connection, format it and then fresh install OS El Capitan.

 

The thing to note is that my MBP has been behaving erratically the last 2-3 years with episodes of kernel errors and freezing and shutting down. I figured it previously had something to do with an external app - google chrome and got rid of that to use Opera instead. It made the errors far less frequent but nevertheless still occurred.

Because of this it did not seem logical to use the clone apps (though clearly would have made life simpler) and I need to somehow do this the long way round....or so I believe, but please correct me if wrong.

 

I have a Time Machine backup before I upgraded my OS, and prior to attempting anything I shall do another one so its off the new OS.

 

My questions are:

 

1. After formatting my SSD, should I make a partition?

2. Is it acceptable to then simply drag a copy of the OS El Cap to the SSD and launch it hopefully leading to installation?

3. What is the best way to migrate my data?

 

Please note I am not a tech savvy person, have never done anything like this before and its taken me weeks to get to these conclusions so far.

Any advice with step by step instructions will be gratefully received.

 

Thank you.

MacBook Pro, iOS 10, Mid 2010 model

Posted on Sep 24, 2016 6:36 AM

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Q: I need some advice on how to upgrade my MBP mid 2010 HDD to SDD without using clone software

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  • Helpful answers

  • by alex7375,

    alex7375 alex7375 Sep 24, 2016 7:34 AM in response to Fesm13
    Level 2 (295 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 24, 2016 7:34 AM in response to Fesm13

    Create partitions first then format each partition.

    I think you have to create an Install USB flash drive and then boot from the flash drive and go threw the install process.

  • by dwb,

    dwb dwb Sep 24, 2016 8:07 AM in response to Fesm13
    Level 7 (24,253 points)
    Notebooks
    Sep 24, 2016 8:07 AM in response to Fesm13

    Check out this Apple knowledgebase article. If your firmware isn’t up-to-date, download the proper updater. Having done so, your computer should be able to boot into Internet Recovery which I’ve also provided a link for. Once you’ve booted into Internet Recovery you can run the Disk Utility program to partition your SSD. Then still in Internet Recovery you can download and install the OS. (This will download the most operating system you most recently installed which would be El Capitan.) After this you can then restore your applications and/or data from TimeMachine.

  • by Fesm13,

    Fesm13 Fesm13 Sep 24, 2016 8:58 AM in response to dwb
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Notebooks
    Sep 24, 2016 8:58 AM in response to dwb

    dwb,

     

    Thank you for your reply. Am I to run the firmware update on my old HDD that is still in the MBP and then boot into internet recovery from here with the new SDD attached externally via a SATA cable before then installing it physically into my machine?

     

    Thanks

  • by alex7375,

    alex7375 alex7375 Sep 24, 2016 9:13 AM in response to Fesm13
    Level 2 (295 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 24, 2016 9:13 AM in response to Fesm13

    I usually install MS-Windows 10 on the NEW SSD first and then download and install the newest firmware update for the Samsung SSD which can only be done with in MS-Windows.

     

    I don't know if they have a bootable USB option for Samsung SSD firmware upgrade.

     

    And then after you have upgraded the firmware on the SSD boot off your OS-X install Usb flash drive and erase and partition and format the SSD for use with OS-X. Install OS-X

     

    After you have OS-X installed on the new SSD you need to enable "trim" support for your Samsung SSD.

    Open 'terminal app" and enter this command "sudo trimforce enable" Select YES, YES and reboot when complete.

  • by Grant Bennet-Alder,Helpful

    Grant Bennet-Alder Grant Bennet-Alder Sep 25, 2016 1:57 AM in response to Fesm13
    Level 9 (61,140 points)
    Desktops
    Sep 25, 2016 1:57 AM in response to Fesm13

    There are two sets of problems you may encounter:

     

    Those related to the software upgrade.

    Those related to drive-swapping 'surgery'.

     

    In order to minimize the number of problems you face simultaneously, you should do as much as you can before swapping drives. Mac OS is happy to Install, boot, and run from any appropriate drive, including external drives.

     

    There is no need to do 'Fancy' partitioning on your new drive. Creating ONE partition from the entire drive using the defaults is all that is required. {just for reference, that is: GUID partition Map, MacOS Extended (journaled) Volume.}

     

    at this late date, the firmware supplied on your new SSD should already be up-to-date.

    Every SDD should be using TRIM for reliable long-term operation.

  • by dwb,Helpful

    dwb dwb Sep 25, 2016 1:57 AM in response to Fesm13
    Level 7 (24,253 points)
    Notebooks
    Sep 25, 2016 1:57 AM in response to Fesm13

    You may have already installed the firmware so check the site I linked to, it shows how you can check your computer. If it is already installed you’ll be able to boot into Internet Recovery mode by holding command option R. I’d test to make sure that works.

     

    If it does then you have two options using Internet Recovery: 1) connect the SSD with your cable, boot into IR recovery and then partition and install the OS as I described or 2) just install the SSD and then boot into IR recover etc. There’s a slight advantage to option 1 in that you can get the SSD all prepared, OS installed and data migrated before you install it.

  • by Fesm13,

    Fesm13 Fesm13 Sep 25, 2016 2:07 AM in response to dwb
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Notebooks
    Sep 25, 2016 2:07 AM in response to dwb

    So I have formatted and fresh installed OS El Cap onto my new SSD via SATA -USB connection - that took it 5 hours....but all done.

     

    I have now booted from the SSD and walking through the steps to get it up and running. I am at the the information transfer stage....but it gives me the option to transfer from my original Mac HDD or from the Time Machine......which one should I use?

     

    in anticipating questions.....my data is important - documents, images, pdf's etc. I am not that fussed about apps as I dont really have many nor use them much

     

    I am mostly concerned that I don't want to bring over any corrupt files that may have been the cause of the spinning beachball and spontaneous repetitive shutdowns in the past (get an error message and something in an oriental language with a grey fog over the screen and only option is to power it down to get out of it - last happened maybe 6 or 8 weeks ago)

  • by Fesm13,

    Fesm13 Fesm13 Sep 25, 2016 2:12 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Notebooks
    Sep 25, 2016 2:12 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

    I am already at the data transfer stage, and clearly overlooked this step. Can I TRIM enable after I've migrated my data Or should I stop and go back?

     

    I Am stopping at this stage until I can figure out which transfer method to adopt.

     

    appreciate all the help I am getting. Thank you all

  • by dwb,

    dwb dwb Sep 25, 2016 5:06 AM in response to Fesm13
    Level 7 (24,253 points)
    Notebooks
    Sep 25, 2016 5:06 AM in response to Fesm13

    Enable trim after putting it in the computer.

  • by Grant Bennet-Alder,Solvedanswer

    Grant Bennet-Alder Grant Bennet-Alder Sep 25, 2016 8:01 AM in response to Fesm13
    Level 9 (61,140 points)
    Desktops
    Sep 25, 2016 8:01 AM in response to Fesm13

    You can enable TRIM after you move the drive inside the computer.

     

    Since you know your Hard Drive has some problems, I would choose to source the data from your backups. It should not make a lot of difference. 'Not booting from that Hard drive' indicates the over 350,000 files that make up MacOS X are damaged, but you are replacing those with a new copy.

  • by Fesm13,

    Fesm13 Fesm13 Sep 27, 2016 11:08 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Notebooks
    Sep 27, 2016 11:08 AM in response to Grant Bennet-Alder

    I used my Time Machine backups as the source data. All fitted and up and running,

     

    Thank you all for the timely advice.