SATA II 3.0 Gigabit on a Mid 2009 MacBook Pro

Question

SATA II 3.0 Gigabit on a Mid 2009 MacBook Pro

I am looking to upgrade my hard drive to a larger one, but haven't been able to find the answer to this question:

Can I use a 3.0 Gigabit SATA II drive on my MacBook Pro? I have looked in System Profiler and found this:

Intel ICH8-M AHCI:

Vendor: Intel
Product: ICH8-M AHCI
Link Speed: 1.5 Gigabit
Negotiated Link Speed: 1.5 Gigabit
Description: AHCI Version 1.10 Supported

So, does that mean that my MBP only supports up to 1.5 Gigabit? Will a 3.0 Gigabit drive still work at a limited speed, or must I upgrade my current drive with a 1.5 Gigabit drive?

Thanks in advance for the help!

-Jason

Macbook Pro 2.2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, Mac OS X (10.6.6)

Posted on Mar 12, 2011 2:21 PM

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Answer 1

Tevfik

Level 1

0 points

Apr 6, 2011 11:51 AM in response to jasonwlangley

I have the same problem with my MacBook Pro Late 2008 (non-unibody). Both Link Speed and Negotiated Link Speed are 1.5 gigabit.

Could somebody please explain if there is something wrong with the settings?

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Answer 2

JoeyR

Level 6

8,305 points

Apr 6, 2011 12:42 PM in response to jasonwlangley

There is a firmware update (which should normally have been available through Software Update quite some time ago) to enable the 3.0GB interface in the mid 2009 MacBook Pro:

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3561

It should be noted that there were MANY reports of problems in using drives with a 3.0GB interface. The above KB article states that Apple only used 1.5GB drives. Their response to just about everyone that had problems with 3.0GB drives was that they did not support third party drives. You can find the "second" part of the thread on this here:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2267098&start=0&tstart=0

Note the link in the very first comment. A new thread was created to carry on the original which had gotten so long that it was causing problems with some browsers timing out.

Having said that... I have a mid 2009 MacBook Pro with a SATA 3.0GB drive and I have not had any problems. I actually waited a year before I updated my firmware for fear that it would cause a problem... but it has been running fine.

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Answer 3

Bessem

Level 1

1 points

Apr 6, 2011 3:00 PM in response to Tevfik

You've got a penryn macbook pro, I think. Look at this link:
http://discussions.info.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=2803704&tstart=0

The one above, has a unibody macbook pro version just after yours.
To answer your question, it is limited to 1.5 Gbps for SATA. By cons for the macbook pro 5.1 it is an update that allows them to activate the SATA 3Gb and be clamped.

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Answer 4

Apr 8, 2011 9:34 AM in response to jasonwlangley

I have a 3.0 Gigabit drive installed on my MBP as of a month now (running at 1.5 gigabits apparently) and so far no problems...

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Answer 5

fellow

Level 1

84 points

Sep 3, 2011 11:34 PM in response to JoeyR

Hey JoeyR,

I got so hopeful when I read your post and found the 1.7 firmware. Unfortunately, my MBP 5,2 is showing Negotiated Link Speed of 1.5. This was alright with my Apple SSD TS256A, which is on the slow side. But I just got an OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 6G (sata v3) SSD that could easily run at sata v2, which my machine should do. The 1.7 and 1.8 firmwares will not install with the package.

Is there another way?

Thanks to all,

fellow

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Answer 6

Jul 8, 2012 8:23 AM in response to fellow

I have the same issue. I have an OWC 6G drive on a mid-2009 MBP. It only connects at 1.5 gigabit. And, the firmware update won't install (says I don't need it). I sent a query to OWC, I think this may be a design issue with 6G drives. I'm only getting 132 MB/s reads and 72 MB/s writes.

FYI, the new 2012 MBPs are SATA III (6 gigabit)! I have a Samsung drive that gets 450 MB/s reads! Boots in 8 Seconds..... Wooo Hooo!

On the "its not so bad" side, my 2009 MBP does boot in 15 seconds. Not bad, but not 8 seconds!

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Answer 7

Jul 8, 2012 8:53 AM in response to Halfmoonh4

PS: I finally found this, that seems to explain the problem... Basically the 2009 MBP won't support certain types of high-end SSDs. I'm assuming my OWC 6G falls into this same category. I'm hoping OWC will swap it for a 3G that may fix the problem.

http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/forum/showthread.php?68873-Finally-the-truth-a bout-the-mid-2009-Macbook-Pro-and-Vertex-drives

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