Negotiated Link Speed only 1.5Gbps on original hd (SATAII) - 15" mid-2009 MBP

I think that Apple Care is wrong.

I have 2 drives in my mid2009 MBP and I see this in system information

NVidia MCP79 AHCI:

Vendor: NVidia

Product: MCP79 AHCI

Link Speed: 3 Gigabit

Negotiated Link Speed: 3 Gigabit

Description: AHCI Version 1.20 Supported

ST95005620AS:

....

NVidia MCP79 AHCI:

Vendor: NVidia

Product: MCP79 AHCI

Link Speed: 3 Gigabit

Negotiated Link Speed: 1.5 Gigabit

Description: AHCI Version 1.20 Supported

SanDisk SDSSDX480GG25:

....

That's incorrect. Apple usually puts hard drives in that aren't up to the max capacity of the computer.

That aside, I put an SSD rated at SATA III in a mac mini, and it showed at SATA I speeds. The vendor said I needed to use their SATA II SSD, which I did, and instead of showing 1.5 Gbit/s it now shows 3 Gbit/s 🙂

I have a MPB 8,1 and have both a Cortex M4 SSD in the original drive bay, and the original 750GB HDD in an OWC DataDoubler (or maybe it's the other way around). I have the following listed under SATA in System Information (aka System Profiler..):

Intel 6 Series Chipset: (Tosheba HDD)

Vendor: Intel

Product: 6 Series Chipset

Link Speed: 6 Gigabit

Negotiated Link Speed: 3 Gigabit

Description: AHCI Version 1.30 Supported

TOSHIBA MK7559GSXF:

Capacity: 750.16 GB (750,156,374,016 bytes)

Model: TOSHIBA MK7559GSX

Intel 6 Series Chipset: (Cortex M4)

Vendor: Intel

Product: 6 Series Chipset

Link Speed: 6 Gigabit

Negotiated Link Speed: 6 Gigabit

Description: AHCI Version 1.30 Supported

M4-CT128M4SSD2:

Capacity: 128.04 GB (128,035,676,160 bytes)

Model: M4-CT128M4SSD2

So it looks like the SSD is running at 6 Gb/s ("full speed" I guess), while the HDD is only running at 3 ("half speed" maybe).

Jim

hey, Jim.

i'm looking to do the same thing you've done, and i have pretty much the exact same set up as you with the same toshiba HDD, same MBP 8.1.

It would really help me out to know if you're getting the 6Gb/s with the SDD in the Optical bay or in the original Hard drive bay. On the OWC website, it says that tests from Apple have shown that you can't get those speeds from the connectors in the optical bay, and thus recommends that if you get a sata III drive, you should install it in the Hard Drive bay and put your old drive in the Data Doubler in the optical bay. However, I've been unable to discern through my research if the Toshiba 750GB HDD will fit in the data doubler (data doubler says it takes 2.5 inch drives of UP TO 9.5mm, while the Toshiba says it needs slots of AT LEAST 9.5mm).

If you did the upgrade yourself, I would think you might remember if you had to take the extra step of removing the original hard drive and putting it in the data doubler. If you are getting those speeds on the SSD from the optical bay, it would make this upgrade much, much easier...

Also, how has the performance been subjectively? does it feel a lot faster? i want to upgrade to a 240GB SDD for my system drive, as well as go from 4GB ram to 16.

any info you could give me would really help me out greatly, because you have exactly my system, it seems, and have done pretty much exactly what i want to do.

Thanks,

Harry