how to install SSD as a boot drive for Snow leopard? I am confused...

Hi, There are any number of different ways to move the data from one drive to another. My preference (the last one) would be to do a clean fresh install using system disks because of the way SSD drive's lay down data.

I'm not going to go into detail laying out HOW you do this. I assume you can do a Google (or other) engine search for details.

1) SystemMigration - this is a built in MAC OS X utility that allows you to move system + data from one drive to another

2) Do a Time Machine backup of everything and then use TM to restore everything the way it is or REINSTALL a clean install of the data+new system on the replacement drive.

3) Carbon copy Cloner is a great cloning application and can "block clone" from a smaller drive to a replacement drive of the same or larger size

The above 3 methods assume you will transfer ALL the date, good bad & ugly, from the magnetic media to the SSD. This is the most efficient method, but from personal experience you may end up not getting

the faster boot up time and disk responsiveness you would expect from an SSD. I can't say why; it may have to do with the way data is initially "laid down" on the SSD OR all the extra "jetsam and flotsam" that accompanies a used system drive - "(how's THAT for non techno-geek detail).

I have noticed that Drive clones are only as good as the source from which they are taken and that when I cloned a magnetic Lion 10.6 Drive to an SSD, there was no significant advantage in boot times with a 10.6 Lion boot taking anywhere from 45 to 60 to 75 seconds (pretty much he same for magnetic drives).

I then did an original clean system install on the SSD as if I were doing it for the first time....updated it completely and THEN and only then did I reinstall all the apps individually followed by cloining the data files.

By doing this, I was able to cut the boot time on that SSD (and all subsequent ssd clones of the original SDD) to 25 to 30 seconds.

NOT BAD. Just simply cloning what you already have is a simple option, but if you're looking for optimal SSD performance, I'd opt for a fresh clean instll of everything.

Uygirs wrote:

Hello; This is first time I will use SSD on my macpro. I ordered the SSD from amazon and it will come next week I hope. I need some help and advice. My boot drive is HDD (Macintosh HD) now. So, I Want to move from the HDD to SSD. What's the easiest and guarentee way to do it? I am not a good technician... 🙂

My system:

Macpro early 2008 (3.1)...

In addition to how to get your boot drive's contents onto the SSD, you'll need to worry about how to get the SSD to fit in your Mac Pro. Since it's obviously a lot smaller than the standard 3.5" HD you already have, it's not going to mount directly into the HD sled that comes with your Mac Pro. And since yours is 2008, I know of no pre-made sled designed for an SSD that will fit yours or earlier Mac Pro's. There is a sled for 2009 and later but that won't fit. If you look here http://eshop.macsales.com/search/mac+pro+ssd+sled, you'll see the sled that fits the later Macs and a nicely made adapter which will match the SSD to the earlier sleds. There's also a way to install it below the DVD drive, but that's somewhat more complicated.

You can also give OWC a call; they are very helpful and knowledgeable.

There ARE sleds to mount SSDs on 2008 Mac Pros as well as 2006-2008 Mac Pros. Icy Block works fine on 2006 through 2008 Mac Pros and I'm sure they make mounts for ALL Mac Pros.

OWC is a GREAT resource. Good luck!

Just boot to your install disc, open up disk utility from the utilities menu and use the restore feature to restore the data from the HDD to the SSD. That would be the easiest and quickest. Just drag the start up volume (HDD) to the "Source" Field and drag the New SSD volume to the "Destination" field. Then hit restore. Your HDD will be cloned to your SSD.

curtispsf wrote:

There ARE sleds to mount SSDs on 2008 Mac Pros as well as 2006-2008 Mac Pros. Icy Block works fine on 2006 through 2008 Mac Pros and I'm sure they make mounts for ALL Mac Pros...

It took a while to find them because they aren't sleds, they are 3.5" HD drive sized enclosures which the SSD is installed into (if there is such a sled, a link would be really helpful). That enclosure is then mounted on the Mac Pro sled. While there are some cooling slots in the Icy Dock box, the SSD doesn't receive the benefit of the Mac Pro's PCI fan blowing on it. I know that SSD's are supposed to be cool running, but I installed one two weeks ago and ran it in a Voyager Q (http://eshop.macsales.com/item/NewerTech/FWU3ES2HDK/) before mounting it internally so the drive was exposed. It didn't get hot like a hardworking hard disk, but it was definitely warm, and that was with ventilation. Wrapping it in plastic, which the cheaper Icy Dock enclosures are made of, likely won't help it keep cool.

I have used ICY DOCK products to mount SSDs on several Mac Pros alongside standard mag drives.. My experience is that they are absolutely fine for SSDs in terms of ventilation. The SSDs will get slightly warm which is what happens to virtually ANY product that has current flowing throught it. (Moving electrons generate heat).

By contrast, the magnetic drives get HOT to the touch. Not exactly scientific, but one can feel the difference.

You are correct, these are docking adaptors, not sleds, but they perform the function of sleds. AND regardless of "name" they are incredibly easy to find without naming or linking to them. All one needs to do is search for "mount SSDs on Mac Pro". That's how I found them.

Also beware of getting any generic 2.5 to 3.5 converter bay-type things. When I worked for Apple we would have people come in with these hoping to get there SSD mounted in their Mac Pros, only to find that the SATA connector doesn't line up properly since it is stationary on the Mac Pro. It needs to be designed specifically for a Mac Pro (and the correct Applecare model at that).

I have had issues in the past restoring the startup disk to another volume since you are booted from it at the time of the restore. It either won't work at all (resource busy error) or it will be horrendously slow. If you boot from the installer or a seperate OS on an external drive or partition then the image should go much faster.

MyrkridianRhapsody wrote:

I have had issues in the past restoring the startup disk to another volume since you are booted from it at the time of the restore. It either won't work at all (resource busy error) or it will be horrendously slow. If you boot from the installer or a seperate OS on an external drive or partition then the image should go much faster.

Actually, if you wish to install a "CLEAN" new SNOW Leopard System, you can restore using Time Machine. Just boot up from the Snow Leopard DVD and select Time Machine restore. It will give you a clean original system install PLUS ALL of your files. The downside is that you would need to use software update to update the operating system, but that might not be a bad idea. This might give you the cleanest "fresh" install from which to start from in using your new SSD Drive.

Best of luck!

curtispsf wrote:

I have used ICY DOCK products to mount SSDs on several Mac Pros alongside standard mag drives.. My experience is that they are absolutely fine for SSDs in terms of ventilation. The SSDs will get slightly warm which is what happens to virtually ANY product that has current flowing throught it. (Moving electrons generate heat).

By contrast, the magnetic drives get HOT to the touch. Not exactly scientific, but one can feel the difference.

You are correct, these are docking adaptors, not sleds, but they perform the function of sleds. AND regardless of "name" they are incredibly easy to find without naming or linking to them. All one needs to do is search for "mount SSDs on Mac Pro". That's how I found them.

First, they don't perform the function of sleds, they perform the function of mimicking the shape, mounting points and, hopefully, correct alignment of the bus connectors of a 3.5" HD; you still need Apple's sled to connect the SSD/adapter combination to the Mac Pro's back plane.

Second, if the SSD gets warm when almost fully exposed to ambient air and the heat can dissipate, it's going to get warmer and warmer as the heat is bottled up inside a plastic box in an already warm environment. It's obvious from the pictures on Icy Dock's website that there are some ventilation slots cut in the plastic box and that can't hurt but it won't cool as well as having the drive directly exposed to the blast of the PCI fan. Unless you can get a reliable temperature measurement of the SSD as installed in the adapter on the sled in operation for some time, there's really no way of knowing how well that ventilation is working.

FatMac\>MacPro wrote:

curtispsf wrote:

I have used ICY DOCK products to mount SSDs on several Mac Pros alongside standard mag drives.. My experience is that they are absolutely fine for SSDs in terms of ventilation. The SSDs will get slightly warm which is what happens to virtually ANY product that has current flowing throught it. (Moving electrons generate heat).

By contrast, the magnetic drives get HOT to the touch. Not exactly scientific, but one can feel the difference.

You are correct, these are docking adaptors, not sleds, but they perform the function of sleds. AND regardless of "name" they are incredibly easy to find without naming or linking to them. All one needs to do is search for "mount SSDs on Mac Pro". That's how I found them.

First, they don't perform the function of sleds, they perform the function of mimicking the shape, mounting points and, hopefully, correct alignment of the bus connectors of a 3.5" HD; you still need Apple's sled to connect the SSD/adapter combination to the Mac Pro's back plane.

Second, if the SSD gets warm when almost fully exposed to ambient air and the heat can dissipate, it's going to get warmer and warmer as the heat is bottled up inside a plastic box in an already warm environment. It's obvious from the pictures on Icy Dock's website that there are some ventilation slots cut in the plastic box and that can't hurt but it won't cool as well as having the drive directly exposed to the blast of the PCI fan. Unless you can get a reliable temperature measurement of the SSD as installed in the adapter on the sled in operation for some time, there's really no way of knowing how well that ventilation is working.

curtispsf wrote:

FatMac\>MacPro wrote:

curtispsf wrote:

I have used ICY DOCK products to mount SSDs on several Mac Pros alongside standard mag drives.. My experience is that they are absolutely fine for SSDs in terms of ventilation. The SSDs will get slightly warm which is what happens to virtually ANY product that has current flowing throught it. (Moving electrons generate heat).

By contrast, the magnetic drives get HOT to the touch. Not exactly scientific, but one can feel the difference.

You are correct, these are docking adaptors, not sleds, but they perform the function of sleds. AND regardless of "name" they are incredibly easy to find without naming or linking to them. All one needs to do is search for "mount SSDs on Mac Pro". That's how I found them.

First, they don't perform the function of sleds, they perform the function of mimicking the shape, mounting points and, hopefully, correct alignment of the bus connectors of a 3.5" HD; you still need Apple's sled to connect the SSD/adapter combination to the Mac Pro's back plane.

Second, if the SSD gets warm when almost fully exposed to ambient air and the heat can dissipate, it's going to get warmer and warmer as the heat is bottled up inside a plastic box in an already warm environment. It's obvious from the pictures on Icy Dock's website that there are some ventilation slots cut in the plastic box and that can't hurt but it won't cool as well as having the drive directly exposed to the blast of the PCI fan. Unless you can get a reliable temperature measurement of the SSD as installed in the adapter on the sled in operation for some time, there's really no way of knowing how well that ventilation is working.

Yes, I believe I did post that. My point was that words and precision matter. Had you planned on replying?

FatMac\>MacPro wrote:

curtispsf wrote:

I have used ICY DOCK products to mount SSDs on several Mac Pros alongside standard mag drives.. My experience is that they are absolutely fine for SSDs in terms of ventilation. The SSDs will get slightly warm which is what happens to virtually ANY product that has current flowing throught it. (Moving electrons generate heat).

By contrast, the magnetic drives get HOT to the touch. Not exactly scientific, but one can feel the difference.

You are correct, these are docking adaptors, not sleds, but they perform the function of sleds. AND regardless of "name" they are incredibly easy to find without naming or linking to them. All one needs to do is search for "mount SSDs on Mac Pro". That's how I found them.

First, they don't perform the function of sleds, they perform the function of mimicking the shape, mounting points and, hopefully, correct alignment of the bus connectors of a 3.5" HD; you still need Apple's sled to connect the SSD/adapter combination to the Mac Pro's back plane.

Second, if the SSD gets warm when almost fully exposed to ambient air and the heat can dissipate, it's going to get warmer and warmer as the heat is bottled up inside a plastic box in an already warm environment. It's obvious from the pictures on Icy Dock's website that there are some ventilation slots cut in the plastic box and that can't hurt but it won't cool as well as having the drive directly exposed to the blast of the PCI fan. Unless you can get a reliable temperature measurement of the SSD as installed in the adapter on the sled in operation for some time, there's really no way of knowing how well that ventilation is working.

You are correct about the terminology; they are adaptors and of course, a sled is necessary. I have used 4 SSDs so far and the terminology never got in the way of figuring out what was needed to mount. ICY DOCK is very highly rated for MAC products and that is what I would stick with.

Years ago, I was able to measure the temp of installed drives with an application....used it with G4 towers and was surprised by just how hot the drives actually. I'm sure there must still be an app out there to actually test the temp of the drives. That said, I HAVE checked and compared the temp of mag drives alongside SSD drives using a simple device...what all MOMs have used for ages...my hand. I felt the mag drives and then removed the SSD sled/adaptors. The mag drives were all HOT to the touch. I opened the adaptors and the SSDs were slightly warm but nowhere near as hot as the mag drives.

Conclusion: ICY DOCKS are fine for dissipating whatever heat is caused by SSD drives. These drives have much cooler operating temps than mag drives because they have no moving frictional parts (other than electrons).