Solid State and Applications

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freak4mac Author

Level 1

4 points

Solid State and Applications

Hi all,

I have a Mac Pro tower -- 20 gigs ram - and about 4 TB of storage.

However I opted for a SSD for faster startup and access...

here's my questions -- because that limits storage of files, I still need my applications and new ones added -

today I needed to download Adobe Illustrator and says not enough space. Is there a way i can download it from adobe to another destination? If so how do i point it there?

What about programs like Aperture - can i store that on one of my externals since i need the storage space?

Please advise...

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.4.10)

Posted on May 17, 2013 10:36 AM

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Answer 1

The hatter

Level 9

60,990 points

May 17, 2013 10:46 AM in response to freak4mac

your downloads from any browser can go where you want but an SSD should always have 20% 20GB or more free space; your OS and apps should fit fine on 120GB SSD with ALL data and media on other drives (you can leave your own ~/Library on SSD which is ~3GB)

If an app allows custom install location, fine, or maybe you should choose a 2nd SSD and RAID, or just upgrade to 240GB Samsung 840 or 840 Pro.

You say external, well not knowing what OS you run and which Mac Pro tower but SSD PCIe cards (SATA and add your own one or two SSDs for $150-300) means you can have 6 at least (or more) internal drive devices. Why external?

And you need to use the TRIM Enabler for your SSD to help with managing deleted space and cells.

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Answer 2

May 17, 2013 7:39 PM in response to The hatter

The simplest way to set it up is to put System, Library, Applications, and the hidden unix files including Paging/Swap on the SSD. Leave one Admin account that you use only for administration on the SSD, then move the rest of the User's Home directories off. (Moving you main account's Library back to the SSD is a flourish The hatter favors -- I prefer the simplicity of all daily-use Accounts on a secondary drive.)

These articles explain how and why to accomplish this without having to use any Terminal commands to get there:

Japamac's Blog: Make Space for Performance -- Moving the Home Folder

http://chris.pirillo.com/how-to-move-the-home-folder-in-os-x-and-why/

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