Replacing Optical Drive in MacBook Pro with SSD Drive. Steps after installation with OSX?

Question

Replacing Optical Drive in MacBook Pro with SSD Drive. Steps after installation with OSX?

Hi everyone,

This is my first post to this Apple Support site. I recently decided to upgrade my rarely used optical drive on my Macbook Pro i7 (late-2011 model.) I looked through Youtube videos and know the steps as in what type of SSD drives to buy and such but my main question is about the installation of OSX after the installation. I know that you have to format the newly installed SSD once its in the Macbook. But how do you copy the OS over to the SSD, what application do you use (or is recomended?) and what do you do with the OS that is on the HDD already?

I'm currently stumped on this main point. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

-Bryant

MacBook Pro, OS X Mavericks (10.9), Late 2011, 15-inch, i7

Posted on Nov 13, 2013 8:31 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Best reply

GeekBoy.from.Illinois

Level 4

2,829 points

Nov 13, 2013 9:06 PM in response to theappleorchards

You can clone the OS over from the internal HDD using an application like Carbon Copy Cloner or Super Duper!. I have used both of those and they both work nicely. I will say that Carbon Copy Cloner does allow you to clone the Recovery Partition, whereas the last I checked, SuperDuper! didn't have that option (although I haven't donwloaded their latest update either).

I would like to add that you really should consider putting the SSD in the primary drive bay and outting the old HDD in the optical bay. You might be surprised how much of a performance boost that could give you. Also depending upon your MBP, you may have issues with the SSD in the optical bay...

Reply