Internal SSD for early 2008 Mac Pro: TRIM Enabler Question

Install TRIM Enabler after you install Mountain Lion on the SSD.

Clone the SSD. You need to. And you need to boot to that or another sys tem that also has TRIM Enabler so that when you run Disk Utility's Repair Disk (system partitoln name) it invokes TRIM.

There is also since Lion the ability of DU Repair Disk to also check and repair the 'raw' drive level (WDxxxx or SEAxxxx) to check all the partition tables.

After installing ML boot to another drive, install TRIM and repair t he SSD, and install TE to the SSD.

http://www.groths.org/software/trimenabler/

Before you clone, install TRIM Enabler

Nothing gets moved physically, only the system.

You dont' say where you are going to clone your new ML OS to. Can be anywhere, just needs a small 120GB partition on one of your drives, so it really does not take up much space - I sometimes use TimeMachine, I also have it on the end of the major data drive as well.

Unless you are going to dual boot I would pull Snow Leopard after you pull the files off and moved so you can use it for a data-only drive, or something else.

If you clone your system - and hope you have looked at and used / tested CCC already, nice to do a walk thru and test it all out and get the feel for it once -

you clone the system then you have cloned Applications.

What you also want to do is include JUST the minimum from /Users/my-account/

- such as ~/Library and maybe Documents but small and nothing else.

You want to copy your user folders such as Documents... on to the end, and anything else, to another drive ... ideally.

Now have a clone of the old sysem

Have copied all the important media files, folders, documents to another drive

Have an installer for OS X ready

Installed clean system to SSD

Setup Assistant will ask to import to Mac OS X on the SSD from your other system that you want to import, and you only want to import your apps that you trust are compatible and current. Those that have installers sometimes best to use the installer. Your prefs and mail are in ~/Library. You want that.

The user home Library gets a lot of hits on IO for reads and writes and best to have on the SSD - rather than have on another drive. If you want the entire user account on another drive, as one or more tutorials show and which is easy to do with Accounts settings in OS X, go ahead. I don't, I left mine on the SSD.

I would clone your SSD soon after you have it the way you want it.

And after all the disk I/O and writes, even with TRIM, I would boot from a system running Mavericks and run DU Disk Repair (never run DU from an older system on a newer OS).

Fantom drive - these are green? and uses USB3? something else? connected to a PCIe card? and 100% worthy of trust, right?

And you are going to use one drive, partitioned, with partitions for cloning the system, small 200GB, TimeMachine, 350% capacity of what you would ever need, and maybe even a data clone partition? Fine. Ideal is to have two drives, two sets, not have all your files and backups on one drive if the drive fails for some reason. Convenient as it is.

Does Mountain Lion install use anything from Snow Leopard to be successfully installed?

That is not a dumb question, unless you though of it and did not ask it. The answer is surprisingly complicated!

RE: How to Install 10.7 or later on a Mac that does not have Internet Recovery

The Mac Pro silver tower does not have Internet Recovery programmed into its Firmware the way the latest MacBooks do. To Install onto a completely blank drive, you need to boot from somewhere to run the Installer. That can be:

1) A stand-alone home-made bootable Installer image on a bootable drive such as an 8GB USB thumb drive or a Dual-Layer Installer DVD.

2) A Recovery_HD Volume from any drive, including:

-- a Hard Drive from 10.7 or later (which has a Recovery_HD Volume on it)

-- a Recovery Disk Assistant Recovery_HD on a 1GB thumb drive (created especially for this circumstance) Everyone who owns a silver Mac Pro should have one!

-- a Time Machine drive from 10.7.4 or later (which automatically includes a Recovery_HD)

3) "Install Mac OS X Application" just downloaded from the Internet. Running under the current Mac OS X (which could be 10.6.8) this works because it pre-places many of the Installer components onto the Install-to Drive, and creates a temporary bootable image [not clear if it creates a Recovery_HD or something else] and then proceeds to boot from it and then Install.

.

All my links and tips recommend users doing clean installs, that means format the drive first, nothing on the device, and makes sure that all new partition maps and volumes are created.

How to create an OS X Lion installation disc MacFixIt

Migration Assistant Update for Mac OS X Snow Leopard

http://www.apple.com/support/lion/installrecovery/

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13727_7-20080989-263/how-to-create-an-os-x-lion-ins tallation-disc

http://www.coolestguyplanettech.com/how-to-make-a-bootable-osx-10-8-mountain-lio n-disc-or-drive-from-the-downloaded-mountain-lion-app/

How to make your own bootable OS X 10.9 Mavericks USB install drive

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2013/10/how-to-make-your-own-bootable-os-x-10-9-mav ericks-usb-install-drive/