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Level 3

612 points

will a samsung 850 pro ssd work with yosemite?

Christopher Breen has an article today in Macworld explaining that most SSDs will not work with Yosemite. To paraphrase Mr. Breen, Apple's TRIM technology doesn't work with third party SSDs, and, while you could use Trim Enabler to make TRIM work with your drive in Mavericks, Trim Enabler modifies kext files and Yosemite will not run with modified kext files. The only workaround is to globally disable kext signing, which is not recommended for security reasons. Has anyone had any experience with this issue? I just purchased a third party SSD for my MBP. Thank you for any input.

Cheers, Peter

Posted on Nov 19, 2014 12:47 PM

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Network 23

Level 6

12,333 points

Posted on Nov 19, 2014 5:45 PM

Pram wrote:

Christopher Breen has an article today in Macworld explaining that most SSDs will not work with Yosemite.

That's not what it says. SSDs will work with Yosemite, the only thing that won't work is enabling third-party TRIM support. The SSD will boot and the SSD will work and it will be fast; having TRIM enabled is not even remotely a requirement. TRIM is just a housekeeping routine that is generally thought to be desired, but there's even debate on that.

The part of the Macworld article about not booting should only happen if you 1) enabled TRIM, 2) disabled kext signing, and 3) reset NVRAM, which re-enables kext signing and therefore blocks access to the hard drive you need to boot from. But if you didn't do 1-3 your Mac will boot into Yosemite just fine.

Some SSD brands do not require TRIM and some like OWC don't even recommend it because their SSDs have their own similar routines. I have a Samsung 840 and it works fine in Yosemite but I have not attempted to enable TRIM. I am not sure what the long term impact of that is, and I'm going to post a separate question regarding whether Disk Utility performs a trim when you Repair Disk because I read that somewhere.

In the end, the questions are: Does my SSD need TRIM, and if it does, how bad is it to run it in Yosemite without TRIM enabled? I am trying to find out the answer to the second question to know if not enabling TRIM is going to cause any more than minor problems down the road.

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75 replies

djpac1

Level 1

0 points

Apr 11, 2015 12:52 AM in response to bossen16

Hi i use CArbonCopyCloner and my samsung 850 pro works fine with yosemite

Apr 12, 2015 3:58 AM in response to djpac1

Just installed a Samsung 850 EVO 1Tb SSD this morning, following the steps on Crucial's website:

Initialising the SSD with Disk Utility via USB to SATA cable.

Restarting holding 'Cmd' + 'R' then using the Disk Utility option to clone the old HD to the new SSD....

...8 hours later... swapped them round using instructions on www.iFixit.com. Seems to work fine - only difficulty was that the mounting pins in the old hard drive use a Torx T6 screwdriver, but were very tight so needed careful use of pliers to loosen first.

Debating whether to enable TRIM or not. Wouldn't have thought installing the PRO would be very much different to the EVO.

15" Macbook Pro Late 2011 i7 Yosemite.

Apr 12, 2015 8:22 AM in response to Sooty Nixon

i just installed an 850 EVO last week and love it, i spoke to Samsung level 3 tech

support and they definitely recommend using a Trim Enabler ! he said he has seen

new drives fail in less than 60 days if you do a lot of writes and deletes without

using trim and even though the drive is under warranty it's a huge hassle !

Caveat Emptor !

DJ Nitro

Level 1

0 points

May 7, 2015 4:18 PM in response to GreyWullf

Hey there, since your original post about this was ages ago, could you please tell me if you had any problems afterwards? I am thinking of buying 850 EVO 1TB and would like to know if it is worth buying/burning cash for something that might not work? Cheers, appreciate it!

etresoft

Level 8

46,390 points

May 7, 2015 4:22 PM in response to Sonia McConnell

OS X does not support TRIM on 3rd party drives, nor is it safe to apply the low-level hacks to enable it.

May 7, 2015 6:21 PM in response to DJ Nitro

i've been using the EVO 850 for a month now with my late 2009

Mac Mini and it's definitely a huge improvement over a standard

platter hard drive. apps open almost instantly even large apps like

photoshop open and perform much quicker. have also been using

trim enabler with no apparent issues.

depending on the age of your Mac you may only get 1.5 or 3Gb performance

instead of the 6Gb it's rated at.

definitely worth the upgrade, i got the 500Gb EVO 850 on Amazon for $189

DJ Nitro

Level 1

0 points

May 8, 2015 3:26 AM in response to Sonia McConnell

Thank you Sonia, but I was hoping I could do without TRIM as reported by a few people that it works since Samsung uses a different approach to this issue. I have 2.53 GHz Core i5 from 2010 with 8 GB RAM.

bossen16

Level 1

0 points

May 8, 2015 9:02 AM in response to djpac1

My problem turned out to be the hard drive cable and not the Samsung 850 pro. Got a new cable and everything runs perfectly. Photoshop, Illustrator and Indesign opens in seconds, no delay at all. I'm very satisfied. Write speed 486,7, reed speed 518,7. See screen shot.

Network 23

Level 6

12,333 points

May 8, 2015 10:59 AM in response to DJ Nitro

DJ Nitro wrote:

Thank you Sonia, but I was hoping I could do without TRIM as reported by a few people that it works since Samsung uses a different approach to this issue. I have 2.53 GHz Core i5 from 2010 with 8 GB RAM.

From the reading I have done, Samsung is not one I would choose. Samsung seems to say TRIM is needed, while OWC and Crucial say it is not needed with theirs. I have an older Samsung SSD (which I regret buying for multiple reasons) and to make up for not enabling TRIM, I am going to occasionally condition it with the new Disk Sensei tool. It is written by the same guy who wrote TRIM Enabler, and in fact replaces it.

etresoft

Level 8

46,390 points

May 8, 2015 11:34 AM in response to Network 23

Hello Network 23,

I have a Samsung SSD in my 2011 MacBook Pro. TRIM is not enabled. I cannot tell any difference between that and my 2014 MacBook Pro with an Apple SSD and TRIM.

Network 23

Level 6

12,333 points

May 8, 2015 12:17 PM in response to etresoft

etresoft wrote:

Hello Network 23,

I have a Samsung SSD in my 2011 MacBook Pro. TRIM is not enabled. I cannot tell any difference between that and my 2014 MacBook Pro with an Apple SSD and TRIM.

It's hard to know whether that is a valid comparison without knowing how long each SSD has been in service. The performance degradation resulting from no TRIM support would not be apparent for some time, maybe months, and it would depend on how much the SSD is used. Certainly if an SSD were freshly installed, there would be no difference in performance between TRIM and no TRIM.

For my own Samsung SSD, I am not going to worry about it too much unless I think I notice a performance degradation and then I'll condition it. Otherwise I might refresh it every few months. In practical use this maintenance might not be too onerous but I would prefer a brand where it may not be necessary at all. My other reason for not liking Samsung was their poor handling of the 840 EVO performance fiasco (does not affect 850).

Westah

Level 1

4 points

May 21, 2015 7:47 AM in response to Pram

I have purchased and mounted a SAMSUNG 850 EVO into my Macbook pro 2012 Running yosemite from USB stick.

Now when i try to erase and partion the Samsung SSD it would not do it in Disk utility. It says somethings wrong in Disk Utility. I cant Erase or Partition the samsung SSD.

I am running yosemite. Do i need to get a USB to SATA and have it not installed via my internal SATA before yosemite is installed? I mean, do I have to partition the new SSD through USB to SATA externally?

Jul 12, 2015 9:39 AM in response to Westah

Did you ever find a solution to this issue, Westah? I have purchased a Samsung EVO and was planning a clean instal using an El Capital usb.

ApexRon

Level 1

41 points

Jul 12, 2015 10:34 AM in response to Pram

I installed a SanDisk SDSSDXPS480G last November. When I did the physical install I also removed the Optical drive and purchased an USB BlueRay. By removing my Optical drive I got the full benefit of the SATA interface rather than the half speed caused by the Optical drive.

Link Speed:	3 Gigabit
Negotiated Link Speed:	3 Gigabit
Physical Interconnect:	SATA

I have a MacBook Pro Mid 2009.

Results	375.76
System Info
Xbench Version	1.3
System Version	10.10.4 (14E46)
Physical RAM	8192 MB
Model	MacBookPro5,3
Drive Type	SanDisk SDSSDXPS480G
Disk Test	375.76
Sequential	237.45
Uncached Write	369.68	226.98 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write	289.55	163.83 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read	121.18	35.46 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read	410.71	206.42 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Random	900.02
Uncached Write	1199.92	127.03 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write	542.64	173.72 MB/sec [256K blocks]
Uncached Read	2061.82	14.61 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read	779.36	144.62 MB/sec [256K blocks]

Aug 2, 2015 11:51 AM in response to Pram

Hi there!

I installed a Samsung EVO 850 1TB in my Macbook Pro 15" Early 2011 and without a single hitch.

I used an external SATA-reader to first format the drive, then I installed switched my internal HDD with the EVO. Then I performed a Yosemite install using a USB stick. Then I used the migration assistant when prompted to get my data from the old drive using the same SATA-reader as before. Done! Everything works like a charm. Had roughly 500GB of data so it took about 5 hours for migration assistant to migrate over USB. You can get it to run faster with carbon copy or similar but this worked for me.

Regarding TRIM. You can enable trim in Mac OS X Yosemite version 10.10.4 using a Terminal command. It's as easy as [sudo trimforce enable] and is the official Apple supported way. http://www.macrumors.com/2015/07/01/os-x-trim-ssd/

However, debate is still going on wether this is something that will increase or decrease the SSD's lifespan. Modern SSD technologies haven't been out that long; though, Samsung's 5 to 10 year warranty signals the manufacturer's trust in their drives after all...

Cheers!

will a samsung 850 pro ssd work with yosemite?