An ssd connected over thunderbolt seemed like overkill, and i was already powering one display with the built. I had spent extra money when i bought the imac, to get the fusion drive, thinking it would have an ssd to run the os and i would get the. How to select a different startup disk apple support. With transfer speeds up to 560 mbps you can quickly save, edit, and archive large photos, videos, and source files. The plugable thunderbolt 3 nvme external ssd is a solid state drive that offers one terabyte or two terabytes of external storage for those who like to create on the go. External ssd thunderbolt drive vs internal ssd drive. Gtechnology 1tb gdrive mobile ssd rseries storage apple sg. However, i must go in to the mac os first, and tell it to use the external windows bootcamp partition to boot from. Depending on how pricing of thirdparty external thunderbolt drives goes, you might even see users buying the minimum onboard storage for macs and just booting every time from a. Well, heres the thing, you can simply boot from the. If you are able to fix the hard drive or ssd in your mac or an external drive using disk utility you will hopefully be able to recover your files. I bought this case in hopes of using it with a samsung 960 nvme 2280 m. To use os x recovery and other advanced features, you need to use the guid partition table format.
Using external thunderbolt ssd to speed up mid2011 27 imac in reply to bent christian jun 20, 2017 seconded either i or my sister found the monster ssd when she was looking for a way to upgrade her older imac instead of buying a new one, and it worked so well, i had my wife buy one for her late2012 21. I cloned my hdd to a samsung t5 500gb ssd because i didnt feel like tearing open my imac to replace the internal hard drive. How to add a fast new ssd to your old mac or macbook for only. Booting from a solid state drive like the samsung t5 should give you a boost in performance, especially if you are running an older imac with a. Note that im currently running windows on an external ssd and playing games on top of that via usb 3. Mac users can even install macos on one ssd to create an incredibly fast boot drive. The 8 best external hard drives and ssds for mac and pc users. The rugged ssd pro includes just a single thunderbolt 3usbc interface, but most of its high price is down to the use of the latest nvme solidstate drives, which provide top performance for high. Bootcamp on mac using an nvme ssd bootcamp egpu setup. Aug 30, 2018 one final requirement which is sometimes forgotten, but which can stop any of this from happening, is that the hardware the macs interface and the drive enclosure for external disks must support booting that mac. I have the stock 500gb drive in my mac mini and have all my media on an external fw800 drive. I had this question myself, as i have a 20 imac that has been beachballing like crazy over the past year.
Why the ability to boot from thunderbolt on a mac is huge. Booting windows from an external thunderbolt drive. Booting from a solid state drive like the samsung t5 should give you a boost in performance, especially if you are running an older imac with a 5,400 rpm hard drive. Sep 28, 2017 i had this question myself, as i have a 20 imac that has been beachballing like crazy over the past year. In theory, working with an ssd drive attached via thunderbolt should feel much faster than working with even a 7200 rpm hdd installed inside. I have bootcamp up and running already from the internal disk, everything works perfectly, but id like to reclaim all that disk space and run windows and all my games off an external drive.
Is it possible to install and boot windows on a thunderbolt. Jan 02, 20 this is a test of the boot speed on my mid 2011 imac with an external ocz ssd connected via thunderbolt compared to the stock internal wdc hard drive sata 7200rpm. I would like to be able to work directly from this drive without having to transfer sessions back and forth. For this example, you will discover how you can boot to mac os mojave using a samsung t5 ssd. Unfortunately, connecting the case directly to the apple thunderbolt adapter unfortunately does not seem to provide enough power to the drive inside the case.
Having the same problem, so thanks for the idea to plug in the drive before booting. When looking for thunderbolt externals though, they seem to almost all be raid enclosure. Booting from an nvme ssd inside a thunderbolt pcie enclosure can breathe new life into an older mac and make a thunderbolt 3 mac soar. How to add a fast new ssd to your old mac or macbook for. Anyway apple are hiding something because my macbook pro ssd write speed is 10. I picked up a transcend store jet ssd to use as a boot drive for my 21 20 imac, and also for my wifes 2011. This is a test of the boot speed on my mid 2011 imac with an external ocz ssd connected via thunderbolt compared to the stock internal wdc hard. Booting windows 10 from an external drive on an egpu. Dec 05, 2019 i believe the 2018 mac mini should have thunderbolt 3 ports for fast transfer speeds. Obviously i could just go and buy a thunderbolt drive and try it out but theyre pretty expensive compared to otherwise equivalent and.
Not to be confused with the samsung t5 that i have mentioned in other posts, the samsung s x5 is the thunderbolt 3 ssd model and highly rated by mac users. Jun 29, 2011 thunderbolt equipped macs are able to boot from external thunderbolt drives. Speed up your older imac by booting to an external solid state drive. Can an external ssd match the mac minis pricey inbuilt storage. Browsing my apertureitunes library etc is slow and i would like a faster solution. All the modern mac and windows pc laptopsallinone have equipped with the uptodate lightningfast thunderbolt 3 40gbps interface, and accordingly the netstor thunderbolt 3 fourslot m. I want to be able to just hold the option key down and select either the macos drive or the bootcamp external drive. Now we can set the boot order to boot from the external drive. Apr 11, 2019 how to boot mac os mojave from external ssd speed up your older imac with an external samsung t5 solid state drive, in this video you will discover how to. Booting windows from an external thunderbolt drive im considering getting an external drive for my retina macbook pro to boot windows externally. One final requirement which is sometimes forgotten, but which can stop any of this from happening, is that the hardware the macs interface and the drive enclosure for external disks must support booting that mac. For example, if you install macos on an internal or external drive, your mac can recognize that drive as a startup disk.
How to boot a mac from an external drive or alternate. I dug a little deeper and i think that win in bootcamp sees thunderbolt as pcie, so a thunderbolt drive would not work like an external drive. How to boot mac os mojave from external ssd speed up your older imac with an external samsung t5 solid state drive, in this video you. Fusion drive will automatically put just those parts of files that are used a lot on the ssd drive, and put everything that isnt needed much to the hard drive. Nov 06, 2017 i compared both my thunderbolt enclosure and usb 3. Using carbon copy cloner, i copied my active startup drive in the mac mini to the external ssd. Mar 20, 2014 i just thought i would share my recent experience with updating my mid2011 27 model imac with an external thunderbolt ssd drive to avoid the cost and hassle of installing an ssd drive internally.
How to install windows 10 on your mac mini with an. The best thunderbolt 3 ssd and hard drives for your. The ssd was 64gb and the hdd was 80gb, so i just used carbon copy cloner to clone the ssd to the hdd, daily, and if there were ever any problems i could just boot from the internal, or wipe and reformat the ssd and recreate it from the internal clone, or do a fresh install and migration assistant from the. Use an external ssd to make an old mac feel new without cracking. Apr 06, 2020 by default, your mac starts up from its builtin hard disk, but a startup disk can be any storage device that contains an operating system compatible with your mac. First aid tool will check the disk for errors and then attempt a repair as needed. Choose apple menu system preferences, then click startup disk. Why the ability to boot from thunderbolt on a mac is huge gigaom. After the restart, i had to reconnect to a few services.
It helps to verify and repair a range of issues related to startup hd and external drive problems. Considering the hasstle to add another internal ssd, i was thinking of the following solution. How to boot a mac from an external drive or alternate startup. The gtechnology g drive mobile ssd rseries delivers rugged storage you can trust thanks to ip67 water and dust resistance, 3meter drop protection, and a pound crushproof rating. This video shows you how to upgrade a 2011 imac to run on an external ssd hard drive using a lacie thunderbolt 1 external enclosure. That uses the space on the ssd drive much more efficiently than you could ever do by hand. My question is is an external thunderbolt ssd hard drive just as good and fast as an internal ssd hard drive.
Speed up your mac with an external ssd robin monks. Make sure to move to high sierra while still on your old drive, so that a newer firmware is. Even the new 16inch macbook pro has its ssd soldered directly to the motherboard, making replacing or upgrading the drive a nogo for most. Lacie rugged ssd pro 2tb solid state drive usbc thunderbolt 3, drop shock dust water resistant, for mac and pc computer desktop laptop, 1 mo adobe cc sthz2000800 4. How to boot mac os mojave from external ssd speed up older. I compared both my thunderbolt enclosure and usb 3. Pocketable drives that carry not just your data, but your entire computer for use with any mac s aapl you encounter that much closer to a reality today, thanks to the discovery that thunderbolt s intc on new macs supports booting from external storage. Using external thunderbolt ssd to speed up mid2011 27. In theory, working with an ssd drive attached via thunderbolt should feel much faster than working with even a 7200 rpm hdd installed inside your macbook, for example. I am booting a 20 mac mini off an external samsung t5 512gb ssd via usb 3 and the performance is much faster than the internal drive. I consider installing mavericks on an external ssd drive connected via thunderbolt to my mac mini late 2012 and booting macos x from it. Experience the extreme performance of an owc ssd upgrade with this easy diy ssd and hard drive replacement kit. Which ssd thunderbolt product for main boot drive for my. Nov 14, 2019 first aid tool will check the disk for errors and then attempt a repair as needed.
I have attached photos of the disk speed benchmarks. If you see a message that your security settings do not allow this mac to use an external startup disk, check the external boot setting in startup security utility. But just not as super duper fast as i expected a thunderboltconnected ssd drive to be. Even though, they are not just good for speed, there are dozens of other advantages that ssd have over hdd. The gtechnology gdrive mobile ssd rseries delivers rugged storage you can trust thanks to ip67 water and dust resistance, 3meter drop protection, and a pound crushproof rating. Thunderbolt supports booting from external disk macrumors. Please visit the other pages of this site to explore the diverse market of pc and mac compatible external ssd thunderbolt drive options for budgets large and small. Pay special attention to the comment at the bottom of the post. Add an external thunderbolt ssd 250 gb and use it as the main drive use the internal drive partitioned for timemachine. But the problem i am fighting is when i start the mac, the external drive does not light up and is not recognized causing my mac to boot into recovery mode. How to boot mac os mojave from external ssd speed up your older imac with an external samsung t5 solid state drive, in this video you will discover how to. Thunderbolt ssd as booting drive i recently bought an external thunderbolt ssd from lacie for my mid2011 imac to use it as my boot drive mountain lion. I am considering buying the lacie 500gb ssd rugged thunderbolt hard drive as my main portable session drive. Using external thunderbolt ssd to speed up mid2011 27 imac.
Boot mac os from external ssd hd enclosure on older imac. I just thought i would share my recent experience with updating my mid2011 27 model imac with an external thunderbolt ssd drive to avoid the cost and hassle of installing an ssd drive internally. Thats actually 10gbs that is gigabits per second not gigabytes per second. Boot your mac from the original startup disk in the external enclosure hold down the option key while booting your mac to get to the startup disk selector screen. You can then follow the steps in this article to start up. Thunderbolt equipped macs are able to boot from external thunderbolt drives. Oct 24, 20 thanx for the article, really, really helpful. How to boot mac os mojave from external ssd speed up.
External ssd thunderbolt drive vs internal ssd drive gearslutz. Christopher stevens when the new intel macs were released, those of us who keep all our tools on a separate hard drive, found a nasty surprise you cant boot an intelbased mac from an os disk for a powerpc mac. Then in the startup disk preference pane, i set the ssd as the boot volume and restarted. Mac thunderbolt ssd vs internal sata hdd boot speed test. Thunderbolt supports external boot disks os x daily. Which ssd thunderbolt product for main boot drive for my imac. I understand it should be possible to boot from a ssd connected via thunderbolt or usb 3. I am considering the lacie 1tb thunderbolt ssd as a stopgap until we see new imacs. I really do not want to deal with taking apart my 27 imac to replace the drive. With apples thunderbolt cable and the first thirdparty drive systems hitting. I believe the 2018 mac mini should have thunderbolt 3 ports for fast transfer speeds. The first is the internal 256gb ssd drive inside my late 20 15 rmbp.
Jun 29, 2011 in theory, working with an ssd drive attached via thunderbolt should feel much faster than working with even a 7200 rpm hdd installed inside your macbook, for example. Ive had issues for ages with my imac being slow always accompanied by excessive hard disk readwrite noises. Jun 29, 2011 thunderbolt supports booting from external disk. Apr 12, 2019 booting from a solid state drive like the samsung t5 should give you a boost in performance, especially if you are running an older imac with a 5,400 rpm hard drive. How to install windows 10 on your mac using a boot camp.
Ssd boots over usb, doesnt boot connected internally. This means that you could run a full mac os x, windows, or linux installation from an external drive connected to a mac with thunderbolt connectivity, and because of thunderbolts speed, it would be extremely fast. Some drive cases offer connections such as usb 3 or thunderbolt which cannot be used to boot through, even though many. I needed to keep working during part of the operation. Topselling external thunderbolt ssd drives for macpc. You can prepare the disks partition table manually, so the main question is if the macs firmware will boot an mbrbased os from a thunderbolt drive. The second is the screen shot for this drive, the transcend 256gb thunderbolt ssd sjm500 drive. I am severely limited by the lack of storage space. Install the new disk inside your mac and put the original disk in your external enclosure.
Add an ssd to your hard drive equipped imac to experience faster booting, near instant application launches and data transfer speeds up over 500 mbs. But just not as super duper fast as i expected a thunderbolt connected ssd drive to be. Now my problem is that after the apple starting sound it often takes a lot of time sometimes up to one minute until the apple and the spinning wheel appear. Ive considered selling this late 2012 imac and upgrading to one with straight ssd, but with new imacs potentially around the corner that seems like a bad move. I am just curious how future macos updates via app store will be installed. Booting your intel mac to an apmformatted drive by m. A guy on youtube has a somewhat boring video of his mac pro taking 3 minutes to boot and launch paint shop pro with his hard drive and then after setting up one of these it cut down to 15 seconds. The thing boots in seconds, rather than minutes, i use my i i internal drive for documents and media, and keep a small bootable partition synced with the ssd drive, just in case something goes wrong with the external. Before any hard disk to ssd swap, my advice is to run a complete time machine backup to an external drive preferably one thats connected. Click the lock and enter your administrator password.
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