Format external drives to Mac OS Extended before using with Aperture Tips on preparing a new external hard drive for use with Aperture. You may wish to use an external FireWire or USB hard drive to store your Aperture Library, referenced images, or Vaults. Best performing Mac compatible SSD drive upgrades for Apple MacBook, iMac and Mac mini computers in 2018: Crucial, Samsung, OWC, and SanDisk SSDs.
When I first wrote about, high-capacity SSDs were just beginning to become affordable. Replacing a Mac’s 500GB or 1TB hard drive with a same-sized SSD required at least $250 back then, but the benefits were tremendous: even an aging machine became markedly (5x) faster, silent, and — unexpectedly — more fun to use. All for much less than the price of a new Mac.
Today, high-capacity SSDs are more affordable than ever. Replacing your old 500GB hard drive with a same-sized SSD from a reputable manufacturer, while, each $100 less than only a couple of years ago.
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Once unthinkably huge and are now commonly available, too, albeit at eye-watering prices. With this week’s, Apple has officially made SSDs its preferred Mac storage solution, introducing the new APFS standard to further optimize SSD performance over Fusion and traditional hard drives.
So this is a perfect time to revisit the topic of SSD upgrades; if you held out before, now’s the time to jump in! The Big Picture For nearly a decade, SSDs have been acknowledged as the “future” of Mac storage. Even without changing a Mac’s CPU, GPU, or RAM, replacing the hard drive with an internal SSD instantly leads to much faster macOS performance, app loading, restarting, and file accessing. A Mac that once took over a minute to boot can now start working in seconds; Macs built with SSDs can awaken from sleep instantly. Despite superior performance, high prices led Apple to slowly stagger solid state drive adoption across individual Mac product lines.
The January 2008-vintage original MacBook Air was the first Mac with the option of a 64GB SSD (for a $1,300 premium over the laptop’s base price), and 1TB SSDs were going for roughly $4,000 — Apple didn’t even try to sell 1TB SSDs at that point. Nine years later, dramatically faster and smaller SSDs with the same capacities can be had for less than a tenth of those prices, so every current Mac either has an SSD by default or as an option. Running cooler, quieter, and with superior energy efficiency than traditional hard drives, SSDs have fewer failures, and reputable manufacturers tend to warranty them for longer than their predecessors. For instance, generally have 5-year warranties, and if you’re willing to pay more, its have 10-year warranties, eclipsing all but the most expensive enterprise-class desktop hard disks. Not all SSDs are equivalent in reliability and performance, but ones from top-tier chip companies are pretty incredible. Which Mac Models Can Be Internally Upgraded? Good news first: most older Macs and even some current Macs can be easily user-upgraded to include SSDs. With limited expertise and only three tools, I was able to swap out my 2011 iMac’s old hard drive for an SSD in roughly 30 minutes.
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[Alternately, if your Mac has a SuperDrive, you may be able to replace that optical CD/DVD drive with the SSD, though it’s important to note that the SSD mightn’t run as fast due to slower Mac internal connections to the SuperDrive. Hard drive replacement is generally the best option.] Bad news: the newer the Mac, the greater the likelihood that actually installing the drive yourself will be tricky. Apple continues to shrink its desktop and laptop machines, more tightly integrating the few remaining components inside, so you’ll want to follow an to safely open and close your machine. Owners of the very latest MacBook and MacBook Pro models shouldn’t bother going further; these laptops have hardwired SSDs that can’t be replaced, a trend that Apple may expand to future desktop Macs. If your Mac is one of the following models, it can probably be upgraded with an SSD. IMac: Up through 2017 (current) models Mac mini: Up through late 2014 (current) models.