What ssd is in macbook pro 13. Installing an SSD and a second HDD. Needs no introduction

The thermal paste was replaced (I don’t remember which one exactly) and the cooling system was cleaned.

Despite all the troubles of that SSD, I left it as the main one, since at first I simply did not notice the difference in the behavior of the computer. Later, however, friezes and the “rainbow wheel of death” familiar to all OS X users began to appear, but who should be blamed: the SSD, the operating system, which loaded the laptop more and more with each update, or, perhaps, low-quality thermal paste? In this material I talk about the maintenance of my main work laptop purchased in 2013 and share my experience of using it.

The text may and most likely does contain grammatical, spelling, punctuation and other types of errors, including semantic ones. I strongly encourage readers to point out these errors and correct me through private messages.

What is MacBook Pro mid 2012 (MD101) today?

No significant increase in operating speed was noticed, with the exception of a noticeably increased speed of copying files inside the disk. On the other hand, I finally acquired 250 GB of memory, and taking into account the careful handling of 120, this reserve will last me for a long time. I’m not particularly worried about reliability, because... today's production technologies solid state drives brought to a fairly high level, and as a last resort, every week the laptop itself makes backups in Time Machine. For those suffering, I note that the system boots from the off state to the desktop (taking into account entering the password) in 20 seconds.

As a result, we have before us high-quality and fast SSD very favorable price. Over time, local prices will probably stabilize and buying from China will no longer be so profitable, but for now this is an excellent offer for upgrading a PC, which I did not fail to take advantage of.

Time for inspection!

Again, the choice of thermoplastic was predetermined long before the maintenance was carried out. The article on . The GD900, which won the contest, was ordered on Aliexpress for just $3 in order to provide itself with the necessary consumables for several years to come. Moreover, in order to get acquainted with Windows 10 and modern games In the near future I plan to build an inexpensive home PC.

Concerning temperature regime in the last six months. During everyday use of the browser and basic set applications, the temperature on the CPU is around 65-67 degrees Celsius, which is quite high for a laptop. When exporting photos or videos, the processor heats up to 80-85 degrees, and the video core “stokers” up to 110. At the same time, the outside temperature of the laptop rarely exceeds 45 degrees, but in this case the coolers also hum noticeably at 6000 rpm.

During testing, the temperature was recorded using the program, and the maximum system load was achieved using the LINPACK Benchmark based system.

After turning on the computer and starting the program queue from startup, the CPU temperature stabilized at 52ºC, GPU was already approaching 70. At the same time, the laptop is not audible at all (2000 rpm), the temperature outside (on the bottom) is around 30-35 degrees. Launching the necessary set of software (2-4 chrome windows with 20+ tabs, instant messengers) adds 15-20ºC to the mentioned indicators, the cooler speed does not increase, and the laptop warms up to the usual (for me) 40 degrees. I usually spend 95% of my time at the computer in this mode.

Launch CPUBurn. After less than a minute, the graphics core reaches 100ºC (1), and CO slowly begins to manifest itself (3.5k revolutions). After another minute, the stock cooler reaches a maximum of 6000 rpm (2) and hums noticeably. After 10 minutes of “burning” (3), the laptop case still did not heat up above 45 degrees. The maximum recorded graphics temperature is 105 degrees, the processor is 77ºC. Such temperatures last for a matter of seconds while the cooler accelerates to maximum speed. All tests were carried out with a connected FullHD monitor; the temperature of the graphics core in similar tests without a monitor differs by 3-5 degrees lower.

It's time to change the thermal paste. iFixit has a good disassembly guide, but I’ll just remind you that first of all you need to take care of the power supply motherboard by disconnecting the battery and you can continue the preparation.

Judging by the amount of dust, I delayed the maintenance a little.

This is what the remains of the previous thermal paste looked like:

During the cleaning process, I got so carried away that I forgot about the need to take a photo, so the application remained behind the scenes. I applied the thermal paste in drops, fortunately the pressure on the radiator is excellent.

Now about temperature conditions after replacing thermal paste. The result, in principle, is obvious. When idle, after turning on the PC, the temperature on the graph. core decreased by 4-5 degrees, although on the CPU the drop is barely noticeable. After launching the required software package, everything falls into place - both indicators “fell” by 10% on average.

When burning using CPUBurn, the situation also changed somewhat. The journey to 100 degrees (1) on the graphics core took significantly longer (about 5 minutes), and even after reaching this temperature the cooler spun up to only 2.5 thousand revolutions, and the laptop remained silent. After another 10 minutes of testing, the temperature still did not rise above 100 degrees, but the CO gradually reached 4000 rpm (out of a maximum of six) and the temperature dropped slightly (2). Manual installation Maximum cooler speed (3) lowers the GPU temperature to 83 degrees. Before replacing the thermal paste, this figure was at 100ºC.

, . On my website I duplicate my own publications from all over the Internet, so too. Thank you for your attention!

In the basic configuration of McaBook Pro, Apple installs hard disks at 5400 rpm. And their performance with modern operating systems Mac systems OS X (10.6-10.8) leaves much to be desired. And it’s not for nothing that Apple is gradually but confidently moving to installing SSD drives in all laptops.

We think it's time to make your favorite MacBook even better. You just need to install it SSD drive. And so that you are not confused by the limited capacity of the ssd, you can install a second one HDD in place of the DVD drive.

What laptop models is this solution suitable for? — Yes, to almost all MacBooks and MacBook Pros except MacBook Pro Retina

SSD 120Gb	SSD 240Gb	SSD 500Gb	SSD 1Tb	SSD 2Tb
9,000 rub.	12,000 rub.	20,000 rub.	55,000 rub.	RUB 94,600

In laptops, a combination of read/write speeds from/to the hard drive at a disk spindle speed of 5400 rpm. does not even reach 50 Mb/sec. A 7200 rpm disk will revive your MacBook almost twice: the read/write speed can fluctuate between 80...105 MB/sec.
It is worth noting that there are also hybrid hard drives from Seagate on the market, which feature a 7200 rpm hard drive with a 16 MB data cache and an 8 GB SSD drive. With such a “combined” drive, the read/write speed can increase by another 5-7% compared to a conventional 7200 rpm drive.

The read/write performance of SSD drives varies from manufacturer to manufacturer and from model to model. In addition, prices for SSD drives have still not reached a level comparable to conventional ones hard drives. The price is gradually falling, and even top-end ssds with a capacity of 500 and 960GB are approaching $1 per 1GB of storage.

Because Mac OS X is very compact operating system, and in the set with the majority necessary programs The total volume on the disk usually does not exceed 30-50GB. You can safely look at an ssd with a capacity of 120GB or more.
Although, in our opinion, it is already worth considering an ssd with a capacity of 180GB or more.

Precisely because the capacity of an ssd, combined with its price, limits most users to choosing to use an ssd, we suggest you consider the option of high speed ssd and good capacity hdd installed in place of the DVD drive.

For upgrade Apple Mac Book Pro 2011-2012, we will need 3 screwdrivers: torx 6, torx 8 and a Philips 00 or 000 Phillips screwdriver.

Remember! Before disassembling any device, you should remove any residual static electricity from yourself.

On the bottom cover, unscrew 10 screws, 3 of which are longer.

This is what the MacBook Pro 13 looks like from the inside

Before changing anything in the laptop configuration, you MUST disconnect the battery from the motherboard. We don’t want to start a repair with you and replace the system board after a short circuit, do we?

In place of the standard “slow” hard drive we install the ssd drive, and we can put the old disk in optibay in place of the dvd drive. In our case, we installed a new disk with a capacity of 750GB at 7200 rpm in Optibay, in order to increase the speed when accessing user data, which we plan to store on the hdd.

Unscrew the two screws on the plate that holds the hard drive.

We transfer 4 screws (torx 8) around the perimeter of the “old” hard drive to the SSD drive.

We install the ssd in place of the system disk and secure it with a bracket and two screws.

We install the hard drive in the Optibay and be sure to screw it with reverse side two screws.

Remove the optical drive.

We need to disconnect 5 cables.
We do this very carefully.

Disable

• hard drive cable
• optical drive cable
• WiFi cable
• camera cable
• speaker cable

Unscrew the speaker and disconnect the antennas from Wi-Fi module and put the speaker aside.

DVD superdrive. Unscrew the three screws and pull it out.

We rearrange the data cable and mounting bracket from the DVD drive to optibay, observing the installation direction of the bracket.

We install optibay with a hard drive in place of the DVD drive.

We reinstall the plastic speaker bar and connect the antennas to the Wi-Fi module.

We connect the cables and cables in reverse order to system board. And connect the battery.

Close and screw the bottom cover.
We install the system from an external boot drive or through the Mac OS X recovery system via the Internet (using the Cmd + R combination when booting the computer).

Now, the owner has at his disposal a very fast Apple MacBook Pro from 2011: the system itself and all programs launch several times faster than with a standard hdd. The system responds instantly. With a significant number of applications open, there are no freezing or freezing of the “spinning colored candy.” Programs that use work data caching work with large files without any delays. And when processing very large amounts of information, the execution time was reduced (according to the laptop owner) by 2-3 times.
It is worth noting once again that the hard drive is limited by the physical ability to read/write to spinning metal plates. Therefore his " throughput» does not exceed 115 Megabytes/sec. (best case scenario). There are no mechanical elements in the ssd, so the read/write speed on the ssd can reach 550 megabytes/sec. There is an option to theoretically increase this value to 1.2 Gigabytes/sec., but for this you need to use an external hardware RAID array that is NOT a system drive connected at best via a Thunderbolt bus of 10 Gigabit/sec (or 1.25 Gigabytes/sec .) and exchanging data with another similar RAID array via the same Thunderbolt bus.
If you are an Apple owner Mac Pro— you can install four or more SSD drives, make a large RAID array (but keep in mind that it will not be hardware, but software, if you do not use a special RAID controller). And even in this case, you can achieve theoretical data transfer rates of up to 750 Megabytes/sec (which corresponds to a data transfer speed of 6 Gigabit/sec on the sata bus).

In the next article we will tell you how to make Fusion Drive yourself on Apple laptop with two or more hard drives installed. And how, in our practical opinion, does Fusion Drive differ from the operation of a conventional SSD+HDD combination.

The article was prepared based on the results of repair work at the MacFix Service Center.

The cost of installing an SSD on a MacBook in our service center

SSD 120Gb	SSD 240Gb	SSD 500Gb	SSD 1Tb	SSD 2Tb
9,000 rub.	12,000 rub.	20,000 rub.	55,000 rub.	RUB 94,600

The already low-budget prices for Macbook Pro in our country have been aggravated by the economic crisis. The bottom line is that only wealthy people can afford a new Pro-series Apple laptop. But what should the “poor students” who dream of a laptop with an “apple” on board do? The answer is obvious - buy a used model without any fears, because Macbook Pros are equipped with the coolest hardware with a great reserve for the future.

In this review, we’ll talk about the 2012 Macbook Pro and try to figure out whether this model has enough power today, which Apple supplied it with 5 years ago.

The Macbook Pro lineup is not as simple as, for example, the iPhone lineup—the rule: one year/one device doesn’t work here. Apple often manages to release a couple of firmwares a year, and sometimes it even manages to introduce three. To distinguish the models, they are called early, mid and late.

Nose Apple Macbook Pro 2012 will not have to be confused in early and late “releases”, there was only one presentation of firmware that year, and this event fell in the middle of 2012. That is, there will be no division into Mid 2012 and Late 2012 in the review, but (!) there will be diagonal division. Macbook Pro 2012 was released in models with 13 and 15-inch screens. And it would seem that the difference is simple and clear, where you get confused. That’s right, but the 15-inch version of the proshka received a more powerful filling than its smaller brother. Well, let's deal with this Apple "feint".

Needs no introduction

But let's start our description with something simple - with design. There is no need to understand anything here. The appearance of Apple laptops has never changed significantly in their entire history - the all-metal body remained all-metal and shone in a noble gray-silver color. The minimalist design and luminous “apple” on the lid added sophistication. The 2012 Macbook Pro was no exception. All the trump cards mentioned above are in place.

If we talk about changes in appearance, it is worth mentioning that the 2012 models have become lighter and thinner than the 2011 models, in addition, the display frames have become smaller. But in the realities of 2017, this positive change is difficult to evaluate, because in five years the frames, of course, have become even smaller, and the body is even lighter and thinner.

A scattering of connectors

However, an outdated look is not always a disadvantage. For example, there are connectors that Apple is getting rid of with particular cynicism - what can you do, the Apple giant sees aesthetics in a small number of ports (as if a garden of adapters is beautiful).

In the latest, most modern Macbook Pro model, only four USBs and an audio jack “survived”. Needless to say, Apple fans were upset. Well, take a look at the Macbook Pro 2012 and smile - because not only does it have a connector for almost every taste, but it even still has a disk drive!

And one more business card

Design is not the only immortal advantage of the Macbook Pro - the advantages of Apple laptops, which have not lost their relevance throughout the history of their release, also include input devices - a keyboard and a trackpad.

The trackpad, first of all, is notable for the fact that it is huge and very comfortable to work with, even in graphics applications you forget about the mouse. And, of course, he is responsive - he responds immediately.

The keyboard also deserves top marks. Firstly, due to the keys of a convenient size and with a comfortable distance between them. Please note that these advantages also apply to the compact 13-inch model. And one more advantage - the keyboard is backlit.

Not Retina

Consistency, however, is not always enviable. Then, in 2012, fans of Apple laptops waited and believed that the Apple giant would introduce the first Macbook with a Retina display, but an unpleasant surprise awaited everyone.

No, of course, the screen of the Macbook Pro 2012, just like the screen of any other device with an Apple on board, is good even without Retina clarity, but, as they say, there is still a sediment. After all, it’s a premium laptop, why wouldn’t they be generous with a Retina display?! But what about remembering the past, let’s better concentrate on the merits.

Despite the “archaic” clarity - 1280 by 800 pixels for the 13-inch model and 1400 by 900 for the 15-inch model, the screen cannot but please - excellent color rendition, wide viewing angles, good brightness and contrast. In general, a non-demanding user can do without this vaunted “retina” of yours.

Still nimble?

However, if we were buying a five-year laptop, the screen, one way or another, would not be the main interest. Well, you must agree, the main point here is performance, or rather the question is, how quickly and without lags can a laptop with a “high mileage” (and not a small one) cope with modern tasks?

Yes, easily! If it's a Macbook Pro. At least, if you believe the reviews of owners of used old firmware. For example, here is one great video review.

No, of course, no one is saying that the MacBook Pro 2012 today will easily handle even the heaviest modern utilities. However, we assure you that the device will cope with standard office tasks, browsing and simple entertainment, such as watching movies and listening to music.

Look at the characteristics. The 13-inch model is equipped with a 2-core processor Intel Core i5 (clocked at 2.5 GHz) or i7 (clocked at 2.9 GHz) depending on the configuration, at the heart of the 15-inch is a 4-core Intel Core i7 (clocked at 2.3 GHz) or a 4-core Intel Core i7 ( clock 2.6 GHz).

RAM Macbook Pro both 13 and 15 inches 2012 - 4 or 8 GB depending on the configuration. ROM - 500 or 750 GB.

As you can see, the hardware is generally very good; add to it the optimized mac OS, and it becomes clear why users of used firmware call them fast and very pleasant to “communicate.”

On fragile ice

One of the most delicate aspects of purchasing a used device is, of course, the condition of the battery. And here it’s hardly worth talking about what was originally laid down. However, in fairness, the autonomy of the Macbook Pro 2012 is 7 hours. Today, plugs can last longer without recharging, but when compared with competitors, 7 hours is an excellent figure.

But they still know that the battery tends to wear out and it is not known in what condition you will receive it. Unfortunately, there is no way to check this when purchasing - unless, of course, the former owner offers a test drive.

On the other hand, one way or another, the battery is quite easy to replace. Although “simple” in the case of an all-metal case is a relative concept. And in general, Apple equipment is not repair-friendly. But here the “age” of the Macbook Pro 2012 is an advantage, because the older the “apple”, the better its maintainability parameters.

To buy or not to buy - that is the question

Of course, a used device always comes with a lot of questions. But we won’t talk about sad cases when the buyer gets a gadget that is clearly damaged by extremely aggressive use.

Our goal is to let you understand how the characteristics of the Macbook Pro 5 years ago correspond to today's tasks and what classic Apple goodies this laptop can provide.

Well, the main trump cards are in place - stylish design and excellent input devices - keyboard and trackpad. And if we talk about performance, then we need to take into account the context. Looking for a laptop for classic office tasks, browsing and entertainment? Then the potential inherent in the hero of our review in 2012 will be enough for you. But if you constantly need to work in “heavy” applications, and at the same time you want the laptop to “fly”, then, of course, you should take a closer look at something more modern.

Let us note a number of other points.

The obvious drawback of the 2012 Macbook Pro is the lack of a Retina display. The obvious advantage is a large number of connectors in comparison with modern firmware, as well as better maintainability in comparison with them, which even allows you to upgrade your Macbook Pro. Well, the obvious controversial point is autonomy; if you want maximum mobility, which is stated in the official parameters, most likely the battery will have to be replaced.

In general, as you can see, the picture is positive, and, let us emphasize once again, if you set classic everyday tasks for your laptop, we would recommend the Macbook Pro 2012. We hope you will be able to find this model at a reasonable price and in a presentable appearance.