Installing SSD into Mac Mini

Mac
#1

Continuing the discussion from Installing an SSD in 2011 21.5" Imac:

The temptation was too much! I figured I’d grab a 120GB SSD and have a go at putting it in.

It was very straight forward, I didn’t even have to unplug any of the connectors, the bits could just sort of move out of the way if you’re gentle.

I actually think I could install a second drive in there the same way without having to unplug everything :smiley: So maybe a task for another day**. I actually realised that after I put it all back together that while this is a HTPC, it also hold my iTunes library so I actually do need a bit more storage than the 120GB allows.of storage. For the moment I’ve got the old stock drive in a USB case, I’ll look into ordering one of the mounting brackets and cable one day.

The hardest part was re-installing OSX since I wanted to start clean. My copy of El Cap didn’t want to work, while it booted the installed form a memory stick it told me it was corrupt. Then my MBP didn’t want to let me re-download it…
Option-R gave me the online recovery… but that wanted to install 10.8 :frowning:
Luckily I could simply boot from the old install from it’s USB case and was able to download the needed installed through the app store and create a new USB installer. A little bit later it’s up and running nicely (and very quietly I might add). I just have to re-setup all the little bits I was using the old machine for.

**EDIT: Actually it looks like the mounting frame needs the whole board out to get it in there.

2 Likes
#2

I had the same problem, maybe it has something to do with the updates.

You should be able to ‘Migrate’ your settings from the old boot drive. It will need to be running on another mac at the same time though…

#3

Perhaps this could be why?

OS X Installers Downloaded Prior to February 14 No Longer Work After Certificate Update [MacRumors]

#4

I did this quite recently, popped a 1TB SSD into my mini - well worth it.

#5

That exactly it. Are those certificates actually dated making your installer disk only good for a period of time? Or is it checking online during the install and marking them dead? ie can you just disconnect from the network to run the offline install?

I get that it makes for a safer install if you’re getting the latest version, but plenty of people out there have slow connections or a single Mac so wouldn’t have been able to simply jump to another machine to download a new version. Especially when the updates needed are actually quite small. Damn shame you can’t either patch the installer or just run the updates afterwards.

#6

I believe the packages on the installer drive are signed with the expiration date, and if the system date and time is set beyond that date, it fails to install. It makes no difference if a machine is disconnected from the internet for the installation.

#7

It’s so frustrating the way Apple has ditched optical media, and forced everyone onto this new instal/recover methods… And I hate change and love the old ways…

Gee, solid state sounds great… :wink:

#8

Nice one! I also did this with a 2009 Mac Mini (used to belong to me, but I’d given it to Mum and Dad). They kept complaining that it was too slow so I bought them an SSD and replaced the Optical Drive with the SSD (the Optical Drive had actually already died ages ago, but they never used it so no loss).

#9

At least in the newer OS’s there is a built in tool (albeit through the command line) to create an install USB. It’s just totally insane that it would expire! Again, I get “latest is best/safest” and all that, but it makes things difficult. Even on a decent connection that 6GB download takes a while.

If we continue down the “latest is best” way of thinking, why the hell does the recovery console revert to the latest version for that machine?! Given it’s a free upgrade anyway, why doesn’t it simply default to the latest OS available (or at least give you a choice to select a perfectly valid, legal legit OS :rage:

But then I suppose the average Apple User would never see this screen anyway since Apple machines never break down… or they would simply buy a new machine… or return it to the Genius Bar to have a new HDD installed anyway… right? right?

And it’s only half sarcastically I say all that :stuck_out_tongue:

In any case, at least I now know that all my old installers probably need me to tweak to the date to use them, not that I’m all that likely to be installing an older OS these days anyway.

But I digress. An update on the SSD install. The old spinning disk is in an external case plugged in the back of the Mini and I had loaded the old iTunes library from there. Until Sunday when it stopped responding.

The whole machine was hanging and after a little poking it seems that HDD was the cause. It’s not showing up in Disk Utility and when it’s plugged in it’s causing total instability/hanging. I tried plugging it into my MBP and it’s just flashing away and not showing up.

I assumed a dead drive so since I’d be short of space on the SSD I loaded up a network share on my NAS and created a new iTunes library and started the (long long) process of downloading all again. iTunes Match is a magic thing for this, everything was just there! I suppose I could have just lived with everything streaming, but I’m old school (read paranoid) enough to want to keep a copy of all my stuff locally.

In the interim I took a punt and plugged the USB drive into my NAS (which supports the Apple disk format) and it popped up without problem and then happily copied all the files across. I’ve cancelled the download and pointed the Mini at the old library on the NAS and everything seems to be working just fine.

Strangely going back inside and the USB case showed up one of the two partitions then hung… while it says it’s Mac compatible on the box, I’m wondering if just maybe it’s not! For the moment I’ll see how it goes with the library being located on the server and if that gives me grief I’ll look into getting the data doubler and getting that drive re-installed locally.

#10

Just FYI everyone… I tried to install 10.9.5 onto a Mac Pro 3,1 this morning.

It was a 10.9.5 installer I’d previously downloaded and saved. I created a USB installer and then booted no probs. But the install failed. So I just opened the terminal (in the installer) and issued a date command to set the date 3 years back, and boom - installed no worries. :slight_smile:

How to create USB Installer
How to Set Date from Command Line

Cheers,
John

#11

Sucks that you have to know that or be forced to download a new copy of the installer everytime you need to re-install.

Further into my install, it seems that El Cap doesn’t want to maintain a network share connection which means my iTunes library which is sitting on my NAS keeps screwing up :frowning:
I don’t know if this is an AFP issue that would be solved by moving to SMB… or even iSCSI is on the table…

OR…

I just bite the bullet and get that second HDD bay adaptor and put that old 500GB drive back into the mini.

edit: Which I’ve now done… looks like I’ll be pulling it all apart again next week :stuck_out_tongue:

#12

How were you connecting the share point? I’ve found “browsed” connections drop out, where as command-k is usually persistent especially if you use IP not local DNS.

#13

They are AFP shares that I would guess that I used command-k to create the first time around since that’s my normal way of doing these things… But could I have browsed?? Maybe? It’s easy enough to delete then and re-create them.
And yes, my shares are IP based.

Even then, those shares are auto loaded at boot (not that the machine is normally rebooted that often) by dragging the share into the login items in preferences. The machine has been rebooted multiple times and the shares come up fine after a boot… they just drop out later.

To add to that the whole thing is connected via ethernet too so no WiFi issues.

#14

Apple’s Filesharing is so flakey. :frowning:

I can totally believe it’s happening - but I’d probably also look at whether the NAS is to blame. Maybe it’s killing ‘idle’ connections?

I’m very tempted by a NAS at home on iSCSI… but it’s a significant investment that I can’t guarantee will work which is what’s holding me back…

#15

I’ve found NFS much more reliable (and faster) since several Mac OS versions ago. YMMV

#16

I read something the other day that said Apple was quietly phasing out AFP in favour of SMB2? (or something like that anyway). Could this be the reason why?

As for NAS, I’m running a QNAP TS-870 Pro, no idea if it’s killing idle connections or not but it does support iSCSI so I could try that too.

Give the username and password are saved on that machine, why isn’t iTunes smart enough to re-initialise the connection if it’s dropped rather than just failing? There is no user interaction required, it should be able to pick up and keep moving without issues.

Windows and it’s drive mapping has always “just worked” yet networking on Macs has always been a little flakey for me.

I can try and simplify the network path, although that shouldn’t be an issue. For the moment it’s:

24 Port switch (in the network rack in the garage)
The NAS is in this rack and connected to the switch too.
(along with the router)

Cat 6 cables are installed to various places around the house (including the TV unit in the lounge where this all lives). The gigabit line is plugged into the WAN port on a 2011 - MD032LL/A 2TB Time Capsule which then has the Mac Mini plugged into that. (The TC is in bridge mode essentially acting as a switch and AP.

While I could run new network lines I don’t want to add them, I could swap this out for a small gigabit switch to get the TC out of the equation if it’s age is a problem (although it all appears to be working without issue).

I’m still leaning towards an general OS sucky-ness when it comes to network shares over a hardware/wiring problem.

TRIM Support for SSDs
#17

My parts turned up today (yesterday actually but no one was there to sign for them) so I’ve installed the second HDD. At this point I feel like I’m an expert having pulled the damn thing apart three times now. It’s actually pretty straight forward so if you’re thinking about it, give it a bash.

So I’ve installed the SSD a couple of weeks ago.
Then installed the second drive today…
As it turns out, the stock 500GB drive must be toast. Even installed internally it’s not showing up… balls.

So back it all came and I’ve shoved in a spare 250GB and it’s humming away nicely and copying the iTunes library back across (strangely the network connection for iTunes hasn’t dropped since I last posted!). I might up put in a larger drive later but the iTunes library is only 125GB so I should be good for a while.

#18

Agreed about networking on Mac. Mapping drives etc on Windows I’ve never had problems with in years of using it, but trying to get Mac drive mountings/mappings/whatever to stick properly or just work when both devices are turned on is SO painful. There’s all these pissy little work arounds and stuff but they’re just fiddly and annoying and half the time they don’t work.

#19

Have you tried it in an external enclosure? There can be a bit of a gotcha with the second HDD cable - it can pop loose as you push the motherboard board in if the drives aren’t in the perfect position.

#20

The stock drive was working perfectly (as far as I know) in the mini until I started all this.

When I first put it into an external enclosure it appeared to work at first but I noticed it crapped out later. Plugging it into another Mac gave the same results, but strangely plugging it into my NAS seemed to work OK and I copied everything off it.

At this point I assumed it might have been an incompatibility with the enclosure and didn’t think too much more about it…

You know what they say about assumptions…
As I said, plugging it in internally gave me the same results as the enclosure, swapping that drive out for an alternative 250GB drive solved the problem.

I’ve got another enclosure I’ve shoved it into for further testing when I get some time…