Swap Hard Drive Mac Mini

One of the best upgrades to make is to swap out the old mechanical hard drive for an SSD. Data transfer speeds will be at least four times faster, and that will make a huge difference in the day-to-day running of your Mac Mini. Intro 💅 I 'rescued' a 2018 mac mini(8th Gen i3, 8Gb Ram, 128SSD). My idea was to use it for my personal home recording studio. I read the ram was upgradeable but the storage is sadly soldered into the unit. IFixit awarded the new Mac mini a repairability score of 6/10, with 10 being the easiest to repair, topping the latest MacBook Air, MacBook, MacBook Pro, iMac, and iMac Pro, and trailing.

• Mac Mini Change Ssd
• Mac Mini Hard Drive Upgrade
• Mac Mini Hard Drive Swap

Swapping out your old hard drive for a modern SSD is surprisingly affordable and results in 5X better performance: a reputable 500GB MacBook SSD can be had for around $150, while 1TB options are available for around $300 — both considerably cheaper than a new MacBook. It's also surprisingly easy, even if you don't know your way around the insides of a Mac.

How to Modify the Virtual Memory in a Mac. Like Windows PCs, Macintosh computers use virtual memory to run more programs than the system memory normally could accommodate. A Mac uses a swap file to temporarily store applications and program components that it does not need at the moment. When it needs something from. Is the SSD the same physical size as my current hard drive? Up until the 2012 iMacs, Apple has used a 3.5 inch hard drive, and the standard SSD drive is 2.5'. To secure the SSD into the 3.5' space in the iMac you need a bracket. From 2012 the 21.5' iMacs came with a 2.5' drive. From 2017 the 27' iMacs shipped with a 2.5' hard drive.

Do I really need to upgrade my Mac hard drive?

Fitting a solid state drive in your MacBook Pro is a quick and simple way to boost performance but an upgrade might not always be needed.

If you only really use your Mac to browse the web and do some word processing, your current hard drive is probably fine. If your system feels a bit sluggish, try running CleanMyMac X first to clean away any resource-hogging junk. That might be the only fix you need (this way junk that is clogging up your system, such as old files, images, apps, duplicates and iPhone backups will be cleared away).

If, however, you're noticing any of the following issues, an SSD upgrade will most certainly help:

• Slow startup
• Sluggish performance in resource-intensive apps such as Adobe Photoshop
• System crashes
• Permission denied errors to files that were previously fine

What to consider when choosing a MacBook Pro SSD

To reap the benefits of an SSD, you need a drive that's up to the task. Here's what to consider:

• Read/write speed — SSDs are rated on their reading and writing speed. The higher the speed, the better the performance. Something in the range of 500MB/s and above is good, although actual speed will be about a third less than what's advertised.

• Memory — MLC (multi-level cell) and SLC (single-level cell) are the two options available. The former is cheaper and capable of holding more information but the latter is more reliable.

• Capacity — Get as much space as you can afford. The greater the capacity of an SSD, the more it will benefit Mac performance.

• Reliability — Read the reviews. See what the experts and other users say about SSD performance and reliability. You'll typically find that brand name SSDs rank the highest. Samsung, SanDisk, Crucial, KingSpec, and Transcend are standout brands. Minecraft single player free download mac.

How to fit a new MacBook Pro SSD

Okay, let's get down to business. SSD aside, here's what you'll need to fit your new hard drive:

• SATA-to-USB cable

• Small Phillips screwdriver

• Torx T6 screwdriver

Step 1: Format the SSD

To perform a MacBook Pro SSD upgrade you're first going to need to clone your existing hard drive so that the new one runs like clockwork when it's installed.

Netcut alternative. Before you do this, you should use CleanMyMac X to perform a Smart Cleanup. This will clear your system of any junk files so that they're not transferred over unnecessarily. You can download CleanMyMac X for free, here.

Cloning the hard drive can be done with a tool such as SuperDuper! or Carbon Copy Cleaner, or with Apple's own Disk Utility program. Here's how to do it with the latter:

1. Connect the SSD to your Mac using the SATA-to-USB cable.
2. Go to Applications > Utilities and open the Disk Utility.
3. Click on the SSD icon, followed by the Partition tab and select 'Partition 1' from the Partition Layout.
4. Click on Options and select GUID Partition Table in the next window.
5. Click on the First Aid tab, followed by Verify Disk Permissions.
6. Click Verify Disk, followed by Repair Disk.
7. Shutdown your MacBook and restart it, holding the Option key as you do. Choose the option to boot to Recovery Disk.
8. Click on Reinstall Mac OS X and choose the SSD as the destination.
9. Copy your files over from the installed hard drive to the SSD. When asked to restore files from another disk, choose the currently installed hard drive.

Step 2: Remove the hard drive

Restore files from time machine to another mac. Now it's time to get hands-on.

1. Make sure your MacBook is shut down.
2. Locate and remove the 10 screws using the Phillips screwdriver. Put the screws in a small bowl so that you don't lose any.
3. Remove the cover and touch a metal part to release the static electricity.
4. Locate the hard drive and remove the plastic bracket securing it. This is held in place with two screws.
5. Gently remove the hard drive and disconnect the SATA ribbon. Do this by wiggling the connector. Don't yank on the ribbon.
6. Remove the four Torx screws attached to the hard drive and screw the posts into the SSD.

Step 3: Fit the SSD

1. Carefully attach the SATA ribbon to the SSD and lower it in place.
2. Fix the holding bracket back in place.
3. Replace the MacBook cover and screw in the ten tiny screws.
4. Switch on your MacBook Pro, go to System Preferences > Startup Disk and make sure the SSD is selected.
5. Restart your computer.

See, we told you it was easy!

Enjoy a faster, smoother MacBook Pro

A new SSD drive for your Mac will make an instant impact. Apps will launch faster, files will save quicker, and multitasking will be a much smoother experience. Use CleanMyMac X to regularly remove junk files from your system and you'll enjoy slick performance for many a year to come.

CleanMyMac X finds and removes junk files from your MacBook Pro to free up space and keep your system running to its full potential. Make it the first app you install on your new SSD!

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Intro 💅

I 'rescued' a 2018 mac mini(8th Gen i3, 8Gb Ram, 128SSD). My idea was to use it for my personal home recording studio. I read the ram was upgradeable but the storage is sadly soldered into the unit. iFixit awarded the new Mac mini a repairability score of 6/10, with 10 being the easiest to repair, topping the latest MacBook Air, MacBook, MacBook Pro, iMac, and iMac Pro, and trailing only the 2013 Mac Pro. Read the original article here.

'The new Mac mini earned its higher repairability score thanks to its straightforward disassembly with no tough adhesive or proprietary pentalobe screws and user-upgradeable RAM. However, it didn't earn a perfect score due to the soldered-down CPU, storage, and ports, impacting repairs and upgrades.'

So, it made sense to find an external SSD and run operations from there. Just logic pro x takes 70 Gb with all the samples etc. By the time i got everything running at minimum, i only had like 15 Gb left. So here's what i did:

Working it out 🤹‍♀️

Mac Mini Change Ssd

What you will need 🧐

Mac Mini Hard Drive Upgrade

• External SSD Hard drive. (I won't suggest brands or capacity leaving that to what you find fit for yourself)
• A Mac!

CleanMyMac X finds and removes junk files from your MacBook Pro to free up space and keep your system running to its full potential. Make it the first app you install on your new SSD!

These might also interest you:

Intro 💅

I 'rescued' a 2018 mac mini(8th Gen i3, 8Gb Ram, 128SSD). My idea was to use it for my personal home recording studio. I read the ram was upgradeable but the storage is sadly soldered into the unit. iFixit awarded the new Mac mini a repairability score of 6/10, with 10 being the easiest to repair, topping the latest MacBook Air, MacBook, MacBook Pro, iMac, and iMac Pro, and trailing only the 2013 Mac Pro. Read the original article here.

'The new Mac mini earned its higher repairability score thanks to its straightforward disassembly with no tough adhesive or proprietary pentalobe screws and user-upgradeable RAM. However, it didn't earn a perfect score due to the soldered-down CPU, storage, and ports, impacting repairs and upgrades.'

So, it made sense to find an external SSD and run operations from there. Just logic pro x takes 70 Gb with all the samples etc. By the time i got everything running at minimum, i only had like 15 Gb left. So here's what i did:

Working it out 🤹‍♀️

Mac Mini Change Ssd

What you will need 🧐

Mac Mini Hard Drive Upgrade

• External SSD Hard drive. (I won't suggest brands or capacity leaving that to what you find fit for yourself)
• A Mac!

Getting the job done 🤓

• First of all, go to disk utility and format your new hard drive. For this you have to choose either APFS or MacOs Extended (Journaled), encryption is up to you. Just make sure you remember your password. (⚠️ THIS MEANS YOUR ENTIRE EXTERNAL HARD DRIVE CONTENT WILL BE ERASED! proceed with caution and, to be safe, use a new external hard drive)
• Once you have formatted your hard drive, restart your Mac, then press and hold Command(⌘)+R immediately after you see the Apple logo. Your Mac starts up from macOS Recovery.
• When you see the macOS Utilities window, choose Utilities > Startup Security Utility from the menu bar.
• When you're asked to authenticate, click Enter macOS Password, then choose an administrator account and enter its password.
• You will see something like this:

• Select Allow booting from external media

We are almost done. Don't restart anything yet. Go back to the first screen and click on reinstall macOS:

• Accept all terms and conditions, and you will be prompted to choose the hard drive where you want to install the operating system on. Click on it and install. The machine will restart a few times.
• You will eventually end up at your regular login screen. If you are in the machine where you will be booting your external hard drive from, you have two options to boot. You can press the option key every time you turn on your computer, and select what hard drive to boot from, or you can switch permanently to your external hard drive.

If you want your machine to always boot from the external hard drive:

• Choose Apple () menu > System Preferences, then click Startup Disk.
• Click the lock icon and enter your administrator password.
• Select your startup disk, then restart your Mac.

That's all folks! 🐷

Enjoy all your extra storage space!. Remember that you can always switch back to your original startup disk!

Mac Mini Hard Drive Swap

Cheerio!