Feeling the need for speed? Back in 2012, Apple introduced the Fusion Drive to Macs in the Mac mini and iMac, merging the speed of a Solid State Drive (SSD) with the low cost of high capacity hard disk drives (HDD). The result is that users get fast boot up and app loading, while having access to tons of storage. In this article, the Rocket Yard shows you how to create your own Fusion Drive for an older Mac to give it a major boost.
- Fusion Drive Space Ship
- Upgrade To Mac High Sierra
- High Sierra For Fusion Drive Macs 2017
- High Sierra For Fusion Drive Macs Download
- High Sierra Mac
Same system requirements as Sierra: You should be able to run High Sierra on the same Macs as its predecessor ran on. If you have a Mac with a hard-disk drive or hybrid Fusion drive, you will. May 09, 2019 The Best External Hard Drives for Mac in 2020. Winebottler for mac sierra. https://generousconsulting591.weebly.com/ue-boom-for-os-x.html. Looking to add storage, or for a smart way to back up your Mac? Here's what you need to know, along with our top-rated Apple-friendly drives. High Sierra doesn’t convert anything but a startup drive that’s an SSD to APFS, so a startup hard drive or Fusion Drive remains untouched, as well as any external drives, no matter what type.
What You’ll Need: Visio alternative for mac.
- A Mac mini, iMac, Mac Pro or “Hackintosh” with at least two available SATA data/power ports
- OS X 10.8.2 or later
- Solid State Drive: MacSales.com offers a wide lineup of SSDs that are perfect for a Fusion Drive
- Hard Disk Drive: Take a look at the MacSales.com selection of 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch HDDs
- Familiarity with the OS X Terminal command line
Installation of Drives
Once again, remember that you’ll need a Mac with enough internal space and at least two SATA connectors in order to put both an SSD and HDD inside. Fortunately, OWC has a library of videos showing how to open and install drives. Note that the proper tools — a spudger, guitar pick, and suction cups are necessities for an iMac teardown — and some skills are required in order to take the old drive out and install a new one.
OWC Data DoublerOnce again, remember that you’ll need a Mac with enough internal space and at least two SATA connectors in order to put both an SSD and HDD inside. Fortunately, OWC has a library of videos showing how to open and install drives. Note that the proper tools — a spudger, guitar pick, and suction cups are necessities for an iMac teardown — and some skills are required in order to take the old drive out and install a new one.
OWC’s Data Doubler mounting solutions are highly recommended for installing both the HDD and SSD that you’ll be placing into your Mac. Data Doublers are available for Mac minis and iMacs that replace the built-in optical drive (AKA SuperDrive) with a second drive, while older (pre-2013) Mac Pro models have four SATA hard drive bays with internal hard drive carriers. Adding a 2.5-inch drive to a 3.5-inch drive bay in a Mac Pro is easy using OWC’s MultiMount (photo right), and that same product can be used to put up to two 3.5-inch drives in a 5.25-inch optical drive bay.
OWC Multi-MountNeedless to say, installation of extra drives is much easier in Mac Pro and Hackintosh devices, since they already have multiple drive bays that are easily accessible. The Mac mini and older MacBooks are next in terms of ease of upgrading, while iMacs can be difficult to upgrade.
There’s also one other solution — using an external OWC ThunderBay 4 or ThunderBay 4 mini (see image below) with an SSD in one bay and a large HDD in another bay as a Fusion Drive. This is very useful for storing large iTunes libraries with many video files, as it places recent movies and TV shows on the SSD for quick retrieval and improves access time for less frequently watched videos as well.
OWC ThunderBay 4 MiniBoot into OS X
Next, you’ll want to install OS X and boot the device into the operating system. For those who are planning on making the Fusion Drive the boot drive, you’ll want to boot the Mac from a bootable USB Install Drive with the latest compatible version of OS X. Fortunately, The Rocket Yard has articles on how to create USB Install Drives with DiskMaker X to help you with that task.
Next, you’ll want to install OS X and boot the device into the operating system. For those who are planning on making the Fusion Drive the boot drive, you’ll want to boot the Mac from a bootable USB Install Drive with the latest compatible version of OS X. Fortunately, The Rocket Yard has articles on how to create USB Install Drives with DiskMaker X to help you with that task.
Now comes the fun part, working with Terminal!
1) Launch the Terminal app. It’s located in Applications > Utilities > Terminal. You can also launch it in seconds by pressing Command-Space on the keyboard, then typing in terminal and pressing the Return key.
2) We want to see a list of the drives installed in the Mac. Type in the following command at the terminal prompt:
Fusion Drive Space Ship
diskutil list
A sample of what the output of the diskutil command produces can be viewed here:
The DiskUtil command at work3) For each drive, there will be a mount point listed in the format:
/dev/disk#
The # is a number assigned to the drive by OS X. Find the mount points for the SSD and HDD that will make up the Fusion Drive, and write them down.
The # is a number assigned to the drive by OS X. Find the mount points for the SSD and HDD that will make up the Fusion Drive, and write them down.
4) Next, let’s type in a command to create the logical volume group using OS X’s Core Storage. This acts like a container for the pooled drives. We’ll need the exact drive mount points we found in the last step – aren’t you glad I had you write them down? The command has the following format:
diskutil coreStorage create LOGICAL_VOL_GROUP_NAME DRIVE_1 DRIVE_2
LOGICAL_VOL_GROUP_NAME is a name that defines your storage group, while DRIVE_1 is the mount point for the SSD and DRIVE_2 is the mount point for the HDD. As an example, let’s assume that we call the group name “FUSION”, that the mount point for the SSD is /dev/disk1 and the mount point for the HDD is /dev/disk2. In that case, we’ll execute the following command in Terminal:
diskutil coreStorage create FUSION /dev/disk1 /dev/disk2
5) Adobe acrobat x pro mac crack download. We’re almost there. The last command creates the logical volume where data is stored when we’re done. This command requires that we find the LVG UUID – that’s a unique identifier assigned by OS X to all storage groups. That ID is created by the command in step 4 and is displayed at “Core Storage LVG UUID”. Write down the ID.
Our final command has the format:
diskutil coreStorage createVolume lvgUUID type name size
You have the LVG UUID from the last step, and that goes into the lvgUUID spot. “type” refers to the file system that will be used, which should be the OS X native file system Journaled HFS+ . That is abbreviated for terminal as “jhfs+”. For “name” enter a name for the volume. OS X usually calls this “Macintosh HD”. The “size” is the volume size, which can be entered as numbers in GB, TB, or as a percentage. Download os x mojave for mac. Since we want to use the entire storage pool as our Fusion Drive, we’ll enter 100%. Here’s the final command to enter (be sure to replace the lvgUUID with the one you wrote down):
diskutil coreStorage createVolume 89E965C6-2AF7-4AFA-ABDC-DC49ECA31E32 jhfs+ “Macintosh HD” 100% Hide my ip for mac os x crack.
6) After the command has executed, you’ll have a Fusion Drive and the volume should be viewable from within Disk Utility from your USB boot drive. Go ahead and install OS X on the Fusion Drive, selecting it as your installation drive.
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Disabling a Fusion Drive
If you should ever need to replace a bad drive in your Fusion Drive or want to upgrade either the SSD or HDD drive — or both — you’ll need to disable the Fusion Drive. This simple Terminal command does the job:
If you should ever need to replace a bad drive in your Fusion Drive or want to upgrade either the SSD or HDD drive — or both — you’ll need to disable the Fusion Drive. This simple Terminal command does the job:
diskutil coreStorage delete lvgUUID
To find the lvgUUID, just run the diskutil list command again from Terminal. https://generousconsulting591.weebly.com/download-os-x-iso-for-hyperv.html. Replace lvgUUID with the real identifier, and execute the command — it breaks the fused drive. Remember that all data on those combined drives is lost, so back it up first!
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High Sierra For Fusion Drive Macs 2017
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In an undated advisory note to those who took part in the High Sierra beta-testing programme, Apple has warned that it will not support the use of APFS on Fusion Drives in the initial release version of High Sierra. That note recommends that anyone who converted their Fusion Drive to APFS during the the beta programme should format that drive in HFS+ before they install the release version of High Sierra.
High Sierra For Fusion Drive Macs Download
That note also reveals that:
- Apple intends that a future version of High Sierra will support APFS on Fusion Drives. It makes no comment about support, present or future, for conventional spinning hard drives.
- High Sierra will be released from the App Store in an app named High Sierra Install Assistant, probably instead of a normal macOS Installer app. When run, that app creates and mounts a volume named InstallAssistant containing the Install macOS High Sierra app.
- The version of APFS in High Sierra release differs from that/those in beta releases.
- A bootable installer for High Sierra requires a minimum of 10 GB storage. Previously 12 GB was specified.
In the preamble to that note, Apple states that, because APFS on a Fusion Drive “is not supported in the initial release of macOS High Sierra, we recommend that you follow the steps below to revert back to the previous disk format.”
As High Sierra doesn’t offer any non-destructive method for reverting a volume in APFS back to HFS+, that note next describes two methods for formatting a startup Fusion Drive as HFS+, before installing High Sierra and restoring the volume from a Time Machine backup.
The first reveals that Apple will be releasing High Sierra from the App Store in the form of an app named High Sierra Install Assistant, which can be used to create an external bootable installer (a process which I will document separately) or to install High Sierra. It is likely that this will replace simpler macOS installer apps of previous upgrades.
At present, the second method appears incomplete. Step 3 states:
On a Mac running 10.12.5 or later, use the Terminal app to run the following command:
then fails to give the command before moving on to step 4.
On a Mac running 10.12.5 or later, use the Terminal app to run the following command:
then fails to give the command before moving on to step 4.
High Sierra Mac
Anyone tempted to format their Fusion Drive in APFS then install the release version of High Sierra on it should think again. It is most probable that Apple has deemed this combination to be unsupported because of continuing problems in this first release version of APFS, not because of problems in converting Fusion Drives from HFS+ to APFS. ‘Unsupported’ could mean that you risk not only losing your data, but possibly even damaging the Fusion Drive.
(Thanks to Garry for kindly providing the link.)