XYMer's Home away from Home

Good questions eep, am looking.

BD, I'll figure out the bootable media thing, I'm going to have to fire it up soon anyway to test out an SSD in a USB case.

For the moment I'm cautiously going ahead with Mojave for my SSD test environment. Powers that be have decided that they could (sigh) either upgrade RAM or SSD but are freaking out at the thought of doing both (though not nearly as freaked out at the thought of buying hundreds of new systems with sufficient RAM & storage). Hopefully I'll figure out a solution that works for the non-technical individuals they invariably have performing technical tasks.

@MB:

Thanks for the reply, so OK, the OSX 10.13 installer has to be downloaded, which possibly might be to Applications folder, and running the commands launches the installer with the "parameters" set for HFS+ . . . ??

I won't be needing it for 10.14, but I have a slot for one more drive, and it could be an SSD . . . whether it would be for OSX or some other open source options . . . but I might also "retro grade" the 10.14 SSD drive back to 10.13, and then these commands might be helpful. The APFS formatting runs a "dmesg" window just for the 10.14 system . . . which seems to be "first command" when the computer boots without the option key . . . .

Yes, using BD's instructions would require you to have the Install macOS High Sierra.app in /Applications which is where the App Store normally places it. It would skip the conversion to APFS in the event it wants to convert your boot disk to APFS.

The second command he listed basically automates the entire upgrade process, so you'd kick it off and a little disk activity later you'd reboot to start the upgrade.

10.14 has no options to not upgrade to APFS, 10.14 requires it. On High Sierra it was optional.

@MB:

Thanks for the reply . . . I had the recollection that I had a "choice" on 10.14.1 . . . but I went for the APFSm but perhaps it was only in 10.13 where I had the choice, but there I stayed with HFS+ . . . in a reg HD.

But, now thinking about the last drive bay and what to put there and then what to install . . . I need more partitions and OSs to play with, never enough, no, no.

Yeah no choice in 10.14. After installation you can clone 10.14 to an HFS+ volume but the reports I read indicated you couldn't install any updates to it, just use it, and even then some functions may be broken (esp. in the future).

@MB:

Cool. So, yeah, no "reason" to have a clone of the system if it won't update . . . that would make it even less useful than it is now . . . . I did spend the night thinking about what SSD I would buy and what I would install on it that would be useful . . . and "work" in the SSD . . . .

But, now I'm thinking I could nuke n pave the SSD I have now and use the SSD speed . . . maybe try a re-install on a regular HD for 10.14 . . . .

Well HDs on APFS get slower over time. I mean crazy slow. SSDs do as well its just slightly better able to cope with that incompetent filesystem.

Not that I'd say hey get this but if you're looking for a cheap SSD that you're not going to use much the new QLC SSDs are cheap. They're also quite slow and likely will need to be TRIM'd regularly to maintain what little speed they have but... they are cheap. You could also go offbrand SSD. They are much slower as well. The DRAMless designs are the bottom of the barrel and honestly I'd stay away from them.

@MB:

OK, thanks for that reply, I was going to post a new thread asking whether it would be "wise" to move my 10.14/APFS system over in to one of my HDs . . . to make better use of the SSD that I have . . . but it seems like you are saying that it would be "slow" . . . and "slower."

But, this is also "interesting" to hear you say that "APFS is 'incompetent' . . . . Bit of a chuckle on that one . . . . But, I haven't found that cheap parts work out too well over time. But might try a Samsung 860 EVO in the Mac Pro in the 4th drive bay . . . at some point coming up.

APFS is not really ready for Prime Time.

I personally think it would pay to clone to HFs+ for use, use the APFS when you need to update, then clone again after update.

@BDAq:

That sounds like a creative response to the problem . . . hmmm . . . maybe I could clone to an APFS "floating" partition??? whatever it is, within the same SSD?? To try to get some use out of the SSD . . . but really I have too many other choices than 10.14 . . . today I'm in #Siduction . . . built on debian . . . from "Sid" selections . . . . Mojave will be idle for several days.

Some comparisons in speed using CCC 5.1.3 Cloning 10.13.6 FW/800 HDD to FW/800 HDD & FW/800 SSD

Meant to have the destinations be equal but they weren't, they were cloned in the past at different times, mostly Windows 7& 10 updates And 10.6 Server in Parallels on the HDD...

To HDD...
Data Copied: 224.68 GB, Number of files: 29,849, Elapsed Time: 13:15:54

To SSD...
Data Copied: 1.13 TB, Number of files: 54,100, Elapsed Time: 10:15:45

I think the biggest problem with Apple Engineering is
their "6 steps to perfection" mentality.

MacOS 10.x.1 - 10.x.6 or less (starting with ML) and then they reboot
and create a new "upgrade" (bigger, better, faster (according to them).

Truth is, 10.8 running on my old mac pro 5,1 will run circles around
any of the newer MacOS versions. It will open and run 32bit or 64 bit programs
faster than 10.9 - 10.13. Booted from the Areca Raid card (2 ssd's raid 0), It will
load (and run) most programs before you can get your finger off the mouse.

_________________
Mac pro 1,1 - Mac pro 5,1 w/Areca Raid - Macbook pro 8,3 - Snow Leopard, Mountain lion and Sierra.
"We are the Messengers between Time and it's Keeper."

Indeed.

I think the funny thing about Apple's transition to yearly OS releases is how they consistently, release after release, forget to include fixes from older OSes.

For example, LDAP lookups usually don't start working until the .5 or .6 release.

The problem? With a yearly release cycle they fork off the old OS branch months before those fixes are rolled in. So release after release after release after release LDAP lookups don't work on the newest OS. Because they forked before the fixes were rolled in. And its not just LDAP.

Couple this with Apple's decision to move to yearly releases but keep the same support schedule (current + 2 previous) means they support operating systems for half the time they used to and we're being given a clear indication that Apple has zero interest in their business customers anymore.

Thanks MB, that explains alot about bugs.

My guess is the yearly release is more for marketing than anything else.

And tell me, exactly who is going to be buying the Mac Pros, their consumer & prosumer base?

Apparently that rare shop who runs only Apple equipment.

Who appear to be stuck in the middle of a religious crisis now that Apple discontinued their Airport line.

I doubt ANY of the really high end video/effects shops run all Cupertino equipment... these are the places that think nothing of thousand dollar stands and 30-40K workstations. My spur of the moment name for the machine was the MaxTaxWriteOff. Sure some very well heeled video producers and a few who stretch will get it (other than those with too much money for their own good who will buy it as a status symbol). I still think they would have sold TONS for 2-3K mini-towers to hundreds of thousands of folks.

There are some TV stations that require all their systems be from Apple. I think they may be the only ones left so flush with cash that they can piss it away that way.

Just to join in, new Apple machines are indeed over-priced, but used machines aren't too bad . . . .

But, was there any conclusion on what the best SSD for a Mac might be? The Blue WD or the Samsung EVO or any?

Blue works fine, but it's slower than an Evo. Right now I'd say the Evo is probably the best option but the Crucial MX500 is probably a sweeter pick.

Neck and neck with the Evo performance-wise but a bit cheaper and with the same 5 year warranty. Depending on which Blue you get, and where you get it, the Blue comes with either a 5 or 3 year warranty.

All three need trimforce to maintain their speed though.

@MB:

Thanks for the details . . . but, eeeeekkkkk, not "trimforce" . . . anything but "trimforce" . . . .

I believe I put an EVO in my '09 MBP and that is still running pretty fast . . . I think I have Crucial RAM in that computer, but for some reason I recall that when I was looking to upgrade my RAM in the '12 cMP that Crucial didn't offer RAM????

I have the OWC offering for SSD in the cMP, but I loaded 10.14 into that drive, kind of a waste of a drive in that even with "updates" it won't sleep . . . don't know if my machine will "qualify" now for 10.15, but I have an empty drive slot that **needs** to be filled . . . I was thinking that trying another, what was it, Black EVO?? might be the choice, but if Crucial offers a drive for the "aging" cMP I would think about it . . . but, um, the "trimforce" problem . . . wow . . . .

eek (trying out a new screen handle) or maybe it should be "eet" aka "este.el.trimforce"????

Apple slammed the door on cMPs with Catalina due to the lack of firmware updates. And so that Mac Pro owners will buy the new Mac Pro using a portion of their Scrooge McDuck gold coin swimming pools. So Mojave is the end of the line.

Not sure if Crucial offers RAM for cMPs - they typically use ECC + Registered RAM, which is a pretty niche market. Servers and a select few workstations and that's about it. Unbuffered non-ECC is what most systems use and to be honest I was thinking you were talking about a 2012 Macbook Pro and was about to mention that Crucial offers RAM for them.

I've run both Blue, Evo, and lesser known far cheaper brands and I can honestly see why the Evo costs more. Their migration tool alone is worth the price difference for Windows systems. The Blue is slower but far less tempermental and still way fater than the far cheaper options.

Honestly I wonder if you could use Hackintosh tools to put 10.15 on a cMP.

Is there a Terminal command to query if trimforce is enabled or not?