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Corsair P128 and MacBook Pro beach ball of death

xinfamousx101

By xinfamousx101
in Solid State Drives (SSD)

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xinfamousx101

xinfamousx101

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Hi all,

 

I been reading these posts a lot and they have been very helpful in assisting me with debugging my problem.

 

Anyhow, long story short, I got a MacBook Pro a few weeks ago and right away I put new ram (Corsair CM3X8GSDKIT1066 G) and a new ssd hard drive (Corsair P128 CMFSSD-128GBG2D) in it. I actually got the ssd a while ago and have been using it in my old laptop (and it has served me very dearly).

 

However, once I got everything setup and running, I encountered the Mac's beach ball of doom problem (spinning loading icon and laptop freezes. However, mouse is still responsive). After many hours of debugging, I think I finally found the problem: the ssd hard drive. I ran around 15 hours of memtest osx (basically memtest for Macs) and the ram passed without an error. And once I installed OS X onto an external hard drive and used that to boot, I have yet to experience a beach ball of doom.

 

I have read that a ssd firmware update fixed many Mac ssd-related problems for other ssd brands such as Crucial and Patriot. So my question is: Will a ssd firmware update (http://forum.corsair.com/forums/showthread.php?t=83708) fix my problem? I bought the drive a bit over a year ago so I am quite sure that the firmware on there is outdated.

 

I mainly ask this and haven't done it yet is because it is a pain to take out stuff in a MacBook Pro. So I want to be sure before performing a surgical operation again xD

 

Also, I have already tried but failed to update the firmware using my Mac. Does anyone maybe know a way to do this? (kinda shooting for the stars here) But if anyone is interested, I couldn't get the usb to boot. However, I did manage to make a bootable cd with the update tools on it and got it to boot. But once I tried to run the utility, I got an config.sys error saying that a mem driver is not installed. I looked in the config code and saw that it is set to run the driver and the driver is present also. After fiddling with the code a bit and it still not working, I shrugged and gave up at "it's probably because it's a Mac."

 

Thanks for any help :DD

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RAM GUY

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Can you connect the drive to a Windows system as a second HDD and then run Crystal Disk Info and see what version in installed on the drive you have now.

But to my knowledge that has never been an issue with MAC's with any firmware version on our Performance series drives, you may want to run parted Magic and Secure erase the drive and try it again but that to will need to be done on an X-86 system.

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xinfamousx101

xinfamousx101

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Hi ram guy, thx for the reply.

 

Ok, so I finally took the drive out, swapped it into a PC laptop and updated the firmware successfully following http://forum.corsair.com/forums/showthread.php?t=83708 guide. With the update tool, it said that the old firmware was VBM18C1Q. Now, it should be the new firmware which is VBM19C1Q.

 

However, the problem still exists! If not worst than before! When I tried to install OS X, it would freeze at the same point 4-5 times in a row (near the beginning of the installation). I finally managed to install OS X onto it and the problem continues under normal operation afterwards and perhaps occuring at an increased frequency.

 

What should I do? This drive is compatible with MacBooks right? I mean apple even has instructions on how to replace the hard drive in the manual! And as far as I know, all standard sata drives should work. But at the same time, it is definately not the drive itself because it works fine in a PC.

 

Thanks for any help.

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xinfamousx101

xinfamousx101

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Just as I thought...

 

Well, any suggestions on what I should do now? Apple probably won't do anything.

 

Is there a way that I can swap for a Corsair drive that is compatible? Or do I have to fork down for a new drive?

 

If so, which corsair drives are currently compatible with MacBooks? I have always been a Corsair fan since they never failed me... Even the ram works like a charm in the MacBook (15 hours of testing with 0 error). Just don't see a reason to switch to OCZ now, unless there is no other option for this case xD

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xottis

xottis

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I have installed a CMFSSD-256D1 in a MacBook Pro 5,2, 17", 2.66Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo (lates OS and firmware) and it works fine until it has to wakeup after a longer sleep. The computer hangs and only the mouse pointer can be moved, but nothing else can be done!

 

The computer works fine with the Hitachi HTS723232L9SA62.

 

The SSD-disc serialno: 10040739-13349362 says that the firmware should be up to date....

 

To get the computer to work again it must be hard booted, sometimes more than one time...

 

Any ideas?

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RAM GUY

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xinfamousx101,

The P-Series SSD is the suggested version of SSD with any OEM system especially a MAC, have you checked on Apple's site or with Apples Tech support to see if there is a firmware update?

You might try and secure erase the SSD and then try a fresh install of the O.S.

 

xottis,

I would suggest using suspend to disk instead and suspend to RAM.

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By default the O.S. will use suspend to RAM, I am suggesting that you disable that and set it to suspend to disk instead. You will need to contact apple to help you if you do not know how to make these changes to power management settings.
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xinfamousx101

xinfamousx101

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xottis,

 

Upon my research to fix my own problem, I have encountered many threads on forums exactly like the problem you are describing. However, I never looked for a solution since it does not exactly match my problem. But, I am quite sure that it is not only corsair ssds that does this, and that the solution is out there (from what I remember, it varied from people to people).

 

But a few things that you can try are:

 

-installating apple performace update: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3901

-turn off hard drive sleep in both power and battery modes

-resetting ur PRAM and VRAM: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht1379

 

None of that probably will not help you, but since you have a much older model, I do believe that the solution is out there. Keep looking and gl to you mate.

 

Ram Guy,

 

Yes I have updated my MacBook to the latest software/EFI and also read most of the helpful forum threads that remotely matches my situation. However, most of the things that I have encountered involves the 09 MacBook freezing issue due to the EFI 1.7 update, which I believe that apple fixed through a performace update. But when I tried to install that, Mac OS X just gave me an error saying that I do not need this update.

 

Since my MacBook is the newest generation that came out just a month ago, I do not believe that Apple will address this problem, if at all, anytime soon. I mean clearly it is a compatibility issue that their EFI system is not supporting or something. But unless you are telling me I can sue Apple or something, I doubt that there is much to do but wait.

 

However, I know that other ssds with different controllers are more compatible with Apple. So I am just wondering if for example the Corsair Force series would work or not.

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RAM GUY

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The Performance Series SSD's are the preferred SSD with Apple and if you have a newer version there are no problems that I am aware of. I would not suggest using any other controller on an SSD with Apple other than what Apple provides support for IE Samsung and Intel are the only two SSD's they offer that I am aware of.
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xinfamousx101

xinfamousx101

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I see..

 

Well, if you are suggesting that it is not a compatibility issue, and since the MacBook works fine on an external drive, that means that there is something wrong with the ssd itself? But it worked so well in my PC laptop.. I still think that it is a compatibility issue.. More specifically, I think that the nvidia controllers are just improperly controlling the drive due to bad/incompatible drivers on the chipset itself. Apple can probably fix this problem with an EFI update. But the question is: when, or even if this update will ever occure.

 

This may sound simple but what this problem seems to me is that the ssd randomly turns off or stops working for some reason. All of the symptons from the freezes suggests that. And when I secure erased the drive and then reinstalled OS X on it, it almost finished installing, but then gave me an installation error and with an option to restart the laptop to retry. Once I have done that, the drive is no longer there. I have to physically cold boot the machine for the drive to be redetected (or turned on?).

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xottis

xottis

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Ram Guy,

 

Ok then I have tried to suspend only to the disk. This was done with the command:

 

sudo pmset -a hibernatemode 25

 

(default is hibernatemode 3)

 

This works fine when the computer is left for a shorter time. You have to push the power button, then you get a grey screen and shortly the memory is loaded from the disk and everything is fine.

 

But if left for a longer while, you push the power button, you get a grey screen and nothing happens... Then you have to make a hard boot.

 

Any ideas??

 

 

 

xinfamousx101,

 

already tried those things, thanks anyway!

 

xottis

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xottis,

That sounds more like an issue with the system, does it try to read from the SSD then error out or you get this at the LOGO screen before it reads the HDD.

 

Are you Both using the Nvidia version or the Intel version? If its the Nvidia version please talk to apple for a update.

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xinfamousx101

xinfamousx101

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sorry for the delayed update, but I have just recently solved the problem. I fixed it by installing a new ssd that runs the latest sandforce controller. The manafacture that produces it uses it own custom firmware, so I dunno if the equivalent corsair drive (force) will also be compatible.

 

you're right ramguy, the new macbook pros also use intel chipsets, my bad for the incorrect information. But since installing a new drive fixed the problem, clearly it was a compatible issue.

 

so FYI for those out there, the corsair performance series (or more specifically the 64 and 128s, because the 256 uses a different controller i believe?) is NOT compatible with the current generation of 17 inch macbook pros (6.1)

 

with a working ssd, i am having a similar problem as xottis now. i been resetting my battery (letting it run out before doing a full charge) and the laptop would freeze (for me when the loading bar happens when waking up). This issue only occurs when suspending to harddrive (right when it is about to run out of battery). when it suspends to ram, it does not have this problem. *shrugs* after what i been through, this seems hardly a problem. to be honest, it might even be because the power goes out completely before it is able to finish the suspension process. I don't care too much to finding out how to suspend to harddrive to try and diagnoise the problem since it is so minor

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