Samsung EVO SSD not recognized in Macbook Pro

[sworrubs]

Hi there,

I am a PC user trying to help out a friend with their quest to swap the current HDD in their 2010 Macbook Pro with a 250gb Samsung Evo SSD and am a bit out of my depth.
We get stuck at the first hurdle as plugging in the SSD to two USB ports (supposedly one for data, one for power) on the MBP doesn't exactly work: The enclosure LED holds red for around 2 seconds then goes out and that's it - it doesn't prompt anything on the laptop and does not show in Disk Utility.
I have tried the drive, using the same enclosure in my Win 7 Desktop and it is recognized with no trouble at all.
I'm not really sure what to try next, I had toyed with the idea that the enclosure might not be getting enough power but is that an issue with SSDs?

If anyone could help with suggestions that would be really greatly appreciated, thanks for your time,
Scott

 

[Karsten75]

As a wild guess I suspect the format (NTFS?) of theSSD may not be recognized by the Mac?

 

[Dereck47]

Watch a couple of these videos and see if they help you.
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=install+ssd+in+2010+macbook+pro

 

[sworrubs]

As a wild guess I suspect the format (NTFS?) of theSSD may not be recognized by the Mac?

Hey thanks a lot for your response - as the SSD is brand new and uninitialized, would it have a format? I suppose more to the point, is there some way to initiliaze/format the SSD on a Windows machine that would give it the best chance of being read on a mac?

Watch a couple of these videos and see if they help you.
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=install+ssd+in+2010+macbook+pro

Thanks for the link though all those that I clicked through to dealt more or less solely with the hardware installation of the SSD and all but skipped over the initialization/cloning part. I will keep looking through youtube though to see if anyone has come across something similar!

Thanks again,
Scott

 

[Karsten75]

Sorry, that was the end of my Mac knowledge. 🙁

 

[psybri]

I just went through this exact situation (same macbook....same SDD). After about an hour of trying (and getting quite upset) I went ahead and chose the option to boot from network (you'll see an option to join a wireless network in lieu of any available HD's available). This will allow the user to load Mac OS X via the internet (which is easy with Apple Store username/password). This will allow the download and upon completion will prompt user for installation destination (at which point the SSD will show as available.)

I'm using it now and works as expected (GREAT!).

-psybri

Hi there,

I am a PC user trying to help out a friend with their quest to swap the current HDD in their 2010 Macbook Pro with a 250gb Samsung Evo SSD and am a bit out of my depth.
We get stuck at the first hurdle as plugging in the SSD to two USB ports (supposedly one for data, one for power) on the MBP doesn't exactly work: The enclosure LED holds red for around 2 seconds then goes out and that's it - it doesn't prompt anything on the laptop and does not show in Disk Utility.
I have tried the drive, using the same enclosure in my Win 7 Desktop and it is recognized with no trouble at all.
I'm not really sure what to try next, I had toyed with the idea that the enclosure might not be getting enough power but is that an issue with SSDs?

If anyone could help with suggestions that would be really greatly appreciated, thanks for your time,
Scott

 

[sworrubs]

I was actually just logging in to post my own solution but great that you found another, almost certainly better, way! For me this worked:
- Plugged in the SSD to a Windows 7 PC using the external enclosure
- Initialize the drive as GPT (GUID Partition Table) using disk manager
- It then asked to be formatted but I cancelled and safely removed the drive
- Plugged into the Macbook Pro using the external enclosure and hoped...
- Hooray, although it asked to be initialized again it was happily recognized.
- Initialization and formatting now worked as expected.

It's still cloning away but am hopeful that that was the only hurdle... not necessarily holding my breath though. Obviously my solution relies on having access to a Windows PC which is probably out of the question for some but between that and psybri's answer hopefully others can get it working too!

Thanks for everyone's help,
Scott

 

[colin1069]

Here is what worked for me- MacBook Pro 13" mid 2010 (7,1); OS X 9.4 (Mavericks):

(copied from a forum on Crucial's website)

Before you can use your new SSD with your Mac, you have to initialize and partition it.

Connect the SSD via USB adapter or other external connection (I used a 2.5" HDD/SDD enclosure purchased from Amazon) method. When the SSD is noticed by the Mac, you will see a message telling you that the drive cannot be read by this computer. In this message, click the button Initialize.
The Crucial SSD will be listed in Disk Utility. Highlight the SSD and click the Partition tab.
Click on Options and verify that it's set to "GUID Partition Table".
Select Partition 1 if you want to use the entire SSD as a single partition, and give it a suitable name.
Verify that the selected format has defaulted to "Mac OS Ex tended (Journaled)".
Select Partition. The drive will now be partitioned and formatted.
When the Disk Utility is done, close it.
The SSD should now be visible on your desktop with the new name you gave it.

I then restarted my Mac in Recovery Mode (holding command + R keys simultaneously).
Select Drive Utility
Select Restore tab
Select "Mac HD" as origination; select Samsung SSD as destination
Click Restore and accept yes for the following prompts.
The Cloning process will begin- mine took about 2hrs for approx 160Gb worth of stuff