More Mac Mini questions

[johnsonad]

I picked up a late 2012 Mac Mini and plan on switching out the spinning HD for a SSD (Samsung 850 Pro, 1TB) in preparation for the Bottlehead DAC.  I plan on running Amarra and iTunes.  The goal is to load my entire library onto this SSD and if it grows, I'll add a Firewire external drive.

My question is, which operating system should I use?  I've heard about cut down versions of Snow Leopard and Lion.  I've read that Mavericks is relatively stable and that Yosemite doesn't support TRIM anymore.  What are you guys using and what do you recommend? 

[John EH]

I picked up a late 2012 Mac Mini and plan on switching out the spinning HD for a SSD (Samsung 850 Pro, 1TB) in preparation for the Bottlehead DAC.  I plan on running Amarra and iTunes.  The goal is to load my entire library onto this SSD and if it grows, I'll add a Firewire external drive.

My question is, which operating system should I use?  I've heard about cut down versions of Snow Leopard and Lion.  I've read that Mavericks is relatively stable and that Yosemite doesn't support TRIM anymore.  What are you guys using and what do you recommend?

I use Yosemite with a 240 GB OWC SSD and the original 500GB mechanical hard drive stores my music and files.   I have an unopened late 2012 i7 mac mini that I have a hard drive doubler and a 250 GB Crucial SSD I'm going to put in.

You can do TRIM in Yosemite but you have to open up a big security problem.  OWC claims that their SSD's don't need TRIM.  Mine has been working like a champ for a few weeks. I've noticed no slowdowns with no TRIM.  Of course you can just install Mavericks and not worry about it.

I can tell you this though.......If you opt to put Yosemite on it get an external SATA enclosure, hook the drive up as USB and install Yosemite to USB.  Then install the drive in the computer.  I put my drive in my Mac Mini and Yosemite would not install.  Contacted OWC support and they told me that was normal and to install it USB.  In the end, rather than disassemble I just got Carbon Copy Cloner and cloned the mechanical drive to the SSD.  It was a new install anyway. Works perfect.

[fullheadofnothing]

Caveat emptor:

I was working in an independent Mac store at the time Mountain Lion was coming out. A few people upgraded and then found reasons that it wouldn't work for them. Downgrading was impossible, since with the App Store method of software installs, your OS gets tied to your serial number. Depending on what is on your computer, you may not be able to get it to Snow Leopard, and once you go to Yosemite, you may not be able to get back. Apple may have fixed this, but I'd doubt it.

[johnsonad]

I've heard that too.  I'm going to try for Mountain Lion, if that doesn't work, then Mavericks as that's what came on it.  The independent Mac store that is going to install the drive says there are work a rounds to getting Mountain Lion on it.  We will see....

Yosemite has been giving me troubles.  I'm new to Mac and didn't realize when the best time was to get on board with the latest OS.

[Horatio]

Just want to chime in with a warning on Mac's with aftermarket SSD's. I have had mixed results recently, where one MacBook laptop that was working fine with an aftermarket SSD under Mavericks simply refused to work with a clean install of Yosemite - the issues ranged from multiple installations failing mid-install to successful installations then failing with random errors in use.

The converse has been true with my iMac with a Samsung 840 Pro SSD with a clean install of Yosemite - that has worked flawlessly.

I have also experienced challenges previously with newer Mac hardware not taking installations of older Mac operating systems - particularly - this is normally because the version of the OS I am installing simply does not recognise the newer hardware - these are Old OS on New Hardware problems... Generally speaking it is always best to allow any new OS X version to get at least a full point update before installing it on critical machines - I always view the X.0 version of any new OS X as being more beta than final when it comes to my setup...

The lack of support for TRIM in Yosemite is accurate, and while I did experience performance issues under Mavericks before using TRIM Enabler I have yet to experience the same under Yosemite - although that may still be to come as I did a completely clean install. I personally am not convinced I want to open the required security hole to enable TRIM again however it has crossed my mind that there may be some work arounds worth exploring...

All of that said, I have had very good results with both Mavericks and Yosemite, both driving my Schiit Bifrost DAC with no issues from my late 2012 iMac with aftermarket Samsung 840 Pro SSD.

Bill

[Yoder]

I have a couple of MacMini's, and several other Mac's around the house. My latest addition is the 5K 27" iMac, i7 quad core, 32 Gb RAM, 4 Gb GPU RAM, and a 1 Tb fusion drive. I run almost ever version of OS X. Of all of the OS's, Yosemite is the most troublesome. You need a lot of memory for it to run properly. By a lot of memory, I mean at least 8 Gb, but 16 would be better. Also, Apple still hasn't made it possible to easily go from a newer OS to an older one. I have found only one solution for running, say Snow Leopard, on a Lion or Yosemite mini.

1. Burn an image of Snow Leopard. This image needs to be of an OS currently running on a computer. If copying to a mini, then I would burn an image from a mini. To do this, use the Disk Utility, select the drive with the older OS and click New Image
2. Partition the HD that you will be installing the older OS to so that you have two partitions. Use the Disk Utility, select main HD and select Partition.
3. Move the image to the desktop of the newer OS (it will be faster this way.)
4. Go to the Disk Utility and select one of the partitioned drives and then Restore. Restore: the Source will be your image and Destination will be the "new" drive.
5. Once you have installed a second OS onto your computer then you need to go to the Preferences and select "Startup Disk." It is easy to choose SL from Yosemite, but not the other way around. Also, it is also almost impossible to try and resize a Yosemite made partition from SL.
6. If you cannot select the correct drive for restarting, then restart the computer manually. As soon as you see/hear life of the OS booting-up, then hold down the option key. This will allow you to make an option as to what drive to boot from.

If using a SSD, then I would suggest using it solely as the boot drive and then using an external drive for music storage. I have a 64Gb SSD with two partitions, and a 2 Tb external. The beauty of the external is that I can use it on other computers if I want. I run SL with Amarra on one partition, and have stripped the OS down as much as possible. The other partition runs Lion and Amarra, and is used for "testing." On my iMac I run Amarra with Yosemite with not issues.

[orson]

Me running Audirvana on Yosemite, internal System-SSD, external Thunderbolt RAID.
I recommend small system drive and external music drive too.
SSDs should have quite an amount of free space for best performance.
With a music player completely buffering the songs to RAM there is no need for having the music on SSD (make sure you have enough RAM as the new Mac Minis are not easy upgradeable).