Miscelleneous by stefan @ 2012-10-01
MCE OptiBay is an adapter that allows us to replace the SuperDrive with an extra storage drive like a HDD up to 1TB or a high performance SSD. The necessary tools are supplied inside the box and if the installation steps are followed correctly, users shouldn't encounter any difficulties when performing the transplant.
I would like to thank first to MCE Technologies for offering a sample of their OptiBay for Unibody Kit for testing and reviewing.
"MCE Technologies, newly located to Brea, California, was founded in Irvine, California in 1993 as a wholesaler of Macintosh equipment to overseas dealers and distributors. In 1996 the company recognized a void in the retail supply of products for the Apple PowerBook and shifted its focus completely to supplying PowerBook products directly to the consumer.
With three electrical engineers leading its staff along with a strong understanding of the needs of PowerBook users, in 1998 MCE joined the Apple Developer Program and launched its own line of MCE branded products for the Apple PowerBook. MCE was first to market with its MCE Xcarét Pro and Xcarét Pro 2000 Expansion Bay CD-RW drives for PowerBook G3.
Since then, MCE has developed a complete lineup of Mac-first storage solutions, including internal and external hard drives, CD-R/RW drives and DVD-R/RW drives, as well as a number of portable accessories for use with various Macs.
MCE now enjoys the hard-earned reputation among its customers and within the industry of being a premier provider of innovative products for the Apple PowerBook , iBook, Power Mac and iMac lines of Macintosh computers. MCE currently markets its brand of high-performance products to overseas and domestic distributors, dealers and professional end-users.
MCE plans to continue its quest to bring innovative and compelling products to the Mac market…empowering its customers and reaffirming their belief that they own the greatest computers in the world."
Available by itself for use with your own or with pre-installed high performance Hard Drive up to 1TB... or with even higher performance SSD (Solid State Drive)
Bootable
S.M.A.R.T. Status Compliant
Easy to setup using Apple's Disk Utility program
Can be set up as a single volume, partitioned, or made part of a RAID array
Optional External USB 2.0 SuperDrive compatible with iDVD, DVD Studio Pro, iTunes, iPhoto, and Finder Burning
LIFETIME WARRANTY on OptiBay Enclosure. Three-year warranty on hard drive or SSD.
Unibody MacBook Pro 13-inch, 15-inch or 17-inch, or Unibody MacBook 13-inch
OptiBay Enclosure Kit with SATA Drive Interface requires a 2.5" SATA hard drive or Solid State Drive (SSD) 9.5mm or less in height.
Portable USB 2.0 SuperDrive requires two available USB ports
Compatible with all Mac OS versions up to, and including, Mac OS 10.8 (Mountain Lion)
MCE OptiBay Hard Drive or OptiBay Bare Enclosure for use with your own 2.5" SATA Hard Drive or Solid State Drive
(Optional) Portable USB 2.0 Enclosure for your SuperDrive (DVD Drive)
Installation and User's Guide
Installation Toolkit
MCE OptiBay Utility Software
Many of us find the free disk space insufficient on the Macbook Pro HDD or simply want to boost the boot drive performances; in these cases we have two upgrade variants, each implying the usage of the OptiBay from MCE.
The OptiBay Kit from MCE Technologies has arrived in a small, plain cardboard box, fully sealed with adhesive tape:
On one of the sides, we can find a sticker with the company logo, the product description and a code name:
All the inside contents are wrapped individually in bubble plastic bags:
Besides the OptiBay itself (on the right), we can also find an USB 2.0 enclosure for the optical drive (if ordered separately), one disk with the installation guides and a small application, along with two screwdrivers:
The OptiBay is designed to replace the internal Macbook Pro SuperDrive with a high performance SATA HDD or SSD. The HDD or SSD must be in a 2.5'' form factor and to fix it on the chassis we'll have to use the screws used by the original drive. On the top side, the Optibay features the imprinted company logo:
On the interior frame we will find the SATA Data + Power ports, where we will connect the drive:
On each side there are two fixing screws with plastic spacers:
On the outside we'll find the external SATA ports, which are positioned in the same area as on the original SuperDrive:
Here is also a lateral view of the OptiBay, which shows the small fixing screws:
For an additional cost, we can opt-in to get the SuperDrive USB 2.0 enclosure, which, in our opinion is a must-have accessories, which completes the kit; the chassis of the enclosure is only made from plastic and mimics the appearance of the aluminum Macbook Pro. The enclosure was designed to hold only slot loading optical drives :
On the back of the unit we will find two holes, along with an USB port and a +5V DC-IN hole:
The bottom side comes with 4 rubber feet, for stabilization:
The enclosure can be opened really easy, by sliding the top cover to the back:
All the SATA to USB interface is held onto a small PCB:
The kit does come with two screwdrivers, one of them having a 4-in-1 design:
To be able to perform the desired modifications, we first have to place the Macbook Pro on a soft surface (to avoid scratches of the aluminum finish) and the bottom side facing up:
After removing the 10 tiny Phillips screws, the bottom cover can be raised, for revealing the internals:
The area we are now interested in is the one with the optical drive; this must be removed in order to install the MCE OptiBay:
With a plastic spudger tool, we must first remove the two data and power cables that are fixed onto the PCB (we do not have to apply a lot of force when performing this operation and must be very careful not to touch the lateral SMD components:
Another cable coming from the Wireless and Bluetooth module must be removed in order to access the first Torqx screw which holds the drive into place:
The module which we were talking about before must also be removed and is held two extra Phillips screws (one longer than the other):
Finally, we have to remove the remaining two Torqx screws residing on the left side; then we can lift carefully the optical drive assembly, without touching any other components:
The SuperDrive has some components pre-attached which must be removed and re-mounted onto the OptiBay; we are talking about the SATA Data + Power adapter and a small metallic adapter held with two black screws:
The removed components will fit in the exact same places onto the MCE OptiBay:
In our case, we will install inside the OptiBay a Crucial M4 SSD; if users are also willing to use a SSD for installation, we would warmly recommend to update the firmware of the respective drive at the latest version, before fitting it into the OptiBay. The drive will be held securely onto the metallic frame with the 4 screws we mentioned earlier:
By performing the steps backwards, we were able to fit in the OptiBay and secure it with the 3 original Torqx screws, fix the Wireless assembly and installing the data cables back onto the motherboard:
Here is a photo of the finished installation:
The SuperDrive that we have just removed from the Macbook Pro can be installed into the USB 2.0 enclosure; first we'll have to attach the PCB into the drives' SATA ports:
Then, we should fix the drive on the bottom of the enclosure and put the plastic cover back:
Two black screws are provided to secure the enclosure:
To power up the drive we'll need two free USB ports:
If the green LED in the back lights up, then we have installed the SuperDrive correctly and can operate it with the Macbook Pro or other laptops/desktops; if data is transferred to or from the drive, the drive LED will flash green and red alternatively:
The OptiBay installation can be performed relatively easy, but we must be very careful not to damage the small screws or nearby components during the switch operation; we can either choose to install a SSD in the bay for obtaining lightning fast boot and application load speeds or we can go the second (HDD) route, which will increase the storage space considerably and eliminates in many cases the need of external storage devices on USB.
MCE Includes the necessary magnetic screwdrivers to perform the installation (except the plastic spudger for disconnecting the data cables).
After we have completed the installation, we have installed a fresh OS on it and performed a restore from Time Machine. The benefits of installing a SSD speak for themselves when looking at the Disk Speed Test results:
If we go onto the SSD route, we should also perform some maintenance tasks in order to minimize the cell wear as much as possible by creating a RAMDrive, relocating some of the folders to the HDD and enabling TRIM.
As we have mentioned before, the supplied disk contains an application named MCE Optibay Utility and some installation guides in PDF format; the disk is written to be read only under Mac OSX so if we'll try to look under Windows OS, we'd think that the disk is blank as it does not show any contents.
The application acts as a DVD Player Activator, that helps us view DVDs using Apple's DVD Player application; the app has another function too and this is to add an "Eject" button right on the top menu, that can be accessed with ease when we want to eject the disk inside the unit:
The MCE OptiBay for Unibody can be ordered from the MCE Technologies website for about $49.99 and if we choose to include the MCE USB 2.0 Enclosure, it will add to the cost another $29.99.
I would like to thank again to MCE Technologies for making this review possible!