Upgrading mSATA or M.2 w/adapter in IDE/PATA Powerbook G4?

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I want to upgrade my 17" Powerbook G4 (running MacOS 10.4.11 on 1.5GHz, 2GB RAM, 160 GB HDD (IDE/PATA)) - with, for example, a 250GB mSATA or M.2 (SATA) SDD (60-80 EUR), and a suitable adapter 44-pin (Mini-IDE) to mSATA (<10 EUR) or to M.2 (around 20 EUR).

Is there a potential problem which I should consider in more detail using an SSD, especially non-IDE, in such an old Powerbook? Could there be a problem with fast wearing out of the SSD with any wrong SSD management by MacOS 10.4 (or 10.5)?

powerbookg4_17

Posted 2016-02-02T22:55:18.783

Reputation: 11

I can't imagine a SSD working at PATA speeds. There are zero IDE SSDs that exist, IDE was discontinued over a decade ago, in favor of SATA – Ramhound – 2016-02-03T00:53:38.723

@Ramhound You comment is irrelevant to the question, which is specifically asking about mSATA > IDE converters. – paradroid – 2016-02-03T06:58:03.617

I disagree its not relevant. The author wants to use a SSD over an IDE bus. There is going to be a huge performance hit by doing that. – Ramhound – 2016-02-03T12:07:24.097

@Ramhound I really doubt that the OP didn't realise that, but you can always point out the obvious if you feel that you need to. – paradroid – 2016-02-03T22:24:56.373

Great, we agree I can make on topic comment to a question! – Ramhound – 2016-02-03T22:41:57.203

After searching on a solution I found my old question. Thanks for comments and for the good answer. Meanwhile, I see that there are IDE SSDs on the market, but too expensive, at least one video on using a small 32GB IDE SSD on exactly or almost identical PowerBook G4 (15" instead of my 17"), but I want a bigger harddrive, and if possible faster than my 160GB HDD. Meanwhile the maximum 320GB IDE HDD (not SDD) cost only around 50 EUR over the internet, but that would not increase performance (much). I will check soon an IDE/SATA converter in the superdrive bay. – powerbookg4_17 – 2016-08-28T15:20:01.803

Answers

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I don't have any experience with doing so on a Mac, but it works with something like a ThinkPad X40 or X41, for example, where it's quite a common upgrade.

Using a modern mSATA SSD with a 1.8" IDE converter, as shown in the picture, is the only feasible way to upgrade a ThinkPad X40/X41, as they used 1.8" IDE drives, which are impossible to find these days.

mSATA > 1.8" IDE converter

You'll have to look into whether TRIM will work on older versions of MacOSX, but SSDs are pretty cheap these days.

paradroid

Posted 2016-02-02T22:55:18.783

Reputation: 20 970

thanks for the answer! This seems to be the final solution to use the original connection for the harddrive. I fear that when using an adapter for a SATA HDD or SDD in the IDE-optical Bay, I may not have the same speed as with the mSata with IDE converter in the normal HDD bay. – powerbookg4_17 – 2016-08-28T15:23:42.437

@powerbookg4_17 It will most likely be faster than the original HDD, and run at the maximum speed that the IDE bus can handle, which will be the bottleneck for the usual SSD speed. – paradroid – 2016-09-12T00:29:46.823

Asked: 2016-02-02T22:55:18.783

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Active: 2020-01-13T09:41:53.453