Differentiating HDDs and optical drives

I was wondering if there was a surefire way to tell if a drive is a HDD or an optical drive; something like a "Drive type" attribute in system_profiler. I don't see any such value on my 10.4.10 machine. Is there an attribute that will always be there that I can look at? Or maybe some other terminal command? I notice there's a SPDiscBurningDataType available for system_profiler, and I could match names if necessary, but will optical drives without burning capabilities show up there too?

I was wondering if there was a surefire way to tell if a drive is a HDD or an optical drive
What do you mean by "drive"?
If you insert a CD/DVD disk into an optical drive, or if you connect an external HD drive to your Mac via FireWire/USB, then they will be mounted under /Volumes/. Info about these mounted "volumes" (not drives) can be obtained by
diskutil info /Volumes/nameof_thevolume
Or do you want to know what kind of hardware devices are available before inserting CD/DVD into the optical drive? In this case you may use "system_profiler" or "ioreg", but I don't know where the exact info is. "ioreg -l" gives you lots of info, and I guess it contains the info you want, but I don't know where it is. Search for a string "device-type", for example.

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What brand and model is the 1TB HDD and optical drive  used?

As subjected mentioned, if you ordered a Mac Pro with additional 1TB hard disk and SuperDrive, what brand and model do they come in?
By the way, any one the exact BOX dimension of the Mac Pro?
Thanks!

It varies. Mine came with Hitachi HDS721010KLA330 in bay 1. Others have reported receiving Seagates and WDC's. My optical is PIONEER DVD-RW DVR-112D.

Transferring internal and optical drives?

Hi all,
I have an older MacBook Pro 2,2 (Intel Core 2 Duo, 2.33GHz, 3 GB RAM) which has small internal drive and an optical drive that is starting to become buggy.
I have access to a more recent MacBook Pro 4,1 (Intel Core 2 Duo, 2.6 GHz, 2 GB RAM) which has a much larger internal drive and a working optical drive.
What I want to know is, can I swap my current internal drive and optical drive for the other MacBook Pro's?
The execution of the two procedures does not bother me as I have some experience doing tech work on laptops. Just want to find out if this is a doable thing.
thanks in advance,
J

The hard drive maybe, the optical drive no due to DVD copy protection schemes requiring a tie in with original hardware.
You will have to erase the hard drive and reverse clone or reinstall OS X as the hardware drivers are incompatible in most cases.
Older computers usually have older SATA connections, so it doesn't make sense to switch hard drives between models of varying years.
Download the free MacTracker and it will tell you everything you need to know.

Upgrade of my PB with new hd and optical drive

Hi all
I have just upgraded my HD and optical drive on my powerbook to give it a bit more space and facilities.
This is what I have done.
1/
HD (80GB)>>becomes HD (250GB)
I used the WD2500BEVE to which I clone in an enclosure. Then I swap them.
This procedure worked well, and the PB booted straight away. Although I go a little folder with an apple as a first screen for a second or 2.
2/
I replaced the combo drive with the Panasonic UJ-85J
It seems to work straight out of the box, and I can burn from finder. I am still in the testing process, but so far I have been able to burn cd-R (max 24), and dvd-R(max x4 instead of 8). That is with finder.
This is what the System Profiler gives me.
Model: MATSHITADVD-RAM UJ-85JS
Revision: FWR7
Serial Number:
Detachable Drive: No
Protocol: ATAPI
Unit Number: 1
Socket Type: Internal
Previously with my old drive, it read> Unit Number: 0
Also the serial number is blank for the optical drive.
The company I bought it from, checked it and told me that it was set-up as master (I guess this is from the firmware) as there isn't any jumper. We did check the System Profiler before together, and both drives (HD and optical drive) were reading Unit Number: 0
He didn't know much about Macs so he didn't really know what Unit Number was, but guessed that 0 meant master and 1 slave?
But here are my questions:
Another thing that has changed, is when I play a DVD movie, the image quality is rather poor, kind of pixilated, and when I enter the full screen mode, I now have a vertical black border (about 1.5 inch) on either side of the image. I have tried with VLC and it does the same.
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Also is it possible to test the PB with its covers open ( i.e.with KB plate) without killing the PB?
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Dam I don't believe it.
I have now played quite a lots of dvds for testing.
They all display in a different manner. Some play full screen with a good quality, some have a few mm to a cm of black line on the right and left side (the image not expending to the full screen capabilities, some have over 1 inch of these same black lines. The video showing the black lines usually shows poor quality images, contrary to the one going full screen that are as good as before. That might be due to the excess of information in a restricted area but I really don't know.
VLC shows exactly the same behaviors.
On DVD player I discovered the zoom-in facility (I can't remember this before), which helps getting rid off the line, but doesn't improve the quality of the image.
All my DVDs have been purchased in reputable shops, and to my memories, all these movies were playing in full screen mode before with a good quality.
As I said earlier, I have also played these with an external drive, but this didn't change a thing.
There is an other thing that I remember when I first tested the new HD in the enclosure. I did a fresh install of tiger first to see if the enclosure will cope with booting. I discover in the fresh install OSX that I had files in the trash, that were not even on my internal HD. I remember reading about HD with malicious viruses installed straight out of the factory. Could that be it?
Although I have read also about people experiencing similar phenomenon in iTune, when one day all worked fine and the next day, they ended up with the black lines that seem to be very similar to mine.
Please help, as I have tried all settings, and the players definitively do not behave has they used to unless it is a video without the lines.
I am now running ClamXav to check if anything is coming up. Thats going to take a while.
As Apple changed something?
Thanks

Best system and file set up for SSD + HDD in optical drive

I have finally pulled the trigger and purchased a Samsung 512GB 840 pro SSD for the main bay in my late 2011 Macbook Pro and a iTB SATA 2 HDD with Data Doubler from OWC to replace my optical drive. My question is what is the best way to set these up after I have installed them?I am an audio engineer and I do a lot of multi channel audio editing with large files and want the SSD for the speed for my editing. Do I set these up as separate drives or do I RAID ( if that is possible)? Do I have my System software and programs on the SSD and use the HDD as my scratch drive? I don't have access to a Mac Mini, so can't create a fusion drive. Appreciate the advise.

Put the SSD in the main drive bay and the rotating HDD in the Optical bay. Use either Disk Utility or one of the Cloning software programs to Restore or Clone your current install from the HDD to the SSD.
Or Make a Time Machine Backup of the current install and then use the Recovery HD system to Restore that TM backup to the SSD.
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Many ways to do what you want. You just have to pick the one you want to use.
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HDD and optical recognized but no boot

First attempt at building a computer, after having prebuilts for 11 years: I've run into a problem; it will not boot from the hard or optical drive. It sees them quite properly in the BIOS setup and as booting:
>Primary IDE Master ST380013A
>Primary IDE Slave Not installed
>Secondary IDE Master ATAPI COMBO48XMA
>Secondary IDE Slave Not installed
>Third IDE Master Not installed
>Third IDE Slave Not installed
>Fourth IDE Master Not installed
>Fourth IDE Slave Not installed
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Hard drive is on IDE1 using the nifty cable that came with the motherboard; it is a known good drive as of yesterday (transplant from my old computer, and fairly new). Optical drive is on IDE2 using a standard ribbon cable from my old computer, a new drive. I do not have a floppy connected.
I have fiddled with the jumpers, currently both drives are jumpered to "master". At first I was having issues booting, the Promise controller gave me "device not found" errors, then "No BIOS found"; since I wasn't using that (and I don't fiddle enough to plan on using it, if there is an issue with it) I went into the BIOS and disabled that controller, no more errors. I also removed floppy from the boot sequence, since no floppy, and doublechecked to confirm that both other drives are listed in the boot sequence.
Help!

I've fiddled with so many variations, I'm starting to have trouble keeping track >
Checked Chip ATA Operating Mode, it is currently (as of last attempt to boot after tweaking) in the suggested settings, EXCEPT P-ATA Keep Enabled is No and is greyed out, with no way to change it as far as I can tell.
Ram voltage is 2.65V, haven't touched that at all in the process.
I have been swapping channels, after deciding in some desperation to ignore the manual ("First hard drive must be on IDE1"). If I put DVD on IDE1 and HDD on IDE2, no change. I tried putting the HDD on IDE3, and it was not seen in BIOS, but the computer still asked to "Press any key to boot to CD" as if it saw a second bootable device (though HDD was set as primary boot at that time, and not showing up in BIOS anyway in that configuration). If the drives are both in IDE1 and IDE2 they do at least show up in BIOS.
If the hard drive is primary boot device, the computer just stops at blinky cursor, doesn't try to get to the DVD to boot. If the DVD is primary boot, it will ask to "Press any key to boot to CD" (now finally figured out how to get it to respond to a keystroke, legacy USB support in BIOS turned on ... though the keyboard had worked just fine in the BIOS without).
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How do I setup 1 serial ata hdd + 1 ide hdd + two optical drives?

Hello,
I'm new with MSI Boards. I'm unable to get everything recognized by the BIOS. Can someone please explain me how should I setup the configuration and were and what should I connect to what connector or slot.
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Connect the SATA to serial1
Connect the optical drive that you'll be running the XP setup disk from to IDE2
Don't connect any other drives yet.
In Bios>>Integrated Peripherals>>On-Chip IDE Config:
Native mode
PATA only
Keep SATA enabled-Yes
PATA channels- Both
configure SATA as Raid-No
Leave other stuff alone.
Bios>>Advanced Features>>Boot device selection:
Set your preferred boot order.
Reboot from the XP setup CD and install XP
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Connect the other optical drive to IDE2(set jumpers correctly)
Reboot.
This should work!

HDD in Optical Drive Not Readable

Hello. I just installed a 1TB HDD in my optical drive. When I turn on the computer a screen pops up and "the disk you insterted is not readable." Thus, the disc is not in the list of devices in finder. However, when I open disk utility, I can see the disk but cannot verify the disk, repair the disk or anything else. I can partition the disk or something like that. It says under "partion map scheme: unformatted." I can hear the hdd spinning as well. I dont know if this has something to do with anything. If anyone knows anything about what I should do or what the problem is I would greatly appreciate it.
Thanks in advance.

sure, create folders and drag and drop or export your collections, it behaves internally the same way an external HD does.
create and structure your files for easy finding of your data.
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There are other ways to structure files, and fancy APPS for same,
look into an extremely useful tool called PATHFINDER for Mac.

Setting up new MBP with SSD and optical drive and restoring from Time Capsule

Hi Everyone-
Sorry if this has been addressed before, but I couldn't find a specific answer by searching. My last macbook was stolen, but luckily I had everything backed up in my Time Capsule. I just ordered my new Macbook Pro (13"), 16GB Ram, and a 240GB SSD. I plan to install everything next week. My plan is to keep all of my apps and working files on my SSD and use my 2nd hard drive for data storage and possibly my itunes library. My question is- when setting all of this up, what would be the best way to go about doing this.
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4.) Other way that I haven't mentioned
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I used setup assistant last time when I changed from a 2009 mini to a 2010 mini. It caused some file permission errors that still persist today with iPhoto. I have 2 accounts on my mini, 1 for my wife and 1 for myself, but I store all our photos and videos on the shared folder in order to avoid duplication. But when she imports pictures from her profile and I try to view them full screen, I'm unable to. I have to relaunch iPhoto and repair file permissions if I want to view them properly. I was hoping to avoid this happening again.

IMac (21.5-inch, Mid 2010) - CPU and Optical drive fans rev up to 4000 rpm

Hello,
I just want to share my experience with my rather new Imac
I bought this Imac last April and I had the fans roaring after 2 weeks of light usage. I followed instructions like resetting the SMC, unplugging the imac and restarted.
However, I started installing other software like Paragon NTFS, VLC, Firefox and also Istat nano. This happened on a more regular basis and istat nano was showing up fairly normal temperatures - an average of 50° C and I had the CPU fan at 3800 and the Optical drive fan at 4200 rpms. According to apple support, at this temperature fans should be running at factory level or a bit more. Even when I stop all activity, the fans keep up and does not stop even after a couple of hours of inactivity on the imac. Apple support recommended that I reinstall macos on a new partition and run tests and during the tests, the only software I installed was istat nano and still got the fans going with the same result - required a shutdown to bring fans at normal levels and yet average temperatures were around 50 - 55 °C.
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I will keep you posted if I get the issue again - could be tempted to install istat nano and run the tests to see if the fans will rev up after this but not sure I want to go through another 4 days of just doing this...
regards
Philip

Hey nycbigapple2,
I'd run through the recommended troubleshooting steps for when your iMac runs slowly here:
OS X Mavericks: If your Mac runs slowly
http://support.apple.com/kb/PH13895
Welcome to Apple Support Communities!
Take care,
Delgadoh

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Will the optical drive run on a t510 if the achi mode is enabled?

achi mode doesn't affect the function of the optical drive.
Regards,
Jin Li
May this year, be the year of 'DO'!
I am a volunteer, and not a paid staff of Lenovo or Microsoft

IMac G5 Won't Boot and Optical Drive Won't Read Correctly

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If you have AppleCare, suggest that you contact them and/or their Online Chat Support.
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ur optical drives' jumpers set correctly?

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Differentiating HDDs and optical drives

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