TRIM Enabler 2.0 for OS X Lion Released
by Kristian Vättö on January 22, 2012 4:22 PM ESTPeople are often concerned with the performance of their SSD; is it running as fast as advertised. TRIM is an essential part of keeping your SSD performance up (see this article for details) and it has been very beneficial for Windows 7 users. However, for Mac users, TRIM is only available if you purchase an SSD straight from Apple when buying your Mac. The actual TRIM command is supported by OS X, so with minor kext modifications, it’s possible to enable TRIM on non-Apple SSDs as well. Terminal is needed for this and although it’s simply a matter of copying and pasting the commands, not all users are comfortable with using Terminal at all.
To make enabling TRIM more user friendly, Oskar Groth (also known as Cindori) developed an app called TRIM Enabler. The app has now reached version 2.0 and is finally fully compatible with OS X Lion. The 1.x version worked in Lion but it included an old kext from Snow Leopard that caused worse performance for some users. TRIM Enabler 2.0 patches the kext file for you and also repairs permissions, something you would have to do manually if using the Terminal method. TRIM Enabler also supports S.M.A.R.T. monitoring on some SSDs, allowing the user to see for example the lifetime reads and the amount of retired blocks.
As always, use such utilities at your own risk. Especially SandForce based SSDs have had problems with TRIM in OS X and it’s generally not recommended to enable TRIM with them--plus the built-in garbage collection in SF SSDs is fairly effective. I would recommend force-enabling TRIM in OS X only if you do something disk intensive where performance matters, and only if you have an SSD where idle garbage collection is proving insufficient; otherwise you most likely won’t notice the change in performance and you run the risk of unintended consequences. On the other hand, TRIM Enabler makes disabling TRIM as easy as enabling it, so giving TRIM a try shouldn't hurt anything. Moreover, you can always enable TRIM later on if you experience poor performance, and even disable it right after it has TRIM’ed the empty blocks in case TRIM causes problems with your SSD.
TRIM Enabler 2.0 can be downloaded here!
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ananduser - Monday, January 23, 2012 - link
I agree with you, a modular approach is also best for environmental purposes(less e-waste).star-affinity - Thursday, January 26, 2012 - link
I'm under the impression the non-modular batteries Apple is using in their i-products and laptops is of a kind that be charged many more times (more cycles) then modular batteries. Should last a couple of years longer than other batteries.But I'm not sure about this. :)
lalapill - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
the unibody batteries are brainless to replace if you have like one cheap screw driver. if you buy the warranty from apple and your battery dies before then you can maybe get it replaced for free often because it died prematurely.otherewise if you have no warranty then replacing it yourself is not in danger of voiding the appplecare.
you're not a design engineer and designing the components and how they fit together iside an mba or mbp is not easy at all, maybe even more crazy for iphone. so long term why should they sacrifice better design for a removable battery most only have to replace once in the useful lifetime of the product??
666an666 - Saturday, May 25, 2013 - link
Non-replaceable battery prevents the owner from putting a faulty / leaky battery in during warranty. Makes sense to me, as I live in China where junk batteries are sold on the street corner to tight-wads who want an extra battery for their phone / music player.inplainview - Sunday, January 22, 2012 - link
Would this be of any use on Intel SSD's. The 320 and 510 series?dagamer34 - Sunday, January 22, 2012 - link
Probably. I don't remember those SSDs having garbage collection built-in like on SandForce drives.ravisurdhar - Sunday, January 22, 2012 - link
So then would you *not* recommend me enabling it on my OCZ Vertex 2 (SF-1200 based)?ravisurdhar - Sunday, January 22, 2012 - link
Should add it's in a 2010 MBP on 10.6.8.rangerdavid - Monday, January 23, 2012 - link
My age-old advice: If it aint broke, don't fix it.cyabud - Monday, January 23, 2012 - link
I use TRIM Enabler with a Vertex 2 (SF-1222) on my machine with no issues (10.7.2). If you're unsure, try it anyway. As the article says, the software makes it very easy to restore the vanilla kext if you notice any issues with the patched one.