13 replies to this topic

[JDW]

I started this thread to serve as a warning to my fellow PowerBook G3 Wallstreet owners who may be contemplating an SSD. Reasons for adding an SSD are numerous, including elimination of noise and heat, power reduction, and greatly improved performance. Sadly, after spending dozens of hours debugging with OWC staff over the past 4 months, and after going through two RMAs, I cannot recommend the OWC Legacy SSDs for the PB G3 Wallstreet. I am posting this today because OWC refunded my money today, bring a close to my long and unsuccessful journey.

In Nov. 2011, I started the following topic about OWC Black Friday discounts and SSD pricing:
viewtopic.php?f=21&t=17318

I eventually purchased the 40GB model, as I discussed in this thread:
viewtopic.php?f=21&t=17322

I also purchased an external 2.5" USB/Firewire enclosure from OWC, anticipating my need to more easily move files to/from the SSD when I was setting it up. Furthermore, I purchased the newest version 3.6 of Intech Hard Disk SpeedTools from OWC, so as to format the drive to get the best performance. We verified the performance benefits of HD Speed Tools in this thread:
viewtopic.php?p=162755#p162755

Sadly, I never could get the OWC Legacy 40GB SSD to work properly in the PB Wallstreet, nor would it work properly in the external enclosure, neither by USB or Firewire, even when I attached it to my Intel iMac. The first and second SSDs I received from OWC worked better with my iMac in the external enclosure than they did inside my Wallstreet, but even then the READs/WRITEs were unreliable and eventually (usually within a day of testing) the drives stopped working altogether.

The third 40GB Legacy SSD I received from OWC (my 2nd RMA drive) did work pretty well. That drive actually worked inside my Wallstreet PDQ computers (I have 2 of them), and I was able to format it with the OS 9.2.1 CD and Apple's Drive Setup. I was also able to install OS 9 from that CD and onto the SSD, which I was not able to do with the first two SSDs OWC sent to me. However, some software acted very strangely. The web browser that came with OS 9 (MSIE 5) worked fine, but Classilla took forever to boot off the SSD and often locked up for 60 seconds at a time when I performed even the most simple operations -- things that never occur on a spinning platter hard drive when used in that same Wallstreet. But even Finder copies were troublesome. If I dragged a folder with a few files of just a few MB in size each over from the OS 9 CD (or another attached hard drive) to the SSD, the first couple files would copy over very quickly, but then the progress dialog would freeze for 30 seconds or longer. Sometimes the copy would complete after a very long time, and other times it keep me waiting for 15 minutes, so I would be forced to restart. Other software would work perfectly. Boot times were fast and reliable, and all the educational software I moved to the SSD for my kids booted right away. But the occasional mystery lockup would occur, and OWC was not able to explain it.

I was upset by the fact I could not format the drive with HD Speed Tools 3.6, nor could those tools "take over" the SSD, despite the fact I could reformat a normal spinning platter drive inside my Wallstreet with HD SpeedTools just fine. I reported this to OWC on multiple occasions, but they never commented about that.

I made numerous HD videos for OWC to show them clearly what I was going through. I am no novice to computing, so I quite nearly overloaded them with details, showing them I was not doing anything wrong. They never did tell me what was wrong with the first two SSDs I got from them, nor were they willing to try a firmware update to get my 2nd and final RMA drive to work in the Wallstreet.

I do not say this to bash OWC. I merely state the facts. OWC Bradley was very helpful through the process, and I appreciate that. But going through the RMA process at OWC takes months, folks. Because I live in Japan, shipping took a long time. Getting a replacement drive from them took no less than 3 weeks to get to me, despite the fact I was required to return my defect drives to them by a deadline. I used EMS at my expense because FedEx (which OWC agreed to pay for) was troublesome for me. (EMS takes about 3 days to get from Japan to the states, and cost about 1/3 of FedEx too.) So the reason this took 4 months to resolve was because of the time required to test, make videos, spend lots of time waiting for discussions on OWC "chat", ship defectives to OWC, then wait weeks to get replacements sent to me, then repeat all previous testing, both inside the Wallstreet and inside the external drive enclosure I purchased. I've always considered myself a man of patience, but this process really put that to a test, let me tell you!

In the end, OWC was unable (and due to the age of the Wallstreets, no doubt, "unwilling") to try a firmware mod to resolve the problem. I verified the problem in two different PB Wallstreet PDQ computers. And that coupled with the fact I have zero issues when using normal 2.5" spinning platter hard drives inside those same Wallstreets proves that my computers were not a problem.

As of today, April 4, 2012, OWC still lists their "Legacy" SSDs as being "For All Laptops that use a 2.5" IDE/ATA Drive." But as my testing has shown that is not true insofar as they do not work with the PB G3 Wallstreet PDQ series (and most likely not the original Wallstreet series either). Furthermore, if you look at the bottom of the individual Legacy SSD web pages, you will see photos of each of the notebook models that OWC says is compatible. As of today, you can still find the Wallstreet series listed, including the PDQ. Again, I must emphasize that this is simply not true as far as the Wallstreet PDQ is concerned. So buyer beware.

I asked OWC several times if they actually did testing in a Wallstreet. Bradley told me indirectly they did, but he never told me directly. He just said that they would never say it was compatible had they not tested it. Perhaps that is what he was told, but my testing proves otherwise. I also spoke to one of the OWC engineers, and he never told me directly if they tested in a Wallstreet. Wallstreets are ancient computers now in 2012, so it makes logical sense that they did not. Had they tested their Legacy drives extensively in the Wallstreet, they no doubt would have found the same problems I found, and then either resolved those problems through a firmware tweak or simply removed the Wallstreet from their compatibility chart. On my 2nd RMA, OWC once again alluded to the fact they tested the RMA drive in a Wallstreet prior to shipping it to me ("alluded" means they did not tell me that flat out nor did they provide me with specifics of that testing). But again, even that drive did not work, and I told OWC that if they did test the SSD in a Wallstreet prior to shipping to me, they certainly did not test it beyond installing OS 9. Because like I said, I could install OS 9 from the CD to the SSD inside the Wallstreet, but then when I booted off the SSD and did even basic things like Finder copies, the problems were very apparent. But again, I think they didn't want to spend a lot of time testing on a Wallstreet (if they did test on one) simply because in their minds, I was probably the lone individual out there still using a Wallstreet. Spending too much time testing would be a waste of time. I am speculating here, of course. But the fact the 2nd RMA drive did not work gives evidence to the fact my speculations may be accurate.

All said, if you own a PB Wallstreet, do not put an OWC Legacy SSD in it. It will not work as expected. And you will lose a lot of money and time during the RMA process. I've been a happy customer of OWC for many, many years, so I do not write this out of some spiteful attack on the company. I don't do things like that, especially when I've been a very satisfied OWC customer until now. I simply wish to report the facts so that future SSD buyers and Wallstreet owners can make an informed purchasing decision. Whether other branded IDE SSDs (if they exist) would work in the Wallstreet is of course something I do not know since I've not tried those. But I will admit to you that I am very skeptical now. I will probably buy things (especially RAM) from OWC again in the future. But as of now, I don't think I would buy an SSD. Perhaps it could be said that their SSDs work better on modern Macs, but the past 4 months discourage me from wanting to test that theory. I hope some of you find this information helpful.

[JDW]

I just wanted to post a supplementary note (now, two years later) to remark about the quality of OWC SSD's. My PowerBook G3 experience was indeed as bad as you read above. No question. But recently I had need to purchase some computer items from OWC for the office, one item of which was an SSD for our company president's MacBook Pro. Having previous purchased no other SSDs except for the failed Legacy 40GB, I couldn't help but feel some anxiety. But that was put to rest when it was installed. It works flawlessly in the MacBook Pro, and the speed is just stunning. It brought me almost to tears, mainly because it's not nearly as easy to put one in my iMac!

All said, I cannot recommend OWCs "Legacy" SSDs with an IDE/ATA interface in a PowerBook G3; but I certainly do recommend OWC SSDs in modern Macs using a SATA interface.

Best wishes.

[antony701]

JDW,

Thanks for sharing your experience with us.
Just curious, what SSD did you end up putting in your PowerBook G3?
And would those "Legacy SSD" work on other laptops such as PowerBook G4 or iBook?

[JDW]

Actually, I ended up never putting any SSD in my PowerBook G3. OWC was the only SSD vendor I found who sold a turnkey SSD solution that had an IDE/ATA Interface. Most SSD's are SATA drives.

So if any of you out there reading this come across a quality, "confirmed and guaranteed to work in a PowerBook G3" SSD with IDE interface, please report back here!

I also would love to find a turnkey SSD solution that has an old 50 pin SCSI-1 or SCSI-2 interface, for use in an SE/30. Yes I am well aware that most people use a CF card solution and hack together a compatible compatible interface. But the best solution is really an all-in-one unit that has the SSDs memory and interface built into the same unit. You also get more longevity and consistent speed with a true SSD, especially those from OWC which have 7% over provisioning.

[Vanceone]

Hmm.

Is this only for the Wallstreet, or do you think that it affects all of Powerbook line, like the Lombard, the PDQ, and the Pismo as well?

I have a Pismo and I've toyed with getting one of these SSD's for it. I always assumed it would work.

[JDW]

If you are referring to OWC's "Legacy" line of SSD's that have an IDE/ATA interface, then yes I do believe they may pose a problem in any Mac. The reason I say that is because when I purchased my OWC Legacy SSD, I also purchased an external 2.5 inch hard drive enclosure that can connect to modern Macs by USB or FireWire. When I put the SSD in that enclosure and connected it to my 2009 iMac by USB and by FireWire, I often had problems reading and writing to it. But when I swapped out to the SSD for a regular 2.5 inch spinning platter hard drive, I could read and write perfectly to that hard drive via USB or FireWire, proving that there was nothing wrong with the external enclosure.

Also keep in mind that my bad experience with OWC's Legacy series SSDs wasn't just an unfortunate rare probem with one bad SSD. I went through three of those Legacy SSDs, and all of them exhibited the same problem. I think this gives strong evidence to the fact that OWC had some serious problems in their IDE interface for that line of drives. Whether they have rectified that problem in their "Legacy" line of SSDs over the past year is not something I cannot comment upon. All I can say is that their SATA line of SSDs works perfectly in modern MacBook Pros. But such is not too surprising in light of the fact that the IDE/ATA interface is very different from the SATA interface.

[beachycove]

In OS9, a simple CF card on an IDE-CF adapter works just fine for most purposes. It will also work in OSX, but there would be the trouble of finding a cheap/large enough CF card to make it worthwhile. In OS9, an 8 GB card is plenty.

[JDW]

Believe me, I've long known about the CF card solutions for vintage Macs. I researched quite a lot about them, in fact. I also kept a close eye on the dialogue here in this forum about ARTMIX Japan's CF card solution for the SE/30. But I had good reasons to purchase a turnkey solution (or at least, what I thought would be one) from OWC.

First, we all know that flash memory has a much more limited life compared to spinning platter hard drives. As such, OWC's 7% over provisioning is a definite plus over any CF card drive solution. OWC also advertises that there SSDs don't slow down over time like other flash memory solutions, and especially not like a CF card would. Defenders of CF cards will of course argue with me about this saying, "in the greater scheme of things those differences are marginal at best, and really don't matter that much." But to me, it matters.

The other reason I chose an OWC SSD, above and beyond their companies great reputation for quality SSD products, is the fact their 2.5 inch Legacy SSD drives are a drop in solution for old PowerBooks that don't require any mounting adapters or special add-on interfaces. Again, for some of you, that is meaningless and irrelevant. But for me, it has a lot of significance.

Yet another reason I chose OWC's Legacy SSD for my PowerBook G3 Wall Street was because I thought it would be faster overall than any CF card solution. And truly, if CF cards or SD cards were in fact faster, why then are true SSD drives selling so well? Why aren't more people just foregoing those drives and sticking an SD card in the side of their iMac and using that? Now some of you will try to argue that a true SSD drive is faster in "modern" Macs than a CF card or SD card, and that old vintage Macs have such slow drive interfaces that really doesn't matter which one you put into them. But in my opinion, such arguments are indeed true when it comes to a Macintosh Plus computer from 1987, but consider well that the word "vintage" covers a broad spectrum of Macs that were produced over many many years. As such, the interface in a Mac from the 80s is very different from the Mac in the later 90s, which also is very different from Macs in the 2000s.

Even if you don't accept any of my arguments, the fact is that others here in various threads have posted their benchmark results from CF card solutions in various old Macs. So I want to purchase an OWC SSD so I could run benchmarks on it and then publish my results for everyone to see once and for all which is faster (in a PowerBook G3 Wallstreet II, anyway). Sadly, OWC screwed up royally on their IDE interface for their Legacy SSDs, and as a result I never could get it to work so that I could run benchmarks on it. That part still dsappoints and disgusts me.

And so, I still have my two PowerBook WallStreet computers, but neither one of them have an SSD in them. But should one of you out there ever come across a true SSD 2.5 inch drives that works perfectly in an old PowerBook G3, be sure to post back here and let us know!

[adlsl]

I just had success in upgrading my Wallstreet Powerbook G3 with a 128gB SSD.  I purchased a Transcend IDE drive on Amazon.  It is has a 44 pin interface.  The 4 pins on the end of drives such as this have manufacturer specific functions.  The typical conventional hard drive for the Wallstreet Powerbook requires that no connection be made to these pins for the drive to function as a "MASTER".  This particular Transcend drive does NOT work this way.  The label on the front of the drive indicates that the last two pins on the end must be jumpered for the drive to be recognized as a Master.  If you do not jump these last two pins the Powerbook will allow you to format and partition the drive but it will NOT boot unless it is configured as a Master by connecting these two end pins together.  Now here is the trick.  The internal connector from the drive to processor board has a 44 pin connector so you can not leave a jumper on these last two pins as when you have the jumper installed the drive will not mate with the connector.  What I did to make it work was to solder a short jumper on the PC board that connects the drive to the processor board.  Once I added the jumper, the Powerbook recognized the SSD as a legit boot device and I was able to boot from it.

 

I partitioned the drive with the first 8gB for OSX and the remainder of the drive for OS9.  I am able to boot without problems into either OSX or OS9 without problem.  The time to boot seems to be only a little faster for OS9 and much faster for OSX.  The really noticeable increase in speed however is in running OS9 applications.  Not just the disk intensive applications but also since I have virtual memory enabled which now uses the SSD instead of the conventional hard drive, the machine runs faster even on non-disk intensive applications.

[Elfen]

adlsl,

 

I have my Wallstreet G3s on SSD (one of them being a Compact Flash and the other on a KingSpec SSD) and can attest to the similar results you got. But being made of Flash RAM in both cases, (y)our device is limited to the number of writes it can do.

 

In my case I have maxed out the RAM on the WallStreets (and other Mac laptops I own with an SSD), and turned off the Virtual Memory. This increases the speed of the system as a whole and limits the number of writes the OS does to the SSD, which will make it last longer.

 

With OSX, you need to go into the system and turn off logging of various components, UNIX writes a log of everything it does in various places, and you need to google this information. I have done this long ago for my G3 and G4 iBook and Powerbooks, and it does speed things up slightly as the system has fewer things to do. But if your system crashes, the log of what happened will not be written. Since it is very stable, I have not had a crash on my G3/G4 laptops since putting in an SSD.

Edited by Elfen, 05 August 2014 - 05:47 PM.

[Elfen]

Even if you don't accept any of my arguments, the fact is that others here in various threads have posted their benchmark results from CF card solutions in various old Macs. So I want to purchase an OWC SSD so I could run benchmarks on it and then publish my results for everyone to see once and for all which is faster (in a PowerBook G3 Wallstreet II, anyway). Sadly, OWC screwed up royally on their IDE interface for their Legacy SSDs, and as a result I never could get it to work so that I could run benchmarks on it. That part still dsappoints and disgusts me.

And so, I still have my two PowerBook WallStreet computers, but neither one of them have an SSD in them. But should one of you out there ever come across a true SSD 2.5 inch drives that works perfectly in an old PowerBook G3, be sure to post back here and let us know!

 

How did my CO at the Police Aux. Services put? Oh yes, "When you buy a bullet proof vest, you don't buy cheap!" Thus do not think that you can go into battle with a $199 bullet resistant t-shirt with the same results when you need a $4900 Dragon Skin Protective Full Body Systems.

 

Thus I have to dismiss much of what many, including you, stated on this thread.

 

Just because you have one bad experience with something does not make it the standard for all others. In Februrary of 2013, I had a Crucial M4 SSD fail on my with TOTAL DATA LOSS. I thought I was the only one but it turns out that there is a problem with ALL M4 SSDs made before a date. The situation is so bad that there is a forum thread about it:

http://www.avsforum....reported-2.html

I'm post #55...

 

In my case, my SSD failure happened within 3 weeks of buying it. Three Lousy Weeks. Other users reported their problems after months of usage. Furthermore Crucial stated that because I used my SSD in a USB Box to switch from one machine (mac) to another (PC), that they consider it as "Abuse" and will not cover it under their 3 year warrantee. Since M4 SSD failure is happening to everyone who has one, then I can say crap about the device and Crucial's Business Practices.

 

You have an issue with OC and their SSD working on a Wallstreet G3. But that is only one example of an issue. Many of us here have used other forms of SSDs with varying success. Though SSDs are not perfect, neither are hard drives. You need to learn the technology and that involves a bit of cash spending to get to learn the technology and see what you can get out of them. 

 

______________

 

Point 2 - CFs are true SDDs, though they might not be True 2.5in SSDs. Wikipedia says "As flash memory devices are solid-state, they are more shock-proof than rotating disks." (Wikipedia CF Entries: 2.3 Reliability ) CF do have an IDE interface built onto to them but to maintain their small size, they needed to use a micro-miniature IDE/ATA connector on it. "CompactFlash IDE mode defines an interface that is smaller than, but electrically identical to, the ATA interface." (Wikipedia CF Entries: 2 Technical details ).  To make it fit into a system, whether it be a Mac or PC with IDE/ATA 40 pin desktop or 44 pin laptop Interface, you will need an adapter. "CF cards can be used directly in a PC Card slot with a plug adapter, used as an ATA (IDE) or PCMCIA storage device with a passive adapter or with a reader, or attached to other types of ports such as USB or FireWire. " (Wikipedia CF Entries: 1 Description )

 

CF's are a low cost SSD option, when compared to other SSD configurations and storage amounts. Do you really need 980GB of SSD storage on a G3 Wallstreet that is not running OSX? I do not think that the entire 68K and PowerPC Software Library is bigger than 16GB! And back in 2005, I indexed the entire internet in under 32GB of Disk Space. True, the internet is bigger now than it was then, but putting TB worth of Storage Space on a system that only needs a few GB makes no sense to me.

 

You also need to consider the speed of your system's hard drive interface, really consider it! Oh sure, that 32GB SSD with 120MB/Sec Read and 96MB/sec Write looks great to have on your system and you would think it would kick some serious processing butt, BUT your Wallstreet IDE/ATA interface only runs at 33MB/sec. You will NEVER see 120MB/Sec Read and 96MB/sec Write the SSD owns!

 

Ever taken a CF or SSD apart? I have. I have been working with SSDs since 1998 or so, CFs since 1999, RAM Disk systems as a whole since 1982... on a Vic 20 and Commodore PET! When you open them up, you see the same thing in all of them: Flash RAM, and Disk I/O handling circuitry on a chip. The interface goes to the I/O processor and then to the Flash RAM. Those 2.5in SSDs are exactly the same to a 1.8in SSD (when using the same interface), nothing has change in them except for the external casing. And looking at the CF and comparing it to the 2.5in or 1.8in SSD, still the same. Only differences are the speed of the chips inside and whether they use high density or low density Flash RAM chips; CFs for their size will use high density chips. To keep costs down, CFs use slower high density Flash RAM chips, but in CFs using faster chips you are still limited by the speed of your system's interface.

 

I have 2 Wallstreets on SSDs, one on a 4GB SanDisk CF, the other on a "faster" 16GB SSD from Kingspec. Except for the capacity, they boot up at the same speed as its due to the IDE Interface in the Wallstreet. Similarly, I have 2 G3 iBooks with the same set up, a PowerBook 5300ce on a 4GB CF by SanDisk and a 4GB SSD by Kingspec in a PowerBook 190 and I just put in a 8GB CF by SanDisk into a PowerBook 1400/166 I just recently got. And that is just my Mac laptops, as I do have desktops and laptops from PCs and Macs and about 50% of everything has an SSD of somekind, including CFs. Except for the 1400, these systems have been using "SSDs" since 2010, and in the case of 1 G3 iBook since 2005. Knowing what expect from them, I never had a problem with them. They are faster than your standard Hard drive machine. Much faster.

 

And CFs are a form of an SSD. They might not be a "true 2.5in" version but with the right adapter they can be. I've done many times with Mac OS, OSX, DOS, Windows and Linux.

 

But they are not perfect. I know that. I use them when I need to use them. I do not expect them to last forever, but they will last longer than most hard drive systems.

Edited by Elfen, 28 August 2014 - 05:05 PM.

[JDW]

How did my CO at the Police Aux. Services put? Oh yes, "When you buy a bullet proof vest, you don't buy cheap!" Thus do not think that you can go into battle with a $199 bullet resistant t-shirt with the same results when you need a $4900 Dragon Skin Protective Full Body Systems.

Seeing the thrust of your entire post preaches the merits of low cost, low end CF solutions, I fail to see how your above analogy benefits your own argument.

Just because you have one bad experience with something does not make it the standard for all others. You have an issue with OWC and their SSD working on a Wallstreet G3. But that is only one example of an issue. Many of us here have used other forms of SSDs with varying success. Though SSDs are not perfect, neither are hard drives. You need to learn the technology and that involves a bit of cash spending to get to learn the technology and see what you can get out of them.

For the record, I tested several SSDs from OWC, and all of them failed in the PowerBook Wallstreet. And eventually, OWC removed all Wallstreet compatible SSDs from their website, confirming my findings. And my findings do not suggest that it is impossible to put a dedicated SSD or CF into a Wallstreet and have it work. My findings were about OWC, which discouraged me to invest in other SSD solutions for my Wallstreet. But I am pleased to see you have found certain CF solutions to work for you. Thank you for your report.

CFs are true SDDs....

If "garbage collection" and other advanced features (such as those which keep the SSD from writing to the same blocks repeatedly) are ignored, you are correct.

CF's are a low cost SSD option, when compared to other SSD configurations and storage amounts.

CF's are certainly not a $4900 Dragon Skin, that's true!

I have 2 Wallstreets on SSDs, one on a 4GB SanDisk CF, the other on a "faster" 16GB SSD from Kingspec. Except for the capacity, they boot up at the same speed as its due to the IDE Interface in the Wallstreet.

I would love to see photos of the CF hardware installed in your PB Wallstreets and a video showing them booting and running benchmarks. How does the benchmark data on a spinning platter drive in your Wallstreet compare with the CF solution?

And CFs are a form of an SSD. They might not be a "true 2.5in" version but with the right adapter they can be.

Agreed. And again I look forward to hearing more specifics about your chosen CF adapters and why you chose them over others.

Thanks.

Edited by JDW, 28 August 2014 - 08:57 PM.

[Elfen]

For the record, I tested several SSDs from OWC, and all of them failed in the PowerBook Wallstreet. And eventually, OWC removed all Wallstreet compatible SSDs from their website, confirming my findings. And my findings do not suggest that it is impossible to put a dedicated SSD or CF into a Wallstreet and have it work. My findings were about OWC, which discouraged me to invest in other SSD solutions for my Wallstreet. But I am pleased to see you have found certain CF solutions to work for you. Thank you for your report.

 

I would like to see the ratings on these SSDs you tested for OWC. What were their read/write speeds, were they "PC Only" specific drives? Or were they general SSDs? The Wallstreet G3s have their pluses and minuses, but you are not the only one to buy an SSD and as given such guarantees that it would work and then it was nothing but trash, Several members here have stated that they bought SSDs for their 1400s, 500 Series, 3400s, G3s/G4s and many other IDE/ATA based (mostly laptop) Macs and they failed. But if they went to a slower unit or a CF variant, it works.

 

So this is not necessarily a problem with the system in question or the SSD. It is no secret that Apple has taken short cuts in their systems, including the IDE Port, and it is the main reason of incompatibility with many things, including some larger hard drives. I could bet you throw those tested and failed units on a Mac and into a PC, they would work without a problem.

 

Like I stated, I have one Wallstreet running on a CF, but I also have another Wallstreet running on an SSD - a Kingspec 16GB PATA II SSD. This one to be precise:

http://www.ebay.com/...=item2570611088

 

 

 

If "garbage collection" and other advanced features (such as those which keep the SSD from writing to the same blocks repeatedly) are ignored, you are correct.

 

Both garbage collection and wear-leveling are present in modern CFs as they are in many modern SSDs. It is the older units that  do not have these things, which I can say any CF or SSD before 2005 and 1GB or less of space.

 

There are also many counterfeiters out there making false SSDs and CFs. SanDisk, a CF and SSD manufacturer I use, is often counterfeited. Transcend Media, Lexar and Kingston are another brands that are counterfeited. I get my CFs and SSDs from trusted ebay sources, not just random sellers. I also never buy used, as a used SSD or CF can be written to the limits of their write cycle limitations and you would not know it. A SSD or CF should last you 5 years under "Normal conditions"; normal being all logging and virtual memory options turned off and only write when you tell it too. I already have SSDs and CFs surpassing that 5 year limit. I have "brand new" hard drives that are currently dying because hard drives too are only rated for 5 years of "normal use conditions."

 

The only hints I can give you is the following:

 

In buying a CF for an SSD, make that the company that makes the CF also makes SSDs. That's SanDsk, Transcend Media, Kingston, and Lexar. This is because the technology used in their SSDs will be used in their CFs. KingSpec just recently started to make CFs on top of their SSDs, so add them to the list, but those other companies have been making both for years.

 

Get to know a trusted source for buying the devices. I have several in the USA and a few in Asia that I can say they will sell me the genuine article and not a copied counterfeit. The proof is in the serial number on the devices I bought can be traced back to the manufacturer, and the both seller and manufacturer will guarantee the device I received. This may mean that one have to pay a little more, but it's worth it.

 

As for the interfaces, All IDE Macs can only use a single sided CF to IDE/ATA. With both these devices and SSDs must be set to MASTER if the IDE/ATA header does not cover those 4 pins outside of the 44pin Laptop IDE connector. As for Interfaces, I say go get the Addonics adapter for CFs. You can use the $2 CF to IDE/ATA adapters from ebay but they will not have True IDE™ and DMA on them and will function as a 33mb/sec drive. (See: http://www.fccps.cz/...adv/frr/cf.html ) But most interfaces on Macs before the G3 Dual USB iBooks is at 33MB/sec anyways, so these devices would be fine for them. This includes the G3 Wallstreets, Prismos, and Lombards. The problem is fitting these devices into the powerbooks, and if you are using the IDE/ATA channels and the original Hard drive caddy, thick double sided tape helps out a lot!

 

You can use a CF to PCMCIA, and they would boot faster than on the IDE/ATA Channels, but this a temporary solution and not a permanent solution. It works with all Mac laptops with PCMCIA slots including the G3 Wallstreets, Prismos and Lombards.

 

Both you and I have problems with SSD manufacturers/sellers. Your is with OWC, mine is with Crucial Memory Systems. Lets find a common ground.

Edited by Elfen, 28 August 2014 - 10:38 PM.

[JDW]

I would like to see the ratings on these SSDs you tested for OWC. What were their read/write speeds, were they "PC Only" specific drives? 

 

Here's an archive of the very OWC product page:

 

https://web.archive..../OWC/SSDMLP040/

 

No specifics about performance are given, but you can see Wallstreet listed in the compatible machines at bottom.  You can also see the SSD itself is a standard OWC SSD, but with an IDE interface that was supposed to work with older Macs.  But as my extensive testing proved, their IDE interface had a flaw (although I cannot state precisely what flaw on a technical level) that prevented it from working properly on the Wallstreets.