Macbook pro with retina display macbook air imac late 2012 and later mac mini late 2009 and later mac pro late 20. Macbook air with retina display macbook pro with retina display imac late 2012 and later. Sense errors were common back when i was using scsi drives and usually pointed to cable length issues. Apr 17, 2019 learn about the external features and ports on the front and rear panel of these computers. I searched in the usual obvious places but was unable to find it. Heres what you need to know, along with our toprated applefriendly drives. Asus bw16d1ht ultrafast 16x bluray burner with mdisc support for lifetime data backup. Apple usb superdrive with attached usb typea connector cable. Jun 25, 2012 the drive doesnt do much of anything unless you have a disk in the drive.
If you think youll need an external drive mostly for bluray discs, most of them will also play dvds and cds but are. Usb c typec ultra slim external dvd drive burner optical drive cd rw dvd rw superdrive disc duplicator compatible with mac macbook pro air imac and laptop 3. For your mac, lg brings an ultraslim dvd external drive. So, even in 2019, there are still situations when you need an external optical drive. Feb 07, 2019 an easy way to boost your graphics performance, on a mac, is with an external graphics card or egpu. Usb c typec ultra slim external dvd driveburneroptical drive cd rw dvd rw superdrive disc duplicator compatible with mac macbook pro air imac and laptop 3.
Other than processor, these two models are identical. Apr 12, 2017 the remote disc feature of your mac lets you use files stored on a cd or dvd hosted from another computer. It is one of four desktop computers in the current macintosh lineup, serving as an alternative to the allinone imac, and sits below the performance range imac pro and mac pro the mac mini is apples only consumer desktop computer since 1998 to ship without a display, keyboard, or mouse. They just need to work on supporting mac vms natively, because there is still a lot of work that needs to be done around ios and osx. How to upgrade the 2012 mac mini for use in 2020 imore. Ive got this model mac mini and the optical drive has a disc stuck in it. Handy for using on the road with a macbook air or retina macbook pro. We could help you answer that question if you told us specifically which mac you have. An easy way to boost your graphics performance, on a mac, is with an external graphics card or egpu.
Apr 15, 2020 if you want to make use of your mac s thunderbolt port, then this is the best external hard drive for macs. Power down your mac mini, disconnect all of the cables, and flip it over. Best external hard drives for macs in 2020 techradar. This lg external disc drive comes with a mini usb cable and needs no other power source. Discover the world of external hard drives for mac. With its 8x dvdr writing speed, you can quickly transfer data from your dvd or cd to your macbook or imac. The bright 27inch retina 5k display has 5120 x 2880 resolution and supports p3 wide color. It should just work, i have been doing exactly that for many years and external dvds have always worked on my macs. You can tuck it away anywhere that makes the most sense for you. Mac pro late 20 macbook, macbook air with retina display, and macbook pro models with. To find your best external hard drive for mac, youll want to decide how quickly you want to save and retrieve data. It will walk you through partitioning your drive to install windows, downloading the necessary driver files to your external drive, and for newer macbook airs, retina macbook pros, imacs, and mac minis without optical drives, creating a usb installer for windows from an iso file. Jul 06, 2012 the same usb port on my hp tower works just fine to power and readwrite data on my external hard drive, but if i plug in the dvd burner instead i get crap results.
With no eject button on the device and powered by usb the visiontech external cddvd drive is very slim and compact. To learn about earlier models, check the product specifications for that model. Desktop external hard drives usually run at 7200 rpm to offer all the speed they can. The drive doesnt do much of anything unless you have a disk in the drive. Place any internal bluray, dvd or cd drive into an owc external enclosure to. How to use external gpu with older mac mini youtube.
Apples sticking to its guns and leaving an optical drive off the mini as well. A server edition of the mac mini was introduced in october 2009, which omits the optical drive in favor of a second hard drive for a total of 1 tb of storage. Such an external drive could read cds and dvds, play blurays, and even burn discs if. Drive speed is measured in revolutions per minute rpm, based on how fast the drive can spin. When your external drive plugged in to your macbook, click on the apple menu, and choose about this mac, and then click on the more info button. Apple usb superdrive for apple macbook air pro mac mini md564zma type.
The remote disc feature of your mac lets you use files stored on a cd or dvd hosted from another computer. If youve recently upgraded to a new imac or macbook pro, youre probably going to need an optical drive if you want to continue importing your movies and music to itunes, or just access the content on your discs. This mac mini does not have an internal optical drive. To do this, youll need to buy an external disc reader that plugs into your mac via a usb cable. The best external hard drives for mac in 2020 pcmag. The mac mini lost its optical drive with the previous generation, in. They naturally grab one assuming itll work because theyll be using it with a mac. About the external features and ports on imac and imac pro. You can also share discs from the optical drive of another mac, or from a windows computer. Ive opened my mac a few times before to change the hdd to and ssd, but this was my first time tinkering with the optical drive. Mar 31, 20 this is my project and guide on replacing the internal optical drive to a 2nd hard drive in the apple mac mini mid2010. With simplicity, this external drive has stateoftheart technology.
A lot of times a persons builtin optical drive fails, and they see the new external at the apple store. It will walk you through partitioning your drive to install windows, downloading the necessary driver files to your external drive, and for newer macbook airs, retina macbook pros, imacs, and mac minis without optical drives, creating a usb installer for. If your mac doesnt have a builtin optical drive and you need to use a cd or dvd, you can connect an external drive like the apple usb superdrive. Asus zendrive slim external dvd burner optical disc 8x speed rewriter drive in black with mdisc support, usb 2. The same usb port on my hp tower works just fine to power and readwrite data on my external hard drive, but if i plug in the dvd burner instead i get crap results. Mac mini model a1283 optical drive replacement ifixit. This reduced power draw helps preserve the battery life of the mac you plug the drive into.
Does anyone know if there is an emergency release mechanism anywhere. During the style evolution, lgs optical drive has achieved a new status from slimmer to the slimmest. Mac mini model a47 optical drive replacement ifixit. The mac pro is unique, as you can actually put a second optical drive in it, but apple has vowed to release a new pro desktop in 20 and who knows what its design will be. The mac mini stylized with a lowercase mini is a desktop computer made by apple inc. I replaced the optical drive in my macbook pro with a ssd and put the optical drive in a portable usb enclosure from other world computing. Swap your imac, mac mini or macbook cddvd drive for. Use the cd or dvd drive from another computer with your mac. Optical drives went the way of the dodo bird a few years ago on mac computers due to most software, movies, and music all moving online, but sometimes you still need a good old fashioned cd drive. How to replace internal optical drive with 2nd hard drive on.
This was the simplest alteration i could make to my ppc g4 mac mini setup. Preprogrammed for both mac and windows, you shouldnt need to do any formatting to get the drive to work. This video will show you how to use an external gpu with an older mac mini, macbook, imac or. An external optical drive will allow you to access discs on your mac. Mac mini and external optical drives apple community. I found that its entirely possible to remove the optical drive without removing the whole subframe. Such an external drive could read cds and dvds, play blurays, and even burn discs if thats what you want. Use the tip of a spudger to remove the black electrical tape spanning the interconnect board and optical drive. Hopefully theres a genius selling it to them whos going to ask which mac they plan on using it with.
You can connect this superdrive with your macbook pro with retina display, macbook air, imac, or mac mini with a single usb type a cable, which is built into this. The last apple mac to ship with an optical cd or dvd drive was a in macbook pro, originally released in june 2012, but on sale until october 2016, when apple discontinued that model, more. Aimed at multimedia professionals, the caldigit av pro 2 is a welldesigned, macformatted external drive that comes in ssd and spinning disk versions, and includes both a usb hub and thunderbolt. All the parts you need to easily add a second hard drive to your 2012 mac mini, including the all important ribbon cable and logic board removal tool. This is my project and guide on replacing the internal optical drive to a 2nd hard drive in the apple mac mini mid2010. Bluray up to 16x, dvd up to 24x, dvddl up to 16x, cdrw up to 48x readwrite burn speeds. Compare portable, usb and external hard drive models for office and home and shop online. How to boot a mac from an external drive or alternate. First plug in the external drive to a usb port that you know works with other devices now insert a dvd movie that you know w. Buy new for apple mac mini late 2012 a47 md388lla md388 desktop 8x dl usb superdrive super multi dvd rw ram burner 24x cdrw writer external portable optical drive silver. This mac external cd drive is designed for the owners of macbook pro with retina display, macbook air, imac starting from 2012, mac mini starting from 2009, mac pro starting from 20.
With the apple usb superdrive md564lla you will be able to watch movies on dvd, install software, create backup copies, and perform many other tasks. Get everything you need to upgrade your 2012 mac mini ssd for a total system performance and capacity boost. I was exited to replace my optical bay with a hard drive caddy, and finally get rid of that thing i never used. Anyways, i encountered two screws which were impossible for me to remove and got stripped to the max. Since i am the one who did this mac mini 2011 2012 with internal optical drive mod described on. Im trying to determine whether i will need to remove the entire optical drive or not. Apple claims that its usb superdrive has everything you need in an optical drive. May 09, 2019 aimed at multimedia professionals, the caldigit av pro 2 is a welldesigned, mac formatted external drive that comes in ssd and spinning disk versions, and includes both a usb hub and thunderbolt. Installing windows on a mac wo an optical drive microsoft. Historically, the only macs that the superdrive supports are macs that were made without an optical drive, such as a macbook air, mac mini starting in 2011, macbook pro with retina display, imacs since 2012, etc. A combo drive was initially offered as standard, with the superdrive being an option, but through the 2010 models, all models that have an optical drive contain the superdrive as standard. Following the mac mini 2011, theres no optical drive here if you have cds or dvd to rip or burn, youre going to need to buy an external drive.
Consider how youll be saving and transferring files, such as photos, videos, files from tablets, files from pc laptops, or photos from toprated cell phones. The y cable works just fine, id be ok with it at my office, but there is no way it would work with the mba usb ports being on opposite sides of the computer. How to get my mac to recognize an external dvd drive quora. This option on boot trick works for quite literally any boot volume, whether its an external usb drive of any sort, a thunderbolt hard drive, boot dvd, cd, the recovery partition, even in dualboot environments with other versions of os x, or a linux or a windows partition with boot camp, if its bootable and connected to the mac it will be visible at this boot manager. Apples external superdrive can work on older model macs.
Looking to add storage, or for a smart way to back up your mac. Dec 15, 2014 an external optical drive will allow you to access discs on your mac. You can also use the shape of the port to help identify the ports on your mac. How to replace internal optical drive with 2nd hard drive. You can remove the four screws on the sides of the drive quite easily, remove the other end of the audio cable then unscrew the two screws on the back of the drive holding the interconnect board to the drive the only fiddly bit as its hard to get a a good angle onto those two screws, then. This drive works just like any other optical drive but keep in mind this external usb dvd burner uses 2. While the mac would recognized that the drive was connected it did not recognize any of the discs that were inserted into the drive. The last apple mac to ship with an optical cd or dvd drive was a in macbook pro, originally released in june 2012, but on sale until october 2016, when apple discontinued that model, more information about the last mac to ship with a superdrive below. The whole process takes about 4560 minutes depending on how familiar you. Anyway, the first thing i did was download the proxmox ve 4. How to use cds, dvds, and blurays on a mac without an. If you want to make use of your macs thunderbolt port, then this is the best external hard drive for macs. It has user configurable hard drive, memory, and optional external optical drive.