instead of upgrading the internal drive of my iMac, can I plug this into the type c port, reformat it, and install macOS onto it? null

Question

kevin · Accepted Answer

Simple answer to your question is a big YES. I bought this product for that exact reason, my iMac is 8years old and has an internal 5400 mechanical spinning disc hard drive. i am not worried about it coming loose as someone else mentioned. My iMac sits on my desk and never gets moved, now if your back there a lot plugging and unplugging things from your usb ports just be careful and you'll be fine. I've had mine for three weeks now and it works flawlessly. I downloaded the mac Mojave iOS on it then did a system migration from the internal hard drive to it and done, i am now enjoying it. I set my iMac to boot from this drive and it boots up way way faster then from the internal drive. My computer is also way faster as well, apps open up almost immediately. My mac was never this fast even when it was new. So far i'm very happy. Will this drive hold up and last 8 years like the original internal drive? I have no idea as of course i've not had it that long. However my original internal hard drive is still in there and intact and with all my stuff still on it. Should this drive fail i would only lose anything new i've added to it. But that's why its always important to do back ups and problem solved.

Answered by kevin 2 years ago

GraybeardGuy · Answer

I would avoid trying this. Instead, it might be safer to transfer your files and documents to the external drive to free up space on the built in drive. The reason I would not try to boot up from an external SSD like this one is that the USB C connection is not particularly solid, and the drive can easily be jarred loose if you bump the external SSD by mistake. This has happened to me many times while copying large files from my MacBook Pro, and I get the dreaded "This drive was improperly ejected" error message. I would not want that to happen during a boot-up of the OS....

Answered by GraybeardGuy 2 years ago

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BadBob · Answer

Should be no problem. Even if the connectors were different, adaptors are available.

Pichu766 · Answer

You can run macOS off of an external drive. It might not be as fast as an internal HDD though.

CommunityAnswer · Answer

Yes, you ca reformat it and install the Mac Os onto it.

“instead of upgrading the internal drive of my iMac, can I plug this into the type c port, reformat it, and install macOS onto it?”

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