iMac EFI Update 1.6 Adds 6 Gb/s SATA Capabilities
Other World Computing reports that the iMac EFI Update 1.6
released yesterday for Apple's new iMacs brings an unadvertised improvement in SATA performance for the internal hard drive bays.
While iMac EFI Update 1.6 is described as including "fixes that improve performance and stability for Thunderbolt," it would also seem that an unadvertised benefit is that it also unlocks the full 6Gb/s, SATA 3.0 capabilities of two of the internal drive bays.
Unfortunately, the optical bay remains at 3Gb/s.
The report notes that Apple also released an EFI update for the current MacBook Pros yesterday, but it is unclear whether that update attempts to address SATA performance issues found in the 17-inch models.
Popular Stories
Game emulator apps have come and gone since Apple announced App Store support for them on April 5, but now popular game emulator Delta from developer Riley Testut is available for download. Testut is known as the developer behind GBA4iOS, an open-source emulator that was available for a brief time more than a decade ago. GBA4iOS led to Delta, an emulator that has been available outside of...
Last September, Apple's iPhone 15 Pro models debuted with a new customizable Action button, offering faster access to a handful of functions, as well as the ability to assign Shortcuts. Apple is poised to include the feature on all upcoming iPhone 16 models, so we asked iPhone 15 Pro users what their experience has been with the additional button so far. The Action button replaces the switch ...
A decade ago, developer Riley Testut released the GBA4iOS emulator for iOS, and since it was against the rules at the time, Apple put a stop to downloads. Emulators have been a violation of the App Store rules for years, but that changed on April 5 when Apple suddenly reversed course and said that it was allowing retro game emulators on the App Store. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel ...
The first approved Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) emulator for the iPhone and iPad was made available on the App Store today following Apple's rule change. The emulator is called Bimmy, and it was developed by Tom Salvo. On the App Store, Bimmy is described as a tool for testing and playing public domain/"homebrew" games created for the NES, but the app allows you to load ROMs for any...
The lead developer of the multi-emulator app Provenance has told iMore that his team is working towards releasing the app on the App Store, but he did not provide a timeframe. Provenance is a frontend for many existing emulators, and it would allow iPhone and Apple TV users to emulate games released for a wide variety of classic game consoles, including the original PlayStation, GameCube, Wii,...
Top Rated Comments
The Z68 chipset has provisions for 6 SATA ports, 2x 6GB/s, 4x 3GB/s. Its the reason why motherboard manufacturers include marvell and other SATA chips to offer more than the 2x 6GB/s ports you would get relying solely on the Intel chipset.
If you install a drive that cannot make use of the temperature sensor that the drive you took out did, then yes, the fan will run at full speed. I took out my optical drive and upgraded my iMac to SSD + HDD and now my optical drive fan runs at max speed - UNLESS I tell it otherwise with SMC Fan Control, which is a free utility you can download :p so... I have no problems.
This is unsupported, therefore irrelevant for the purposes of this update...what really matters is that internal SSDs would benefit from it...EXCELLENT news that should silence the whining of some people around here.
GO APPLE!
Some people remove the optical drive and use it as a hard drive bay.
What the hell? No optical drive can reach 3GB/s