Create a "Fusion Drive" on your CustoMac

[mrengles]

Create a "Fusion Drive" on your CustoMac

​

I've made a Fusion Drive that works with my Hackintosh "CustoMac" but I'm using Clover v2 UEFI Bootloader.


What will you need?

A. Any standard SATA SSD
B. Any standard SATA, USB, or FireWire HDD
C. Mac or (Hackintosh with Clover v2 UEFI Bootloader)
D. Mountain Lion 10.8.2 Installer USB (or another Mountain Lion 10.8.2 bootable drive).


Lets, get started...

1. Boot from the 10.8.2 Installer USB, format both of the drives you want to use with Disk Utility.

2. Open Terminal and type "diskutil list". You need to make note of the BSD drive locations for the two drives that will be used. Ex. disk0, and disk1

$ diskutil list

3. In Terminal Type "diskutil cs create "Fusion Drive" disk0 disk1" this will fuse the drives together.

$ diskutil cs create "Fusion Drive" disk0 disk1

*** Wait a minute. You should see scrolling output about whats happing to your drives in Terminal.

4. Once the fusion of the two drives has finished, in Terminal type "diskutil cs list" this will show the layout structure of your new CoreStorage (LVG) Logical Volume Groups.

$ diskutil cs list

5. You won't be able to create the first partition on the new (LVG) Logical Volume Group with Disk Utility. In preparation for the Mountain Lion 10.8.2 installation, in Terminal type something like this "diskutil coreStorage createVolume D1E3474F-4E7-4F26-9Z77-1A2BADF3CD45 jhfs+ "Macintosh HD" R"

$ diskutil coreStorage createVolume <UUID> jhfs+ "Macintosh HD" R

*** You will have you use your own (LVG) Logical Volume Group's UUID to complete step 8 correctly.


I don't want a Fusion Drive anymore, how to defuse?

1a. If your Fusion Drive is the startup volume, then you will need to boot with the Mountain Lion 10.8.2 Installer USB or another OS X 10.8.2 bootable drive. Once in Terminal type "diskutil coreStorage revert <UUID>"

$ diskutil coreStorage revert <UUID>

*** You will have you use your own (LVG) Logical Volume Group's UUID to complete step 1a above.


Good luck!

Hope this helps you get the latest Apple Technology for a fraction of the price. Check out the links below for more information on the subject.

Original Author's Blog: http://jollyjinx.tumblr.com/post/34638496292/fusion-drive-on-older-macs-yes-since-apple-has

About Fusion Drive: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5446

Undocumented CoreStorage Commands: http://blog.fosketts.net/2011/08/05/undocumented-corestorage-commands/

Tonymacx86 member SJ_UnderWater's Guide: http://www.tonymacx86.com/mountain-lion-desktop-guides/78465-understanding-using-fusion-drive.html

Clover EFI bootloader: http://sourceforge.net/projects/cloverefiboot/


-Mrengles

 

[tonymacx86]

Nice writeup- I've moved this to Mountain Lion Guides.

UPDATE: SJ Underwater did an overview and introduction to Fusion Drive here:
http://www.tonymacx86.com/mountain-lion-desktop-guides/78465-understanding-using-fusion-drive.html

Official Apple info on Fusion Drive:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT5446

 

[tonymacx86]

Here's a video that shows the process on a Mac:

[video=youtube;I_odnNpv-FQ]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_odnNpv-FQ[/video]

 

[mattlqx]

Any specific reason why you turn indexing off?

I understand it will generate an access across every file in the system, but if every file gets +1 access, the activity is all still the same relative to each other.

 

[playgame38]

What happens if one of the disks fail? Similar to RAID where it will be dropped and then SOL?

 

[blzs]

What happens, if I want to have a Windows installed on a partition?
For example:
I have a 60GB SSD and a 500GB HDD and I fuse them to a 560GB 'Fusion Drive'. Will I be able to install Windows on a partition?
Or is it possible to fuse only a partition from the HDD with the whole SSD?

 

[mrengles]

Any specific reason why you turn indexing off?

I understand it will generate an access across every file in the system, but if every file gets +1 access, the activity is all still the same relative to each other.

I'm not an Fusion Drive expert in anyway. I simply followed the original guide link at the bottom of my post. I just typed this guide out to help other here at TonyMacX86.com to find the info easier.

What happens if one of the disks fail? Similar to RAID where it will be dropped and then SOL?

Yes, I would assume you would be SOL, a Fusion Drive is NOT a replacement for RAID-0 "Mirror" and proper backups. Its just like any other single drive if its fails, its fails.

 

[mrengles]

What happens, if I want to have a Windows installed on a partition?
For example:
I have a 60GB SSD and a 500GB HDD and I fuse them to a 560GB 'Fusion Drive'. Will I be able to install Windows on a partition?
Or is it possible to fuse only a partition from the HDD with the whole SSD?

I'm not sure... A Fusion Drive, can only have 1 extra partition. More info can be found here:

https://support.apple.com/kb/HT5446?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US


I apologies to every asking questions about Fusion Drive this? or Fusion Drive that? I created/fused the drives last night before I went to bed, and have been unable to really test anything. I will mess with it more once I get home from work tonight.

 

[GamerDomey]

I was wondering if you could do this, I have a 1TB HDD and a 256GB SSD. Could I make a Fusion Drive and then install Windows on the same SSD and then make a FAT partition of the HDD for my storage on Windows? Or will the Fusion Drive work in Windows? Great guide, thanks for posting!

 

[rcork]

$ diskutil coreStorage createVolume D1E3474F-4E7-4F26-9Z77-1A2BADF3CD45 jhfs+ FusionDriveName 500g

This line would only create a 500GB volume for the Fusion drive. If you want to use all the space available you can substitute 100% for the 500g

$ diskutil coreStorage createVolume D1E3474F-4E7-4F26-9Z77-1A2BADF3CD45 jhfs+ FusionDriveName 100%