[Guide] Install High Sierra or Mojave on the Dell Optiplex 7010 / 9010 Desktop PC - Revision II

[craighazan]

I understand. lets not confuse people. My build is a little different as I'm not using the standard case. I can afford to lose 2 sata connections as I'm using an NVMe SSD. Listen to trs96 folks, my case is different.

 

[woodchip]

Yes, I already knew it's possible, if you want to sacrifice 2/3 of your available Sata ports. The one that is usable with an L shaped adapter points the Sata cable in the wrong direction in a Dell MT case. That's why I advise to use an RX570 mini-itx card. Much less problematic.

It can work. I have a similar situation in a Dell T1600 build. The SATA ports start 7.5" from the back of the case and the graphics card ends at 8.75". Most right angle cables will easily fit under the card. To plug in multiple drives, I recommend the SilverStone CP11. It has worked well for me.
https://www.silverstonetek.com/product.php?pid=445

 

[southlegend]

Question about the RX580. How are you going to make it fit in the Optiplex MT ? The length of those generally will block the available Sata ports. The better choice is the m-ITX sized Sapphire RX570. That fits perfectly and gives you good graphics. Have a look at that.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B079VSD38Y/?tag=tonymacx86com-20

Thanks for pointing that out. I'll have a look for that card. Though the Silverstone CP-11 posted above may be a good solution!

 

[trs96]

Here's the Newegg link to the 90 degree Sata cable by Silverstone. A little pricey but might be worth it in some scenarios.

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA4RE4W87154&Description=CP11&cm_re=CP11-_-12-162-042-_-Product

The SATA ports start 7.5" from the back of the case and the graphics card ends at 8.75"

That's a creative solution Silverstone has come up with. Most of the RX 580s are closer to 9.5 to 10.0 inches in length so then the first Sata0 port gets blocked. Then to use more than one Sata port, it costs about 20 dollars just for two sata cables. So for people doing a budget build with these Dell MT desktops staying with a m-ITX form factor graphics card that is under 7.5 inches appears to make the most sense. Leaves all Sata ports open for additional 1TB - 3TB storage drives in these MT desktops.

 

[trs96]

The THEME EDITOR, are there places to download others? While the GREEN is kinda Borgish - I think I would rather have something else. ;-) Or even a method to CREATE MY OWN.

There are hundreds of themes to choose from on Sourceforge. I like the one that is High Sierra Themed. Looks great.

Clover EFI bootloader / Themes / [649fa8] /themes

sourceforge.net

 

[Grizz]

It can work. I have a similar situation in a Dell T1600 build. The SATA ports start 7.5" from the back of the case and the graphics card ends at 8.75". Most right angle cables will easily fit under the card. To plug in multiple drives, I recommend the SilverStone CP11. It has worked well for me.
https://www.silverstonetek.com/product.php?pid=445

View attachment 393705

View attachment 393706

There are also these:

RIGHT ANGLE: StarTech SATA18RA1 18" SATA to Right Angle SATA Serial ATA Cable

LEFT ANGLE: StarTech SATA18LA1 18" Left Angle SATA Cable

 

[Grizz]

Hi Grizz,


Yes it's possible to have both drives connected at the same time. It would be no different than having one SSD with Mojave. And the Other SSD Windows 10 Pro.



I'm not 100% on this, maybe the two are related. Is TRIM enabled on the Samsung SSD?. I personally would enable it. Seriously?, do you think you'll notice any slowdown on an SSD?. I haven't, if there is slow down I don't think its anything noticeable.

craighazan

I figured it would be possible usiong the BIOS (choose which BOOT device) capability - but given the two SSDs are the same MFG and MODEL - not really feasible. I wanted to have a boot option (if possible) to boot to CLOVER or something else - then choose it. Kinda like Windows allows for multiple OSes to be installed and it boots to a menu and lets you choose one.

I enable the TRIM on the MOJAVE drive and see if there is any improvement - as the HS and MOJ installs are both fairly new, they do not really have the chance to be on for weeks or months at a time. Most of the articles make reference to the 'built-in' APFS clean-up tasks it does.

Thanks,
Grizz

 

[trs96]

I wanted to have a boot option (if possible) to boot to CLOVER or something else - then choose it. Kinda like Windows allows for multiple OSes to be installed and it boots to a menu and lets you choose one.

Do you see the Clover Boot Menu at all or have you set the timeout to 0 ? If so just set the timeout to 1 or 2 then press any key when you see it. Then select the SSD to boot from.

 

[woodchip]

Here's the Newegg link to the 90 degree Sata cable by Silverstone. A little pricey but might be worth it in some scenarios.

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA4RE4W87154&Description=CP11&cm_re=CP11-_-12-162-042-_-Product

That's a creative solution Silverstone has come up with. Most of the RX 580s are closer to 9.5 to 10.0 inches in length so then the first Sata0 port gets blocked. Then to use more than one Sata port, it costs about 20 dollars just for two sata cables. So for people doing a budget build with these Dell MT desktops staying with a m-ITX form factor graphics card that is under 7.5 inches appears to make the most sense. Leaves all Sata ports open for additional 1TB - 3TB storage drives in these MT desktops.

I agree with you that a compact card is the ideal solution. I just wanted to throw out some info specifically for budget builders. It can be far less expensive to buy a specific cable than if you need to buy a specific graphic card. For this machine I used 2 cables I had lying around and just needed to buy 1 Silverstone cable for the third drive. If I put in a longer card, I can just use another right angle cable that I have sitting around from older projects. When I bought my card back in 2017 I paid way less than retail because it was used. It would have been far more difficult to find a card at that price to drive multiple displays if I had been constrained by form factor. Just my 2 cents.

 

[Grizz]

Do you see the Clover Boot Menu at all or have you set the timeout to 0 ? If so just set the timeout to 1 or 2 then press any key when you see it. Then select the SSD to boot from.

Never got the TIMEOUT = 0 to work. I used the CLOVER CONFIGURATOR and set it to 0, the menu also still showed.

Right now, the HIGH SIERRA (when connected) and the MOJAVE (connected at the moment) -- two sep SSDs. Are exactly as they would be per trs96's guide. That horrible (IMHO) Green Borg CLOVER screen <he he>

Grizz