Are there any SSD drives not from Apple for which you can enable TRIM without hacking OS X's kernel?

Solution 1:

Enabling TRIM on third party SSDs

You can enable TRIM on third party SSDs by using a tool called Trim Enabler which "works by patching a kernel extension, and also includes some SMART data to check the health of the SSD drive". [1]

I don't know if buying similar drive will get you TRIM to be auto-enabled in Lion. User @kukoo reports that he has bought an OEM-SSD which auto-enabled TRIM in Lion after installation. [2]

According to user @bmike, Apple usually uses custom firmware . [3]

Is enabling TRIM necessary?

User @cksum has covered this as a part of his answer to a post "Optimize MacBook Pro for internal SSD+HDD drives".