Performance Comparison of Built-In vs. External Storage

Question

What is the functional approach of the built external storage as compared to the internal storage found in an M2 Mac Mini?

Answer 1

Thanks to the internal data transfer rate of up to 2750 megabytes, the combination of an Acasis TBU-405 enclosure and a Sysor ZD1 PCIe Gen 4 x4 NVMe SSD offers affordable, fast external storage which exceeds that of the built-in M2 Mac mini. The standard M2 Mac Mini provides a maximum of around 1700 megabytes and its 512 Gigabytes version is around 2700 sust. Hence, it is more effective and also a better option cost-wise to use an external hard disk drive.

Comments

I didn’t realise how slow my external drives were until I saw this content. Thanks for the excellent demo and explanation.

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I have seen similar results.  I have a M2 Mac Mini (24GB RAM / 512GB SSD) and a 2TB Samsung 980 PRO installed in an Acasis enclosure (TBU401E).  Internal performance is W: 3339 MB/s & R: 2985 MB/s versus 980 performance of W: 2790 MB/s & R: 2713 MB/s.

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Thanks Craig for this great content. I bought a SanDisk Extreme PRO for my new mini M2, 16GB/512GB (to replace my iMac 5K). Since I do need good storage and speed for massive photo/video/Ps/Ai files I assumed SanDisk would be solid due to its reputation. But the SanDisk external ssd was very underwhelming and did not provide a solid and steady connection. So looking for a better and more reliable solution I found your content. I appreciate your lowkey presentation which gives the feeling of trust and that you are not just pitching the things or brands that pay your bills. I decided to go with the Acasis Enclosure (TBU401E) with a Samsung 980 PRO 2TB (haven't received the components but will report anything noteworthy). Just as an fyi, my Mac Mini's internal 512GB tests steady at W:3300+ MB/s, R:3000+ MB/s. Once you are able to pursue this more as a profession I'd suggest to not become too flashy but do add more "how to build/put together" content as well. But love your work and of course we subscribed.

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I have  the exact same results (2700MBps read/write with an Orico Thunderbolt 3 enclosure($60) new off eBay , the same WD Black SN770 1TB (64$ new )off my M2 Mac Mini base 256GB model. I also tried a WD Blue SN570 1TB and it runs also in the 2700 MBps R/W range.   The difference is that the SN770 performs much better with smaller files and random writes by a lot!  The orico is more plain looking, but does it fly when virtualizing Windows 11 and gaming off it.

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I'm currently using an older sn750 and am getting about 2700 MB/s read speed and about 2100 write speeds. I have the same exact nvme enclosure. It works pretty well for running programs.

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Perfect, it works great. i have a macstudio and the results are pretty good. 2700/2700  - SSD disk WD Black SN770 NVMe 2TB / Acasis enclosure

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Great content. I'm doing the same thing, but I ran into a serious problem - the sustained write fails across many SSDs.  I've tested about 12 cards and 3 controllers, and this is a major problem with the cheaper SSDs. Every time I get above 2500mb/s write and read speeds on blackmagic test for 5gb. But once I ask it to transfer a 1tb folder or more, it'll say it will take a short amount of time, but when I check shortly after, all of a sudden it's expected to take much longer. Then I check the speed on blackmagic and it's dropped from 2500 to 30 or 60!  It's just slowed to a crawl. I've tried two WD black chips so far, and both seemed to be duds - maxxed out at 950mb/s. The only one I've found so far that was even reasonably cheap was the Crucial 4tb. But will continue to test.

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It is also possible to increase performance even further if you create a RAID-0 between the two Thunderbolt outputs via Disk Utility

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3000 MB/s is faster than the Mac Mini's internal storage in the case of SOME models. The models that have more than 1 TB of storage have over 5000-7000 MB/s read/write speeds, that's over 40 Gbit/s. Are there any external solutions that get you those speeds?

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Doesn't transfer speed slows up when the cache fills up on sustained usage? in that WD Black>?

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I'm using the same stuff and I get 2,900 MB/s on both my M1 Mac Mini and a M1 Macbook Air.

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The Internal SSD speed on my M1 Mac Mini is 4000MB/s.  The fastest a 40Gbits thunderbolt 4 can manage is 2700MB/s.

There is no way to reach those speeds with an external drive.

However 2700MB/s is a good compromise for a spare drive.

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Using the Samsug 980 pro and acasys thunderbolt case but have a huge problem. Booting often fails due to crash and when it boots it takes like 10 min!!! Once it boots it runs perfectly, 2700 write 2000 read . Same M1 iMac as yours. Any ideas?

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Excellent content, thanks! One question: I currently have an M1 mini, but within the next year or so I'm hoping to graduate to M2 (or beyond). So, would this configuration work on my current M1 in the meantime? Cheers!

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Can I use this SSD for my 2019 Imac desktop? It's been incredibly slow and I need to upgrade or possibly this would fix my problems

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did u test how fast can it be if export directly to the drive from Final Cut Pro ProRes 422? Thanks for the content.

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I get 2,040 write and 2,689 read on the Samsung 980 Pro with my Acasis enclosure connected to my MacBook Pro 14 with M1 through CalDigit TS4 docking station or 2700 read and 2684 write when directly connected to my MacBook Pro 14.

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I bought 2 x these drives to use respectively with my Macbook Pro and Mac Studio. what I don't get is that yes, the disk read/write speeds are around 2700 MB/s, BUT when doing the test on my Macbook M1 PRO is is nearly TWICE AS FAST. Is this because of the internal chips? I am a producer and not a computer specialist, but to me they really don't seem faster than the internal SSD :( Can someone shine a light on this? Cheers