I'm looking to expand my storage. Can you sifu's recommend reliable SSD enclosures and drives to be used with my M4 Mac Mini?

Currently using wd black sn750 2tb with acasis nvme enclosure. Write 25xx and read 27xx

OWC sells the OWC Express 4M2 but I haven't seen it in this part of the world.

I just purchased on Lazada an ACASIS Dual NVMe SSD Enclosure which supports TB3. I've just configured it so I don't have any comments on reliability and performance etc.

what is your budget? how big storage? 1TB? 2TB?

1tb how much dmg ?

There are ranging from 250-330. I've been looking around also and at this price range the best seems to be Kingston KC3000 with 800TBW on the 1TB drive. Others only 600TBW. Read and Write are about the same though. Over 5000MB/s. But we will be limited to thunderbolt 4 speed at around 3500MB/s. I've seen some TB4 enclosure with fan about RM220-250. ORICO has combo ones with enclosure and their 1TB drive from taobao that cost RM570+. My friend bought the UGREEN 40gbps enclosure, I will wait for the review first to see if it can dissipate heat good.

Found this on TaobAo and cost around RM750 for 1TB

so total dmg is about rm580 ??
I come across kickstart offer.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/movesp...category_id=337

This post has been edited by Gold_Moderator: Nov 21 2024, 11:51 AM

This is only 10gbps. You will get around 950MB/s R/W. Not worth it...

For some reason, Orico's official store on Lazada doesn't list many of these items (especially the TB-based enclosures and the Mac-specific ones, like the one you listed, as well as a dual-HDD MacStudio stackable enclosure I saw on the Orico Global FB page). Most of the Orico HDD enclosures in their Lazada store are all USB 3.0 (5 Gbps) based.

Any idea why the Orico store on Lazada doesn't list them? It's not like Lazada only sells to Malaysia.

I am leaning to Orico 1TB NVME O7000 ssd and their USB 4 enclosure with fan. Total up around RM456 from taobao.

It's ridiculous lazada is selling the O7000 for RM428 and from taobao can get RM236.

This post has been edited by yvliew: Nov 21 2024, 07:10 PM

Decided to go for this.

anyone tried this ugreen?

Search for orico and ugreen, they make enlosures

I did look at this one before purchasing Orico. The reviews are good and you can find some reviews on youtube. Speed is good. Cooling seems good too. But the price is more expensive. I think Orico will work similar from the reviews I’ve seen. So I opted for cheaper orico which also has fan for active cooling.

I've been using the Acasis 40Gbps case since 2021 but only Thunderbolt 3. No probs so far. RM169.
https://forum.lowyat.net/index.php?showtopi...&#entry99759788

Also plenty of much cheaper 10Gbps USB 3.1 Gen 2. Recently I got the Orico to try with ip16pm. RM30.
https://forum.lowyat.net/index.php?showtopi...#entry110499693

This post has been edited by soonwai: Nov 28 2024, 05:38 PM

I decided I didn't need the blazingly fast speeds and went with a portable SSD (Lexar SL600) instead. It's supposed to give me up to R/W speeds of up to 2000MB/s but when I tested it today through Blackmagic Disk, I'm only getting about 900+.

How to maximize and increase the speed?

900+ using the front ports?

This post has been edited by soonwai: Dec 2 2024, 04:12 PM

Not the front. Am using one of the 3 available TB4 ports at the back of the M4 Mac Mini. The back ports should give me better speed? Let me switch and try it with the front ports instead.

Yah, front only 10Gbps and back should be 20Gbps for USBC. Dunno why you're only getting 900MBps.

Hmmm ini tak bagus...... could possibly be the cable problem? I'm using the Cable that came with the SSD drive; maybe that's not a TB4 cable so that's why?

A note for Macworld readers: Somewhat confusingly, Macs support 20Gbps USB, but only if the SSD is USB4. USB 3.2×2 20Gbps SSDs such as the SL600 will perform at 10Gbps using the USB 3.1 gen 2 protocol on Apple computers.

https://www.pcworld.com/article/2239717/lex...e%2520computers.

I have almost all the enclosures for NVME from Ugreen, Baseus, Acasis, ShouLe, Fideco, Jeyi and more. So far, only the Jeyi ones has trouble with certain NVME SSDs. The rest all good and stable.

ShouLe ones quite nice. Cheap and has health status LCD but not backlit. Can order from Lazada directly. Much cheaper than AliExpress.

Ah, so this SL600, although it says can support up to 20Gbps, it won't because I don't have the hardware that can support it is it? Sorry ah, tech n00bie here


"A note for Macworld readers: Somewhat confusingly, Macs support 20Gbps USB, but only if the SSD is USB4. USB 3.2×2 20Gbps SSDs such as the SL600 will perform at 10Gbps using the USB 3.1 gen 2 protocol on Apple computers."

But here's the thing, the new M4 Mac mini ports are USB4 isn't it so it should be giving me the max speeds, no?

This post has been edited by tinkerbel: Dec 2 2024, 09:44 PM

Mac does not support USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 protocol which I just learn couple days ago. That's why my 20gbps portable ssd never reach 2000MB/s. Mac only support TB3,4 USB4 and USB 3.2 Gen 2 10gbps.

I thought the 2 front ports on the M4 Mac Mini is USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 protocol.... which reminds me, I should test the speed again using the front ports but OMGAWD I just sorted all the cables!

The front port is only 10gbps.

And the back port?

TB4 40gbps which USB4 can utilize as well.

As a follow up to the SL 600, it's giving me the same speeds of about 900+ on the front ports - I'm not getting the 2000mbps speeds as I expected it to be but ah well...... should be suffice for my needs for now.

its because macs' tb4 ports dont support usb 3.2 2x2 speeds of 20 Gbps. in fact very few pcs do. it came pretty late into the usb lifecycle and manufacturers already started adopting USB4 instead. you can only get 10 Gbps with usb 3.2 gen 2

You can see here the example as given by kingston for their XS2000 external ssd which supports usb 3.2 2x2



only way to get over 10 Gbps r/w speed is by using a gen 4 nvme ssd in a USB4/tb3/tb4 enclosure

Thank You! I've now learnt something

u need enclosure with Thunderbolt 4/USB4 for Macs, else u will only getting 10gbps which i think is plenty enough.

20gbps USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 only supports Windows PC.