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8TB in 2012 Mac Pro

M

monkeybagel

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Jul 24, 2011
1,142
61
United States
Has anyone attempted the installation of a 8TB disk in a 2012 Mac Pro? Considering updating my storage and looking at three spindles. The 8TB (or even 6GB) seems to be an attractive option. I would replace three internal 2TB disks with three 8TB spindles.

I am considering (although I would like to have HGST drives) the 8TB Enterprise Capacity to populate thee drive bays in my 2012 Mac Pro, and upgrade the SSD to 2TB or 4TB drive.

Has anyone tested 8GB in OS X 10.12? Any problems?

Thank you
 
T

theitsage

Suspended
Aug 28, 2005
795
862
I have a pair of HGST Ultrastar He8 8TB in my 5,1 for the past 7 months. They work great and the speed is incredible for spinning drive. They are running about 200MB/s both read and write.
 
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T

TheBigearedOne

macrumors newbie
Jun 21, 2016
10
1
Dublin
Hi
I'd like to install 10TB drives by WD or Seagate in my MacPro3,1 2008 but Im wondering if all 10TB drives have gotten rid of the middle screw holes underneath?

For some reason OWC sleds are only for MacPros of 2009 onwards

Does anyone know if the sleds will work between the 2008 and 2009 models - whats the difference?

I cant find anyone making drive sleds with holes for the 10TB screw configuration that will fit the 2008 mac pro?

Any tips would be very appreciated?
10TB mac pro sled and new holes.png
10TB larger drive screw holes.png
 
W

WayneStewart

macrumors member
Oct 7, 2008
52
9
Vancouver, BC, Canada
The SATA connectors are further in on 2009 and later Mac Pros so the drive sleds are longer. If you use 2009 sled in a 2008 then part of the drive sled sticks out and you can’t close the cover. If you weren’t going to close the cover and don’t mind your drives not being latched in then it should work. Can tell you for sure in 3 days when I’m back home
 
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AidenShaw

AidenShaw

macrumors P6
Feb 8, 2003
18,667
4,677
The Peninsula
nigelbb said:
I have a couple of Seagate Archive 8TB disks in my 2008 MP 3,1 & they work without problems so you shouldn't have any problems with your 2012 model.
Click to expand...
When looking at big disks, worry not only about the mounting holes (some big disks have older style mounting holes, some don't mate with Apple sleds) but about the recording method.

Some big disks, like the Seagate 8TB "Archive" drives, use shingled recording that can really kill random write performance. (In general, "archive" means "write once, probably read never" so this is a reasonable choice to get big drives at a good cost per Gigabyte.)

Other drives, like the Seagate enterprise drives, use standard recording and have decent read and random write performance.
 
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L

lokster10

macrumors newbie
Jan 16, 2018
2
0
I know I am a little late to the thread... I have a Mac Pro 3,1 and cannot buy the new HDD sleds with the updated mounting points from OWC because they are too long for 1,1; 2,1; and 3,1 Mac Pros. It was mentioned a couple of times that there are 6TB and 8TB that fit into the older hard drive hole spacing standard. Can someone point me in that direction? I have been looking on eBay without much luck. Thanks!
[doublepost=1516096575][/doublepost]And... I answered my own question... They do exist. A bit tricky to find. It seems like once hard drives went from 64MB to 128MB of cache, the middle bottom mount hole was removed. The funny part is that OWC's website says that support ends at 5TB. Luckily all I need is a 2x6TB setup in RAID1.
s-l1600.jpg

s-l1600.jpg
 
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B

bsbeamer

macrumors 601
Sep 19, 2012
4,313
2,713
This is the bracket for MacPro 2012 with the new hole pattern on the larger drives:
OWC Hard Drive Bracket Mfr P/N: MPRODBKTLG6
https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/MPRODBKTLG6/

Was actively using in my 5,1 machine before reconfigured the 8TB to external enclosure. There were not any issues with the sled/bracket itself, just issues with the drive not mounting after a soft restart - only would mount after full power down and boot. (Apparently a fairly common issue on this forum.)
 
h9826790

h9826790

macrumors P6
Apr 3, 2014
16,656
8,587
Hong Kong
bsbeamer said:
This is the bracket for MacPro 2012 with the new hole pattern on the larger drives:
OWC Hard Drive Bracket Mfr P/N: MPRODBKTLG6
https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/MPRODBKTLG6/

Was actively using in my 5,1 machine before reconfigured the 8TB to external enclosure. There were not any issues with the sled/bracket itself, just issues with the drive not mounting after a soft restart - only would mount after full power down and boot. (Apparently a fairly common issue on this forum.)
Click to expand...

Did you try this fix?

https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...city-hard-drives.1971809/page-2#post-25660950
 
B

bsbeamer

macrumors 601
Sep 19, 2012
4,313
2,713
h9826790 said:
Did you try this fix?

https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...city-hard-drives.1971809/page-2#post-25660950
Click to expand...

I did, and it was only partially successful. The 8TB 7200rpm drive would not slow down when "not in use" and was wearing out fast (according to DriveDX monitoring). Noticed an increased internal temperature and ended up keeping the side cover off the 5,1 to increase airflow. At the end of the day, it made more sense to move the 8TB drive to an external that I can turn on/off when needed (with not a huge speed difference connected via USB3 vs SATA).
 
h9826790

h9826790

macrumors P6
Apr 3, 2014
16,656
8,587
Hong Kong
bsbeamer said:
I did, and it was only partially successful. The 8TB 7200rpm drive would not slow down when "not in use" and was wearing out fast (according to DriveDX monitoring). Noticed an increased internal temperature and ended up keeping the side cover off the 5,1 to increase airflow. At the end of the day, it made more sense to move the 8TB drive to an external that I can turn on/off when needed (with not a huge speed difference connected via USB3 vs SATA).
Click to expand...

That sounds serious. Which HDD you are using? I think most HDD should be OK to run 24/7 for few years. In fact, all my HDD never spin down (I disabled the HDD sleep in Energy Saver panel). And never have any trouble.

Anyway, thank for confirming that trick work. Also alert us the "unable sleep" side effect.
 
B

bsbeamer

macrumors 601
Sep 19, 2012
4,313
2,713
h9826790 said:
Which HDD you are using?
Click to expand...

HGST 8TB Deskstar 7200rpm. It almost seemed as if the cache was constantly being accessed and written to on the drive with the workaround. The drive makes a different sound when it's been accessed rapidly vs. just running idle (still spinning). Do not believe it was a sleep releated issue as I also disable sleep in energy saver for everything but monitors.

I've run multiple 10+ bay RAIDs on client machines that went 5+ years before dropping drives. Mostly PCI-based CalDigit (from years ago) configured in RAID5. Many ran near 24/7 for months at a time, occasionally shutting down for a night or weekend in summer when temperatures were record breaking. The units were much more reliable than the SCSI drive media RAIDs of the late 90's and early 2000's.
 
M

monkeybagel

macrumors 65816
Original poster
Jul 24, 2011
1,142
61
United States
I have had the same HGST 2TB drives (three of them) running in RAID 0 since I purchased the Mac Pro 5,1 new in 2013 and so far no issues with 24/7 usage.
 
J

joeyfrigo

macrumors newbie
Aug 22, 2015
10
1
wonderspark said:
I have a Western Digital 8TB Gold Enterprise HDD in my 4,1-5,1 Mac Pro, in HDD bay slot 1. No issues.
Click to expand...
[doublepost=1519796067][/doublepost]i have wd gold 8tb and the screw holes for the mac pro sled dont line up i cant use them in the internal bays.
 
h9826790

h9826790

macrumors P6
Apr 3, 2014
16,656
8,587
Hong Kong
joeyfrigo said:
[doublepost=1519796067][/doublepost]
i have wd gold 8tb and the screw holes for the mac pro sled dont line up i cant use them in the internal bays.
Click to expand...

You mean the drive didn’t show up? Or simply because you can’t mount it proper, therefore, you can’t use it in the cMP?
 
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