MP 1,1-5,1 Alternative to Apricorn Velocity?

[nigelbb]

I've been running a 2 x 1TB Samsung 850 EVO in RAID-0 as the system disk on an Apricorn Velocity Duo PCI card in my Mac Pro 3,1 for several years. At the time a 2TB SSD was unavailable (or possibly unaffordable) so as I wanted to replace a 2TB HD I went with RAID-0. I've always been slightly nervous about reliability but SSDs don't break often & I've been reasonably happy with a combination of Time Machine & regular cloning of the RAID set to an HD.

Larger capacity SSDs are far more affordable now so I decided to buy a 2TB Crucial MX500 as the best value/performance option mount it on a PCI SATA III card & migrate from the RAID-0 disks. I discovered that the Apricorn Velocity Duo is no longer available so as an alternative purchased this card https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0147BU80O/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Unfortunately the performance of this Crucial MX500 on the SEDNA PCI card is significantly inferior to the Samsung 850 EVO even allowing for the fact that it's not in a RAID-0 stripe set. Using Blackmagic Disk Speed Test I see around writes of 550MB/s & reads of 650MB/s on the RAID-0 set on the Apricorn Velocity Duo but writes of 185MB/s & reads of 195MB/s on the MX500 & SEDNA combo.

Is there an alternative to the Apricorn Velocity Duo that will deliver good performance on a single SSD? What option are available part from this SEDNA card?

 

[h9826790]

The sad fact is that there is no low cost card can do that well.

Either low cost, but limited the speed to about 350MB/s. Or cost noticeably more, but able to deliver 500MB/s.

In your case, the Senda card is a PCIe 2.0x1 card, which means, can't do anything better than any native SATA II port on your cMP. You can simply plug your MX500 into the optical bay's SATA port, then your MX500 will able to deliver stable 250MB/s.

Anyway, If you want really high speed storage, go for NVMe (with those real low cast adaptor) usually is a better option.

For SATA SSD, we better just enjoy it's low latency, but not spending relatively large amount of money (compare to the SSD itself) just to get that little bit extra sequential speed (which most people don't even really need it).

Update: I overlooked that's a 3,1. Some of the above info is not applicable, or conditional. Please follow AlexMaximus suggestion below.

 

[AlexMaximus]

I've been running a 2 x 1TB Samsung 850 EVO in RAID-0 as the system disk on an Apricorn Velocity Duo PCI card in my Mac Pro 3,1 for several years. At the time a 2TB SSD was unavailable (or possibly unaffordable) so as I wanted to replace a 2TB HD I went with RAID-0. I've always been slightly nervous about reliability but SSDs don't break often & I've been reasonably happy with a combination of Time Machine & regular cloning of the RAID set to an HD.

Larger capacity SSDs are far more affordable now so I decided to buy a 2TB Crucial MX500 as the best value/performance option mount it on a PCI SATA III card & migrate from the RAID-0 disks. I discovered that the Apricorn Velocity Duo is no longer available so as an alternative purchased this card https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0147BU80O/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Unfortunately the performance of this Crucial MX500 on the SEDNA PCI card is significantly inferior to the Samsung 850 EVO even allowing for the fact that it's not in a RAID-0 stripe set. Using Blackmagic Disk Speed Test I see around writes of 550MB/s & reads of 650MB/s on the RAID-0 set on the Apricorn Velocity Duo but writes of 185MB/s & reads of 195MB/s on the MX500 & SEDNA combo.

Is there an alternative to the Apricorn Velocity Duo that will deliver good performance on a single SSD? What option are available part from this SEDNA card?

You have a MP 3.1, which means you are limited on SSDs you can use. NVMe blades are unfortunately out of the question, currently only the MP 5.1 with the Firmware 144 supports them. However, you actually have still options but you have to be selective.
In order to have maximum speed with the SATA protocol, I can recommend my old setup that most MP 5.1 users used to have in the pre 144 Firmware era. On the SSD you need to look for an AHCI SSD blade which is based on the SATA protokol. It is the predecessor to the NVMe blade, has the same blade form factor but uses the older SATA bus system.
With this you can raise your SSD bandwidth from about 550MB/s to 950 or 1350 MB/s depending on the AHCI version.

Fastest AHCI blade, but limited to 500 TB (up to 1350MB/s)

Samsung SM951-NVMe (256GB) PCIe SSD Review

www.anandtech.com

(This SSD came with AHCI and NVMe versions back in 2015)

Little bit slower, but up to 960TB (up to 890MB/s)

480GB HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSD Review - Legit Reviews

www.legitreviews.com

I used to have both blades in separate single adapters. Because I run out of PCI slots on my 5.1, I put them in a dual bridge card that speeds them up further.

The best single adapter I would recommend was this one here:

Discontinued Product | Angelbird

The product you selected has been discontinued

www.angelbird.com

See if you can find it cheap on e-bay. They pop up from time to time.

With this strategy you will remain on the SATA Protokoll and remain MP3.1 freindly and you can move it to a later system as well if you need to in the future. Only culprit is the need for an empty PCIe slot.

 

[nigelbb]

Thanks for the prompt replies. I'm not looking to go with an AHCI blade as I want a 2TB system disk. What I want is the fastest PCI->SSD card. This SEDNA card plus the MX500 is delivering less than 200MB/s. Is it the card or is it the SSD? I know that with the Apricorn Velocity Duo I can get 500-600MB/s in RAID-0 which should mean I can get a minimum of 250-300MB/s from a single SSD but the performance of the SEDNA plus MX500 is far below this,

 

[mikas]

Great summary, thanks.

I've got the HyperX Predator in my 3,1. It's in its own adapter that came with it.
I've got an AngelBird Wingz too, but I use it in my PC. It's been reliable.

I myself prefer the Kryo PCIe adapter products today. The reason for me is that their PCB is so small, and further the form factor allows more "breath" space to other much bigger cards (like VII). I am going to install two VIIs now for my main machine, and the NVMe is gonna go in to a Kryo M2.

Slot 1: VII (no 1)
Slot 2: Aquacomp Kryo w/ Corsair MP400 2 TB
Slot 3: empty
Slot 4: VII (no 2)

I almost was going to install my existing IOCrest, 2-blade switched card, with 2x samsung EVO's in cMP slot 2, but I don't need the speed that much that other you guys do (possibly video guys, you might need all the speed in the world).

The Corsair MP400 was an impulse buy. They had it in their shelves. No bigger than 1TB Samsung available here for a long time now. At least not without a considerable wait.

edit. Oh my God, I did the same as h9826790. Sorry. Read the context too quickly.
But yes, Predator has been steady, first with my 4,1, and then after the NVMe came to 5,1, with my 3,1.

 

[AlexMaximus]

Thanks for the prompt replies. I'm not looking to go with an AHCI blade as I want a 2TB system disk. What I want is the fastest PCI->SSD card. This SEDNA card plus the MX500 is delivering less than 200MB/s. Is it the card or is it the SSD? I know that with the Apricorn Velocity Duo I can get 500-600MB/s in RAID-0 which should mean I can get a minimum of 250-300MB/s from a single SSD but the performance of the SEDNA plus MX500 is far below this,

Thanks for clarification. This of course changes the focus. On the SSD side, you will need to go with the best player in town which is Samsung by far. There is no better and faster SSD out there. If you have time on your hands you can read tons of reviews of that era to confirm my experience. In the years 2011 till 2015 there was a controller war going on. Since Samsung was one of the view who manufactured controller chip and those TLC/MLC chips, they had the best package. Other brands are just buying parts together, hence the reason for large spread of quality. There are very view high-end exceptions, but you will be fine with Samsung. Since this will be the most important drive, I would recommend a Pro drive, avoid the cheaper ones and the newer Q drives.
On the pcie single cards, I used to have various Sonnet cards and I still have an OWC Accelsior S. I do recommend the OWC card as a good choice, avoid OWC SSDs, don’t go for a OWC bundle. (junk controllers, recalls, overprovisioning)
Sonnet is usually great, but they had issues with drivers in the early days. There are some no-name pcie cards out there with a shorter pcie adapter rail (viewer golden slot fingers) - avoid those at all cost. For more details, see:

macOS PCIe SATA SSD Adapters (MP5,1 & MP7,1)

Wiki thread for compiling a list of confirmed PCIe SATA SSD adapters for MP5,1 with macOS. They're not as fast as NVMe, but they're widely available. Should also be helpful with options for transition to MP7,1 and (should) achieve faster read/write speeds with native PCIe 3 availability for...

forums.macrumors.com

 

[zedex]

@nigelbb

The direct answer to your question is the SONNET Tempo SSD Pro - I have one of these but they are very hard to find.

You get the PLX chip and full SATA III throughput. 960mbps according to the website but it's closer to 1050mbps.

You NEEEEED one of these - for some bizarre reason there is a MASSIVE gap between this model and everything remaining.

LINK SONNET Tempo SSD Pro

 

[h9826790]

Is it the card or is it the SSD?

It's the card. As mentioned in my last post, that's a PCIe 2.0 x1 card. This is the limitation.

I know that with the Apricorn Velocity Duo I can get 500-600MB/s in RAID-0 which should mean I can get a minimum of 250-300MB/s from a single SSD

Not true. You should still get 500MB/s from a single SATA III SSD (on a good performing PCIe SATA III card). You can try to install the MX500 on your Apricorn card. That SSD alone (not in any RAID) should able to deliver ~500MB/s.

TBH, there is not much extra performance you can gain to RAID two SSD on the Apricorn card.

 

[zedex]

Dead right. PCIe 2.0 x1 will never get you anywhere. As a general rule - you get 375-400Mbps per lane. Which correlates neatly with the "1500Mbps max transfer speed" commonly cited on the PCIe 2.0 x4 NVME SSD adapters (passive type).

In reality - there are 47 PCIe to SATA cards under different names/brands with the SAME cheap architecture.

 

[m4v3r1ck]

I have two new Apricorn Velocity DUO x2 for sale. Please PM me if interested.

Got them for a Mac Pro project that never even got started...

 

[nigelbb]

I have two new Apricorn Velocity DUO x2 for sale. Please PM me if interested.

View attachment 1882945

Got them for a Mac Pro project that never even got started...

I have sent you a PM.

 

[m4v3r1ck]

SOLD! Thanks you all members that showed interest in this set.

Cheers

I have two new Apricorn Velocity DUO x2 for sale. Please PM me if interested.

View attachment 1882945

Got them for a Mac Pro project that never even got started...