Is running an SSD from Thunderbolt as boot drive identical to having an internal drive?

[nambuccaheadsau]

Did this with a mid 2011 iMac and a Silicon Power TB SSD and it worked very well.

If I wanted to do this now on a TB3 machine I would simply go with this from OWC. Not bad for a 1TB Blade PCI-e drive in a TB3 caddy.


https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/TB3ENVPRC10/

 

[Fishrrman]

iceman wrote:
"Any other thoughts on this as to whether or not upgrading the HD in my late 2014 5k iMac (changing internal to SSD or adding SSD external) is worth it?"

Try "the external approach" first.
That is:
- Buy a "bare" SATA SSD and a USB3 enclosure or perhaps a USB3/SATA dongle/adapter like this:
https://www.amazon.com/Sabrent-2-5-...478&sr=1-2-spell&keywords=sabremt+usb3+to+ssd
- Set it up to be "an external booter" first and see how you like it.
- If all goes well, you might pry it open and install it internally.

BUT CONSIDER:
You may be quite impressed with how the drive runs "externally".
You also might BREAK SOMETHING inside by prying the iMac open.
You'll only gain about 15-20% more speed by doing so (for all the trouble).
Would the risk prove worth it?

 

[mpainesyd]

Some old tips here for making a bootable external SSD
http://www.mpainesyd.com/filechute/BOOT_OSX_SSD.pdf
I agree that opening up the Mac is probably not worth the risk.

 

[Blackshapes1980]

Any other thoughts on this as to whether or not upgrading the HD in my late 2014 5k iMac (changing internal to SSD or adding SSD external) is worth it?

My 2012 27" iMac has had a Samsung T3 hanging out of a USB port for about a year now, and it's my main photo editing machine, runs photoshop and Lightroom fine, shoot nikon RAWs. The trick is not to load the machine up with much else, and to not do too much at once with it. I could hear the fusion drive so I decided to stick the SSD in and suck it up. The performance hit was noticeable but nothing like you're describing. I booted it into recovery mode last night and reformatted the internal SSD (that formerly belonged to the fusion drive) installed OSX and it's flying again. YMMV

 

[Guy Clark]

I ran macOS from an external Thunderbolt 2 SSD on a mid 2011 iMac for some time and found performance to be exceptional.

 

[spheris]

The short answer. Yes.

Using a single Akitio Node Lite and Samsung 960EVO NVME. I get almost identical throughput over TB3. If I raid it with another, that number doubles the internal raid SSD on the iMac Pro at around Ramdisk speeds, 6000+ because the iMac pro has dual TB3 Controllers. Cloning the OS from the internal SSD Raid on the iMac Pro, they are functionally identical, just a matter of selecting which to boot and I use it as my daily driver because I can replace the 960EVO whenever I want. Not possible with the internal SSD on the iMac Pro. I would say even a standard iMac with TB3 would get roughly equivalent performance minus the raid options since I think the standard iMac has only one tb3 controller

 

[bplein]

@spheris I'd love a similar setup: My ideal external drive for my iMac Pro would be TB3 via the USB-C, a small enclosure that accepts a M.2 NVMe drive.

In other words, give me a Samsung T5 using NVMe end-to-end instead of USB 3.1.

I have a 8-core iMac Pro with 1TB standard internal storage. I've added a Samsung T5 2TB for a data drive (and spinning rust for backups)

 

[danielwsmithee]

@spheris I'd love a similar setup: My ideal external drive for my iMac Pro would be TB3 via the USB-C, a small enclosure that accepts a M.2 NVMe drive.

In other words, give me a Samsung T5 using NVMe end-to-end instead of USB 3.1.

I have a 8-core iMac Pro with 1TB standard internal storage. I've added a Samsung T5 2TB for a data drive (and spinning rust for backups)

You can get that already fairly cheap to with this:
https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/exp...67.550871764.1534456932-1624153617.1533579809

It takes up to 4 standard M.2 NVME SSDs in the enclosure, so it isn't super small like the T5, but still pretty tiny and fast.

 

[Ifti]

This the closest I have managed to achieve to matching internal speeds with an external drive.
I use it as my editing drive with Final Cut.
Its FAR from cheap though!!!!

 

[bplein]

You can get that already fairly cheap to with this:
https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/exp...67.550871764.1534456932-1624153617.1533579809

It takes up to 4 standard M.2 NVME SSDs in the enclosure, so it isn't super small like the T5, but still pretty tiny and fast.

Thanks and yes, I'm aware of this product. And "fairly cheap" is relative. At $349 it's not cheap, but that would be OK if I were stuffing it with 4 @ 2TB drives at over $500 each.

 

[spheris]

@spheris I'd love a similar setup: My ideal external drive for my iMac Pro would be TB3 via the USB-C, a small enclosure that accepts a M.2 NVMe drive.

In other words, give me a Samsung T5 using NVMe end-to-end instead of USB 3.1.

I have a 8-core iMac Pro with 1TB standard internal storage. I've added a Samsung T5 2TB for a data drive (and spinning rust for backups)

There is a catch and why I went with this config

in order to get what you paid for out of an nvme drive it has to go onto a controller that does pcie 4x
most of the things I've found have a limit of PCIE 1x or use a multiplier to try to trick out the channels
the akitio tb3 raid station uses a scheme like this meaning you get 550 out of an ss as a single drive
but stops at 800 if using two in raid mode.

If you track with that. Then you see where it gets a lot more important what controller is inside the box than the connection. you can end up with an name drive that advertises TB3 but actually doesn't use that and uses usb3.1 gen2 speeds instead which is roughly TB1

So be careful shopping it out and make sure to check out the node lite, there are some equivalents that are portable but you do get into issues if you're doing real workloads without adequate power

 

[bplein]

There is a catch and why I went with this config

in order to get what you paid for out of an nvme drive it has to go onto a controller that does pcie 4x
most of the things I've found have a limit of PCIE 1x or use a multiplier to try to trick out the channels
the akitio tb3 raid station uses a scheme like this meaning you get 550 out of an ss as a single drive
but stops at 800 if using two in raid mode.

If you track with that. Then you see where it gets a lot more important what controller is inside the box than the connection. you can end up with an name drive that advertises TB3 but actually doesn't use that and uses usb3.1 gen2 speeds instead which is roughly TB1

So be careful shopping it out and make sure to check out the node lite, there are some equivalents that are portable but you do get into issues if you're doing real workloads without adequate power

Thanks. I was a systems engineer for Fusion-io for 4 years so I’m aware of PCIe lanes and their effect on performance. That’s part of why regular consumers have a hard time figuring this stuff out. Chipset quality and specs play a big role and you can have a TB3 connection but a SATA translation and you lose all that goodness.

If anyone were in the position to make an affordable external true TB3 SSD it would be Samsung, say “T5Pro”

 

[spheris]

Thanks. I was a systems engineer for Fusion-io for 4 years so I’m aware of PCIe lanes and their effect on performance. That’s part of why regular consumers have a hard time figuring this stuff out. Chipset quality and specs play a big role and you can have a TB3 connection but a SATA translation and you lose all that goodness.

If anyone were in the position to make an affordable external true TB3 SSD it would be Samsung, say “T5Pro”

I would love for Samsung to do it too but they haven’t yet. They have to know this demand segment is coming though. I went with this because it offered all the perf perks. Swap perks and aesthetic perks I could find in relatively a simple setup that just plugged and rolled.

 

[Chocomonsters]

I would love for Samsung to do it too but they haven’t yet. They have to know this demand segment is coming though. I went with this because it offered all the perf perks. Swap perks and aesthetic perks I could find in relatively a simple setup that just plugged and rolled.

You have multiple options.

Samsung X5
https://www.samsung.com/semiconductor/minisite/ssd/product/portable/x5/

G-technology G-Drive mobile Pro SSD
https://www.g-technology.com/products/portable/g-drive-mobile-pro-ssd#0G10311

OWC Envoy Pro EX (VE)
https://eshop.macsales.com/shop/owc-envoy-pro-ex-ve/thunderbolt-3

All with NVMe SSD and bus powered.

I too considered Akitio Node Lite with Samsung or WD NVMe, but this set up requires external power brick, not portable, and fan noise.

G-Drive comes with 5 year warranty but other two come with 3 year warranty. All with NVMe up to 2800 MB/s speed. Only down side of these portable units are some thermal throttling with HUGH transfer. G-Drive dropped the price from $999 for 1 TB to $699 to match Samsung X5's $699 price.

 

[scstraus]

I don't think Apple's SSD prices are that bad considering what you are getting.

Considering what you are getting?

What you are getting is ripped off. Apple is charging 4 times the market prices for SSD's that are inferior to others on the market.

Current Macbook air upgrade from 128GB to 512GB SSD costs $400.

Specs of this SSD: Apple SSD SM0128G Sequential Read: 1390 MB/s Sequential Write: 730.8 MB/s

Upgrade from a Samsung Polaris 128gb m.2 (at $65) to a drive far better than what Apple is offering like the Samsung 960 EVO M.2 drive such as used in laptops like the Dell XPS 15 which can achieve speeds around 2.7Gbit/sec and costs only $169:

Means the upgrade is $104 vs Apple's $400 for a drive that's more than twice as fast.

 

[EugW]

Considering what you are getting?

What you are getting is ripped off. Apple is charging 4 times the market prices for SSD's that are inferior to others on the market.

Current Macbook air upgrade from 128GB to 512GB SSD costs $400.

Specs of this SSD: Apple SSD SM0128G Sequential Read: 1390 MB/s Sequential Write: 730.8 MB/s

Upgrade from a Samsung Polaris 128gb m.2 (at $65) to a drive far better than what Apple is offering like the Samsung 960 EVO M.2 drive such as used in laptops like the Dell XPS 15 which can achieve speeds around 2.7Gbit/sec and costs only $169:

Means the upgrade is $104 vs Apple's $400 for a drive that's more than twice as fast.

My post was from almost a year ago.

 

[mikehalloran]

I would first look to configure the internal drive to the largest capacity you can afford and then use external drives when that is inadaquate. I believe the current internal SSDs are very faster then external drives. I would also avoid trying to upgrade the internal drive as the risk of damage is high and personally not worth the risk (but that's just me).

Boy howdy is that bad advice, especially in your case.

And it's too bad, really. You have a 2015 model—the one series of iMacs that would seriously benefit from an SSD upgrade. Although you have a blisteringly fast PCIe 3 x4 buss in your 2015, Apple installed an NVMe PCIe 2 SSD that runs at half speed. Oh yes, they did.

Samsung 970 EVO runs $89 (250G) to $579 (2TB) plus an inexpensive adapter. Pop one into your iMac to increase speed and capacity (or not, depending on the size). And, if you're afraid to do it yourself, any experienced Mac technician can do it for you. It takes less than an hour and you're off to the races.

 

[jeddouglas]

I ran macOS from an external Thunderbolt 2 SSD on a mid 2011 iMac for some time and found performance to be exceptional.

What SSD did you use as I am considering doing this on my iMac mid 2011?
[doublepost=1541156262][/doublepost]

Some old tips here for making a bootable external SSD
http://www.mpainesyd.com/filechute/BOOT_OSX_SSD.pdf
I agree that opening up the Mac is probably not worth the risk.

Can you still get a Goflex adapter for thunderbolt 2 as I am looking to do something similar for my mid 2011 iMac

 

[redfirebird08]

Did this with a mid 2011 iMac and a Silicon Power TB SSD and it worked very well.

If I wanted to do this now on a TB3 machine I would simply go with this from OWC. Not bad for a 1TB Blade PCI-e drive in a TB3 caddy.


https://eshop.macsales.com/item/OWC/TB3ENVPRC10/

Wow, the 500 gig version is $280. Not bad at all for 1,800 megabytes per second.

I paid $250 for a 500 gig USB3 SSD a few years ago. It runs around 400 megabytes per second, which is still amazing when I look at my home Internet which is 250 megabits per second (31 megabytes per second). So even my current external SSD is running almost 13 times faster than my Internet connection. Pretty damn good.

One of these days we will see a 500 gig Thunderbolt drive for well under $200 that can go around 2,000 megabytes per second. That will be pretty awesome.

 

[mikehalloran]

As fast as all of those options are, none are as fast the NVMe PCIe 3x4 SSD inside a 2017 iMac — original or a Samsung 970 EVO with an inexpensive pin-out adapter.

A 2015 has the same buss but Apple installed a slower PCIe 2 SSD. The various solutions can get hit the same speed with RAID but it's not as fast as replacing the original blade with a 2T 970 EVO.

It takes an experienced tech an hour to do the install.

The answer to the OP is still the same as it was in January: No.

The 970 EVO list prices: 250G $87.99, 500G $147.99, 1T $277.99, 2T 579.99

I've seen the 2T on eBay for $499.99 with free shipping.

 

[jeddouglas]

Would the following work as an external SSD solution for my iMac 2011

Crucial 240GB SSD
SATA III to usb c enclosure for SSD
Thunderbolt 3 to 2 adapter

I can get all of the above for about £80 and would save me opening up the iMac.

 

[Fishrrman]

jed asks:
"Would the following work as an external SSD solution for my iMac 2011
Crucial 240GB SSD
SATA III to usb c enclosure for SSD
Thunderbolt 3 to 2 adapter"

No, I don't believe it will work.
A tbolt3-to-tbolt2 adapter outputs a THUNDERBOLT signal, which IS NOT THE SAME as USB3 from a USB-c enclosure.

For a 2011 iMac you would need a thunderbolt/SATA enclosure (tbolt1 or tbolt2, I think should work) -- something completely different from ANY "USB" enclosure.

The problem here is that it's difficult to find "empty" tbolt1/2 enclosures.
Here's one (no financial interest in this auction):
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Thunderbol...273532536566?_trksid=p2385738.m4383.l4275.c10

Considering what these empty enclosures cost, an alternative might be to buy a "pre-assembled" tbolt drive that's "ready-to-go".

There used to be a "thunderbolt-to-USB3" adapter sold by a company named Kanex, but these were also expensive and I'm not certain that one could BOOT from one of them (I'm guessing, "no").

There may also be "thunderbolt-to-eSATA" adapters, I recall reading once that they are bootable (from an eSATA enclosure), can't be sure about that, never tried it. Further research would be warranted.

Really, with the 2011 iMac (with USB2), your options are limited.

You could also open it up, but that is not particularly easy to do and I'd be hesitant to try it. Others are bolder than I.

If you're financial situation isn't too bad, before I spent much money "upgrading" a 7-year-old (and soon to be 8-year-old) iMac, I'd begin looking for a replacement. Either a 2017 iMac or perhaps one of the 2018 Minis, or.... hold on about 5-6 months longer for one of the 2019 iMacs.

 

[EugW]

On a 2017 5k iMac. Could you use NVMe to get the same speeds? And if not how big of a difference would it be? I am not willing to pay Apple's exorbitant prices on SSD but may want to upgrade to this in the future if it is in fact an upgrade over using a Fusion drive.

Samsung X5 - a bit pricey though

 

[mikehalloran]

You could also open it up, but that is not particularly easy to do and I'd be hesitant to try it. Others are bolder than I.

A 2011 is very easy. A 27” takes me 1/2 hour. If I had two working arms, it would take less time. If you’re afraid of opening it up and/or don’t want to spend a few $ for the specialty tools, then, by all means, find a technician in your area to do the work. $50–$75 here in the Silicon Valley.

With SSD prices these days, there’s no less expensive way I know. OWC charges $140 for an external TB dock to use with an SSD. The costs to throw it in include a $39 temp sensor, the bracket $11 (optional but recommended) and an NV RAM battery ($3.50 – $8) —again, optional but recommended.

You need to get the OS onto the SSD when done. Internet Recovery is free if you don’t have a boot USB or other external drive. Once done, you can restore from Time Machine or other backup.

A 2011 will boot much faster, run a lot quieter and last longer because you removed a major heat source from the inside.

 

[jeddouglas]

jed asks:
"Would the following work as an external SSD solution for my iMac 2011
Crucial 240GB SSD
SATA III to usb c enclosure for SSD
Thunderbolt 3 to 2 adapter"

No, I don't believe it will work.
A tbolt3-to-tbolt2 adapter outputs a THUNDERBOLT signal, which IS NOT THE SAME as USB3 from a USB-c enclosure.

The enclosure output is stated as usb c thunderbolt 3. With the Thunderbolt 3 to 2 adapter I would have thought this would have worked if plugged into my iMacs Thunderbolt port even if I only get Thunderbolt 2 speeds. Am I missing something?