Mac Studio external storage: U.2 SSDs?

[F-Train]

I have a Mac Studio (M1 Max) that is replacing a 2018 Mac mini as my main computer. With the mini, I've been using Samsung T5 and T7 SSDs for external storage of media (photographs, 4K video, musical instrument sample libraries). I haven't looked at alternatives in about three years, so I'm not exactly up to date on options. The Samsungs work fine, but I want to find out what else is available and whether I'd benefit from starting to use something faster.

I used the Mac mini with an external GPU. I'm selling the GPU itself (an AMD Vega 56), but I've read that the Asus enclosure (an XG Station Pro) can probably be used as an enclosure for a 2.5" U.2 SSD. Both are PCIe and the form factor is the same.

If anyone has experience with these SSDs, I'd appreciate comments on them. I gather that they're mostly used in enterprise servers. Advice on brands, of which there appear to be few, would also be helpful. There appear to be quite large variations in price per GB.

It looks like U.2 SSDs are available up to 8TB in capacity. I'm thinking about 2TB or 4TB, at least to start.

Thanks

 

[Chancha]

My understanding is that its 2.5" form factor plus SATA support means the U.2 gives enterprise setup a bit of flexibility as their hardware are used to that form. For consumer or even prosumer market where Macs are used, you will see most options even DIYs ones are surrounding M.2 NVMe for SSD, then SATA 2.5" and 3.5" are mostly relegated for HDD. This trend may change in the future but if it does, the time will probably be passed your Mac Studio projected usable age.

Since the Studio has this many Thunderbolt (4) buses, I would say you shouldn't even think about that for now as you came from a Mac mini setup, just plug those TB/USB-C drives and use them for now. If your storage need arises then you can start looking to something like 4-bay NVMe card + enclosure, or a multi-bay 3.5" RAID enclosure, or even use the internal 10GbE port to a 10G NAS.

 

[F-Train]

For consumer or even prosumer market where Macs are used, you will see most options even DIYs ones are surrounding M.2 NVMe for SSD...

Yes, I know that. Indeed, while I'm mostly using Samsung T5/T7 drives, I have a 1TB Samsung M.2 970 Evo Plus in an external enclosure. I'm asking about U.2 SSDs:

"If anyone has experience with these [U.2] SSDs, I'd appreciate comments on them. I gather that they're mostly used in enterprise servers. Advice on brands, of which there appear to be few, would also be helpful. There appear to be quite large variations in price per GB.​

​

"It looks like U.2 SSDs are available up to 8TB in capacity. I'm thinking about 2TB or 4TB, at least to start."​

 

[bsbeamer]

If anyone has experience with these SSDs, I'd appreciate comments on them. I gather that they're mostly used in enterprise servers. Advice on brands, of which there appear to be few, would also be helpful. There appear to be quite large variations in price per GB.

It looks like U.2 SSDs are available up to 8TB in capacity. I'm thinking about 2TB or 4TB, at least to start.

They're basically just M.2 NVMe in a different form factor, closer to "traditional" 2.5 SATA-like.

I'd personally suggest this document:

https://www.sonnettech.com/support/downloads/manuals/u2_ssds.pdf

If it isn't compatible there, I'd be really hesitant to buy. These are U.2 for the Sonnet Fusion Dual U.2 SSD PCIe Card (FUS-U2-2X4-E3) which is meant for Mac Pro, but works fine in PCIe expansion boxes (including most eGPU expansion boxes).

One thing to consider is the price, however. If you're looking for only 2TB, get M.2 NVMe instead. If you're looking for 4TB, might be much cheaper for M.2 NVMe depending on your adapter situation.

Sonnet also makes the M.2 4x4 PCIe Card Silent (FUS-SSD-4X4-E3S) PCIe card which houses 4 M.2 NVMe blades.

Apparently a few more 4-blade housings are on the way from several manufacturers.

Know several who've had issues with the OWC TB version (think 4M2 is name) and personally cannot recommend it. They tried to make it almost a docking station within the housing and apparently that creates issues for some.

This looks like the best of both worlds and takes U.2 directly and adapters for 4x M.2 NVMe into U.2, but do not know anyone who personally has used them or can personally recommend them. I tend to avoid OWC whenever possible based on previous experiences, but sometimes they're the only option for niche products for Mac.

OWC Gemini Ultra

Thunderbolt 40Gb/s NVMe RAID storage and seven port docking solution for DITs, professional filmmakers, and post-production firms.

eshop.macsales.com

OWC U2 Shuttle - The First U.2 Carrier Shuttle for 3.5-inch Drive Bays

The world’s first U.2 carrier shuttle for 3.5-inch drive bays, combining up to four NVMe M.2 SSDs into a swappable and flexible RAID-ready storage solution.

eshop.macsales.com

OWC U2 ShuttleOne NVMe M.2 to 2.5-inch U.2 SSD Adapter at MacSales.com

U2SHTLONE OWC U2 ShuttleOne NVMe M.2 to 2.5-inch U.2 SSD Adapter. Premium heat-dissipating adapter that converts an NVMe M.2 SSD into a swappable 2.5-inch U.2 SSD.

eshop.macsales.com

 

[mcnallym]

As you will be basically buying a PCI-E card with a U.2 SSD attached then better off looking at the PCI-E cards that take M.2 SSD.

U.2 drives tend to be enterprise and cater for server storage rather then single user.
Don’t really see consumer U.2 SSD much now, as tend to be the equivalent of the Enterprise branded M.2 drives.

Cannot see any reason why would need to use U.2 adaptor with the XG Station Pro over an M.2 adaptor.
Main thing that eGPU enclosures have is the beefier power supply to power the GPU. Apart from that then thunderbolt wise an EGPU chassis same as a PCI-e slot dock, just they tend to be multi-slot and smaller 75w for something like an avid tools card.

So as previous post suggested something like the sonnet card and then can use M.2 SSD that more familiar to Mac users.

 

[F-Train]

Thanks guys, very helpful.

@mcnallym If I understand correctly, you're saying that GPU enclosure like Asus's XG Station Pro can be repurposed for M.2 as well as U.2 SSDs. Is that right?

 

[bsbeamer]

Almost all eGPU can be repurposed as a PCIe expansion box, which allows it to hold a standard full-length PCIe card (or more if your unit supported that). They "just" have beefier PSU's than typical expansion boxes.

Sonnet clearly states this with their eGFX Breakaway Box eGPU units:

Supports Non-GPU PCIe Cards
Supports Thunderbolt-compatible full-length, full-height, single- or double-width cards –perfect for pro audio I/O and DSP cards and pro video I/O and transcoding cards.

There are PCIe cards available for both U.2 and M.2 options.

 

[Chancha]

There are many cards for multiple M.2 NVMe SSDs some even go as high as 8 slots like the OWC Accelsior 8M2, but that is a PCIe gen 4 card on 16 lanes even the Mac Pro can’t take full advantage of.
That reminds me, I wonder if you will be bottlenecked by the TB3 connection on the eGPU enclosure to the Mac if you put anything fancy in there. Even a single stick of gen4 M.2 NVMe like the Samsung 980 does not see over 28Gbps due to lanes limitation. But I guess the enclosure has power and heating dealt with, which is normally another limiting factor in passive single M.2 enclosures.

 

[bsbeamer]

Also worth exploring solutions from HighPoint for anyone who comes across this. The HighPoint SSD7540 is another 8-blade M.2 NVMe card and at least has two fans for cooling. The 8M2 is over engineered for "future proofing" and also requires using their SoftRAID software, which many have had issues with.

Anyone who complains about fan noise or somehow wants the best performance without any noise at all probably wants to use a silent fan-less card like the Sonnet Fusion M.2 4x4 FUS-SSD-4X4-E3S.

 

[mcnallym]

Thanks guys, very helpful.

@mcnallym If I understand correctly, you're saying that GPU enclosure like Asus's XG Station Pro can be repurposed for M.2 as well as U.2 SSDs. Is that right?

Yes.

In order to put a U.2 SSD into the enclosure then would be a PCI-E board with a U.2 connector.
At that point no reason why cannot use a PCI-E card with M.2 connectors and should be able to fit more SSD in M.2 format.