macOS Big Sur incredibly slow when accessing NTFS-formatted drives (via Tuxera NTFS)

[autoshot]

Hello everyone!

For several weeks now I've been having severe issues when accessing NTFS-formatted drives on all of my Macs (Mac mini M1, Mac mini Late 2018, MacBook Air Early 2015, MacBook Pro Early 2015) to the point that the machines are almost frozen even when just trying to navigate through folders on those drives (I'm using Tuxera NTFS 2020.1). A quick fix for my Intel Macs was going back to Tuxera 2019, but that's of course not an option on my M1 mini...

Do you have any idea how this can be fixed?

Cheers,
Daniel

 

[gilby101]

How does Paragon work with your Macs and NTFS drives? https://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/ I think you can do a free trial.

Says it is compatible with M1.

 

[Slartibart]

Try mounty ntfs or just activate NTFS read/write support by open the terminal and type:

sudo nano /etc/fstab

Add the following line to nano, replacing "NAME" with the label of your NTFS drive:

LABEL=NAME none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse

Press Ctrl+O to save the file after you're done, and then press Ctrl+X to close nano.

Connect the NTFS drive to the computer, unplug it and reconnect it. Then you will see it under the "/Volumes" directory.

In a Finder window, you can click "Go" > "Go to Folder" and type "/Volumes" into the box to access it, because the NTFS drive will not pop up automatically like other drivers normally do on your Mac.

 

[autoshot]

How does Paragon work with your Macs and NTFS drives?

I haven't tried Paragon since even if it worked I'm not going to spend 30 bucks on a single machine license when I paid 25 for a single user license of Tuxera NTFS, which activates all of my machines. I'd rather re-format all my drives to exFAT then...
What I did notice is that, as soon as I connect an NTFS drive, there is immediately significant read-activity going on (> 200MB/s according to iStat Menus, which would also explain the noise my hard drive is producing...). Excluding my external drives from Spotlight didn't help either.

 

[autoshot]

Try mounty ntfs or just activate NTFS read/write support by open the terminal and type:

sudo nano /etc/fstab

Add the following line to nano, replacing "NAME" with the label of your NTFS drive:

LABEL=NAME none ntfs rw,auto,nobrowse

Press Ctrl+O to save the file after you're done, and then press Ctrl+X to close nano.

Connect the NTFS drive to the computer, unplug it and reconnect it. Then you will see it under the "/Volumes" directory.

In a Finder window, you can click "Go" > "Go to Folder" and type "/Volumes" into the box to access it, because the NTFS drive will not pop up automatically like other drivers normally do on your Mac.

Thank you for this quick How-To, but that seems like a little too much effort each time I want to write to NTFS-formatted drives.

 

[gilby101]

I haven't tried Paragon since even if it worked I'm not going to spend 30 bucks on a single machine license when I paid 25 for a single user license of Tuxera NTFS, which activates all of my machines. I'd rather re-format all my drives to exFAT then

If you tried Paragon (which is supported on macOS 11) it would help you determine where the problem lies even if you then give up on using NTFS. I can't find it a reference, but my understanding is that Tuxera is only supported up to 10.15.

 

[jagan]

Tuxera NTFS for Mac supports Big Sur according to their site:
https://ntfsformac.tuxera.com/

 

[gilby101]

Tuxera NTFS for Mac supports Big Sur according to their site:
https://ntfsformac.tuxera.com/

That's good. Is it for M1 Macs, or just for Intel? I can't find a statement on that.

I introduced Paragon because a) it is known to be reliable, b) to get the O.P. to try a different product just to eliminate some possible issues.

 

[zeratul75]

I use it on an iMac 2015 and Big sur.....no problem at all.....

 

[Tuomas (Tuxera)]

That's good. Is it for M1 Macs, or just for Intel? I can't find a statement on that.

I introduced Paragon because a) it is known to be reliable, b) to get the O.P. to try a different product just to eliminate some possible issues.

Hello,

The latest version of Microsoft NTFS by Tuxera is universal, so it runs natively on Intel and M1 processors. There is no need to install Rosetta 2 on M1 hardware to use Microsoft NTFS by Tuxera.

If you have any further questions, you can contact our support at macsupport@tuxera.com

-Tuomas

 

[saudor]

Dont use the terminal command. That one i hear is very unstable.

Tuxera NTFS 2019 version works fast for me (the 2020.1 is super slow even on Mojave as well. The whole system slows down to a crawl and the HDD takes forever to eject. It's a massive downgrade.)

 

[autoshot]

The latest version of Microsoft NTFS by Tuxera is universal, so it runs natively on Intel and M1 processors. There is no need to install Rosetta 2 on M1 hardware to use Microsoft NTFS by Tuxera.

Hi @Tuomas (Tuxera)
Thanks for getting back to me on this issue. Unfortunately, I can confirm what @saudor said: Tuxera NTFS 2019 works just find on Big Sur, while both the 2020 and 2020.1 versions are sensationally slow to the point where even opening folders takes up to half a minute. The problem is that I can use v2019 only with my Intel Macs, while I really don't have much choice on my M1 mini (to make matters even worse, this is my main Mac...). I'd be very grateful if you guys at Tuxera could fix this slowing down issue as soon as possible; please, let me know if I can help (with logs or dumps or so)!
Cheers,
Daniel

 

[simzen85]

I also have this issue with Tuxera 2020.1 and MBA M1. Copying a 9GB file right now and it takes like forever

 

[Slartibart]

Deactivate Tuxera and use the free Mounty

 

[gambitking]

Hi @Tuomas (Tuxera)
Thanks for getting back to me on this issue. Unfortunately, I can confirm what @saudor said: Tuxera NTFS 2019 works just find on Big Sur, while both the 2020 and 2020.1 versions are sensationally slow to the point where even opening folders takes up to half a minute. The problem is that I can use v2019 only with my Intel Macs, while I really don't have much choice on my M1 mini (to make matters even worse, this is my main Mac...). I'd be very grateful if you guys at Tuxera could fix this slowing down issue as soon as possible; please, let me know if I can help (with logs or dumps or so)!
Cheers,
Daniel

Hello, just wanted to add my experience to the conversation.
I had all around extremely bad performance with an external ntfs HDD (wd elements 1tb) + carbon copy cloner
(5+ hours to backup 8gb of data!) using tuxera 2020.1 .
Normal use was impossible, it kept freezing and beachballing.

On the other hand, no problem with an internal ntfs formatted ssd.

as @saudor suggested, downgrading to tuxera 2019 solved the problem, now the backup takes mere seconds.

 

[Joeronzk]

Deactivate Tuxera and use the free Mounty

From my own experience, Mounty has very low success rate for detecting NTFS drive. None of my NTFS USB drives are seen by Mounty. However, it worths trying out as it is free.

 

[tommiy]

Can confirm trying to copy 15GB files to a NTFS Samsung SSD with Tuxera has just taken over 7hrs on a M1. Incredibly slow. In truth these days its like a snail. Tuxera 2020.2 is so slow you would need all day to do anything serious with it. Would not recommend at all. Don't even try would be the advice.

 

[tommiy]

I went to lodge a ticket with tuxera only to find out in the support section they acknowledge that it has slow performance on M1. That may be some understatement. The front pages advertise that its compatible with M1 but then that means it works at a snails pace

Here is the link to the support page. Pretty disappointing that this states it works on a M1.

When I first purchased Tuxera it was quoted as working with VMWare Fusion. I had my VMs on an external SSD. However, Fusion would lock up and crash when trying to use those VMs. I lodged a ticket with Tuxera and it took almost a year to get a fix. I can not see this being fixed faster than that.

 

[saudor]

2020.2 is out. I wonder if it's any better. 2019 mostly works but if you start renaming a bunch of files at once, it will glitch under Big suck and fail rename those files until the volume is ejected and re-mounted.

 

[tommiy]

no idea i moved to using mounty which worked.

 

[posguy99]

Deactivate Tuxera and use the free Mounty

Why do you push Mounty so hard, in thread after thread?

I don't know if there's a reason why Apple doesn't enable the NTFS write support in the kernel, it's not worth my data to find out for sure. Thus, Paragon.

 

[Slartibart]

Why do you push Mounty so hard, in thread after thread?

works. transparency regarding code. motivation of original programmers. ambition to make the world a better place.


I can go on. But that’s the gist of it. 😎

EDIT I: totally forgot - it’s free. 🤓

EDIT II: seriously “thread after thread”? 🤪😂🥳

 

[zoom25]

I can confirm that 2020.2 is slower than anything before. I was using an older year version of Tuxera until recently with Big Sur and it had been perfect. Unfortunately, Monterey broke the old Tuxera, so I got the 2020.2 version. Happy that I can finally write again to my drives since updating to Monterey, but it is SLOWWWW. Even watching footage back off the drives is painful. So stuttery.

I've loved using Tuxera for years because once you install it, you never have to think about the process again. The experiences becomes like that on Windows. I'm surprised that this isn't a bigger issue. Do people not use NTFS drives with Macs???

 

[saudor]

I can confirm that 2020.2 is slower than anything before. I was using an older year version of Tuxera until recently with Big Sur and it had been perfect. Unfortunately, Monterey broke the old Tuxera, so I got the 2020.2 version. Happy that I can finally write again to my drives since updating to Monterey, but it is SLOWWWW. Even watching footage back off the drives is painful. So stuttery.

I've loved using Tuxera for years because once you install it, you never have to think about the process again. The experiences becomes like that on Windows. I'm surprised that this isn't a bigger issue. Do people not use NTFS drives with Macs???

Does it install at all on Monterey ? The 2019 one.

 

[zoom25]

I had either the 2018 or 2019 one installed previously that I was using with Big Sur up until past 2 weeks. As soon as Monterey got installed, it stopped working and I couldn't even access the Tuxera NTFS icon under System Preferences. Had to remove it.

I didn't try re-installing the older ones again. I just assumed it wouldn't work since why would it stop working in the first place otherwise. Maybe that can be beneficial to try an old one again and see if it works.

I don't know, either way, it absolutely sucks that I can't use my drives with full performance. I use Windows as well and NTFS works with just about any system, including smart TVs. If this doesn't get fixed soon, I may have to consider getting another drive strictly for Mac stuff (Lightroom, Final Cut) and format it HFS+ or whatever Mac uses natively, in order to get the full speed.