The "Upgradeable" M1 SSD: has there been other confirmations?

[jdb8167]

And of course external thunderbolt drives are always an option. Since it's a desktop it's not going anywhere so you can get away with permanently plugging a thunderbolt drive into one of the many USB-C ports you got

If the Apple silicon Mac Pro has PCIe slots then you can use a card and do much better than the limited speeds you get with Thunderbolt.

 

[dgdosen]

LTT proved that it can't be done

I had missed this. The fact that Apple use plain old flash on something similar to an M.2 connection pretty much destroys any reasoning for not allowing repair-ability and upgrade-ability. Especially for any desktop.

 

[ignatius345]

They don't call this forum MacRumors for nothing. But we can dream....that one day we can again self-upgrade our stuff, like the 2011 MBP I still have that came with 4GB RAM and 500GB HDD, but now has 16GB RAM and 2TB hybrid drive.

Kind of hard to take Apple's greenwashing seriously -- with all their recycled aluminum and whatnot -- when they go out of their way to discourage people from repairing and upgrading Macs to keep them in use and out of landfill.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

Yep, not limited to the Xbox. Their surface line is a prime example. The tablet/laptops are glued shut in many respects.

You saw those new Dell laptops that use proprietary DDR5 RAM modules?

I think that's a mistake, even Apple admitted the lack of expansion of the trash can was a mistake. I'm hoping they don't return to those days. Of course, this actually has zero impact on me - the current MBPs are at the top end of what I'm willing to pay, never mind a Mac Pro. So I'm basically a spectator in the roll out of a new Mac Pro

Well the issues the trash can had was it was too small for the hardware put into it. Apple Silicon doesn't have those restrictions x86 CPUs and GPUs do. Many professionals had to resort to awful eGPUs because of how small the enclosure was.

For GPUs you're right going external is a mistake. For storage though it's not an issue.

 

[NT1440]

It’s funny to me that people assume Apple does x or y to screw the consumer, while intelligence agencies and malicious actors are constantly trying new ways to gain access to computer systems.

The NSA has been running “repackaging” operations for decades, where they literally replace components and seal up “new” units with compromised components. Most of Apples security measures are a direct counter to this type of attack (FaceID and TouchID encrypting in particular), but tech types view it as anti consumer. We literally spy on our allies, but the one company taking security seriously across the board gets flack for it. Weird world.

 

[maflynn]

Well the issues the trash can had was it was too small for the hardware put into it

I'd say the design was such that it was too small. Lack of space for GPU upgrades, they misread the industry and cards got bigger and hotter. The design's cooling design was another major inhibitor and finally cylindrical design prevented drive bays.

Overall, they chose a design (cylindrical) and then picked components to fit within the design. Form over function. I still remember having discussions with apple fans and how they justified the lack of upgradability stating that Pros don't need drive expansion or better GPUs. Apple finally admitted defeat and they erred, and I have to believe they admitted defeat because sales were simply not there.

 

[Spaceboi Scaphandre]

I'd say the design was such that it was too small. Lack of space for GPU upgrades, they misread the industry and cards got bigger and hotter. The design's cooling design was another major inhibitor and finally cylindrical design prevented drive bays.

Overall, they chose a design (cylindrical) and then picked components to fit within the design. Form over function. I still remember having discussions with apple fans and how they justified the lack of upgradability stating that Pros don't need drive expansion or better GPUs. Apple finally admitted defeat and they erred, and I have to believe they admitted defeat because sales were simply not there.

The design was just way too early. If the trash can released with an M series chip instead of an Intel Xeon and old Radeon, it would've been bleeding edge.

 

[salamanderjuice]

You saw those new Dell laptops that use proprietary DDR5 RAM modules?



Well the issues the trash can had was it was too small for the hardware put into it. Apple Silicon doesn't have those restrictions x86 CPUs and GPUs do. Many professionals had to resort to awful eGPUs because of how small the enclosure was.

For GPUs you're right going external is a mistake. For storage though it's not an issue.

Dell is working to make CAMM a new RAM standard. It's expected to become so later this year.

And the fastest storage is still a x16 PCIe SSD RAID card. Plus it's just cleaner to have it inside instead of cable spaghetti for external drives.

 

[Pressure]

I had missed this. The fact that Apple use plain old flash on something similar to an M.2 connection pretty much destroys any reasoning for not allowing repair-ability and upgrade-ability. Especially for any desktop.

You can buy replacement NAND flash cards directly from Apple under the Self Repair programme but only with what the machine originally came with. The controller is embedded in the SoC.

When TB5 or USB4 ver 2 arrives with 80Gbps it will be moot though for any desktop computer. The problem is still going to be random read and writes which hasn't improved over 3 generations of PCIe.

 

[EuroChilli]

Kind of hard to take Apple's greenwashing seriously -- with all their recycled aluminum and whatnot -- when they go out of their way to discourage people from repairing and upgrading Macs to keep them in use and out of landfill.

I think the same thing, I call BS on their greenwashing as I do find it somewhat hypocritical, BUT, would you look at this, my iPod Touch 3rd Gen is still working along with my 2011 MBP. My brand new BT Bose Earbuds even work with both devices. In other words, these Apple products are still NOT in a landfill.

And the rest of my Apple products, all still working to some degree, the 1 mouse now 10 years old.

 

[WilliApple]

I really hope Apple can give us the tools to upgrade the Ram to 16 GB.

I didn't think I would use 16 GB, but the other day, I had 18 GB of Swap.

Thats the result of becoming a software developer.

 

[Pressure]

I really hope Apple can give us the tools to upgrade the Ram to 16 GB.

I didn't think I would use 16 GB, but the other day, I had 18 GB of Swap.

Thats the result of becoming a software developer.

Buy the right tool for the job.

 

[WilliApple]

Buy the right tool for the job.

Where is it?

 

[ignatius345]

I think the same thing, I call BS on their greenwashing as I do find it somewhat hypocritical, BUT, would you look at this, my iPod Touch 3rd Gen is still working along with my 2011 MBP. My brand new BT Bose Earbuds even work with both devices. In other words, these Apple products are still NOT in a landfill.

Yeah, for sure, a lot of Apple stuff is well made enough to stay usable for a long time. We're still rocking an iPad Mini 4 and a first-gen iPhone SE in our household, as little auxiliary devices. They're laggy but functional with no hardware issues aside from a rather tired battery in the iPad. I think quality-wise they're largely doing great.

 

[EuroChilli]

Yeah, for sure, a lot of Apple stuff is well made enough to stay usable for a long time. We're still rocking an iPad Mini 4 and a first-gen iPhone SE in our household, as little auxiliary devices. They're laggy but functional with no hardware issues aside from a rather tired battery in the iPad. I think quality-wise they're largely doing great.

I have 2 iPhone SE 1st gens. Wife plays games on the one and the other plays Apple Music via 3.5mm jack to RCA through my 1980 B&W stereo. But both the batteries are fubar, yet the phones are still useful, for years still to come, I’m sure. I might try replacing the batteries myself with some €30 iFixits. They even have sim cards, we still make and receive calls with them.

I’ve just been playing music from my 13 year old iPod touch, with BT headphones, for the last 3 hours and the battery is still at 80%! I’m guessing I can go at least another 6 hours.

Moral of the story, I’m not worried about any of my stuff ending up in landfill anytime soon. I’m also not worried about these devices no longer being user upgradeable.

 

[ignatius345]

I really hope Apple can give us the tools to upgrade the Ram to 16 GB.

I didn't think I would use 16 GB, but the other day, I had 18 GB of Swap.

Thats the result of becoming a software developer.

I've got 13 GB of swap going right now on my iMac. It's honestly not a big deal at all and I never think about it unless I happen to look at Activity Monitor. The SSDs these days are so fast, it's not like the bad old days when your hard drive would grind away for 20 seconds to page things in and out of RAM.

 

[Asbow]

Apple's opposition to right to repair is a well known fact. Whether it constitutes anti-consumer behavior is a matter of interpretation and personal stance. This is a very interesting discussion on its own, but is probably not appropriate in the context of this thread.

What I am trying to say is that Linus's interpretation assume that there is specific malicious intent behind these design decisions. But this is an additional assumption which is not necessary to explain or understand these decisions. If I am giving you a sandwich with butter it's not because I go out of my way to prevent you from putting cottage cheese on it instead. It's just that I want to make a sandwich with butter and speading the butter directly onto the bread is the simplest option for me. It didn't even cross my mind that you might want it with cottage cheese instead and if you tell me about your right of having your bread with whatever you want I will probably just shrug. Can you accuse me of malicious intent in this scenario?



I think you might be overdramatising this a bit. First, how can you know that there will indeed be a stack of useless Macs? Apple has been shipping on-replaceable SSDs since 2012, and it doesn't seem like it has exasperated the e-waste issue. But what's most relevant, do you think that there is indeed a substantial enough amount of users who would continue to use the computer with an external SSD or even replace the failed drive? My experience is very different. The majority would just get a new computer once their SSD goes. Hell, people don't even replace the battery on their iPhones, but get a new one instead!

What you say makes a lot of sense in the context of options. The way how Apple designs these things certainly removes the option of prolonging the lifespan of the machine. And I fully acknowledge that there are users who would prefer to have these options and I respect their opinion. Frankly, I too would prefer if the SSD were replaceable and SSD upgrades were a reality (if not by user than at least by Apple). But I don't think it is correct or appropriate to frame these kinds of wishes in the context of environment or e-waste.




This is certainly part of their business model, yes. But there are also some valid technical reasons not to use M.2 SSDs. Power consumption, protocol optimisation, reliability (no third-party firmware with unclear behavior)... For example, Apple SSDs correctly implement data flush operations, while many consumer SSDs lose data even after confirming that the data has been written. M.2 SSDs have their own RAM for caching, while Apple can use the system RAM, improving power consumption and performance in certain situations. And so on.

Do these advantages outweigh the loss of upgradeability and repairability? That's a different question which probably cannot be answered generally. As I said, I'd prefer if all NAND on Apple Silicon was replaceable and if Apple offered a NAND upgrade/replacement service (either in shop or via their self-repair program).

Don’t they still have the same issue where Apple put a 13V line next to the 3.3 for the SSD?

 

[Unregistered 4U]

Kind of hard to take Apple's greenwashing seriously -- with all their recycled aluminum and whatnot -- when they go out of their way to discourage people from repairing and upgrading Macs to keep them in use and out of landfill.

People that don’t want to recycle aren’t going to recycle and no one can force them to, least of all Apple. Someone that doesn’t want to recycle is going to toss their device in the landfill, regardless of how many slots are in it!

 

[flyingmanatee]

That's a different topic (assuming that the thumbnail is accurate). It's talking about SSD modules in the Studio. The article linked by flyingmanatee is about changing the on-chip SSD.

Yep

I’ve recently upgraded my MacBook Air m1. I replaced 256gb nand to 512gb. The process kinda tricky. But it works flawlessly.

Did you post here (or elsewhere about it?)

I'm super curious if it requires a DFU restore or what else?

 

[turbineseaplane]

Such a shame

I give MAJOR kudos to Sony for literally just putting an empty extra NVMe slot on the PS5, so users can pop in more storage as they see fit.

That is how you do it
Bravo!

 

[flyingmanatee]

LTT proved nothing as always cause he doesnt know how to do it. it can be done by repairing the nands to the SoC via Apple Configurator

It can? I'd like to see confirmation of that, I saw a DFU restore you could swap but not upgrade

Such a shame

I give MAJOR kudos to Sony for literally just putting an empty extra NVMe slot on the PS5, so users can pop in more storage as they see fit.

That is how you do it
Bravo!

A few PC makes do this too. Extra NVMe, problem solved.

 

[HDFan]

they're the ones that purposely disabled faceid/touchid if someone other then Apple opened up their phones

Although it would be nice to be able to upgrade components such as SSDs this is the one area where I don't mind it being locked down. All sorts of security issues related to faceid/touchid.

 

[Pressure]

It can? I'd like to see confirmation of that, I saw a DFU restore you could swap but not upgrade


A few PC makes do this too. Extra NVMe, problem solved.

Someone on this very forum upgraded from the base model 512GB to 4TB and explained how he did it.

 

[ignatius345]

People that don’t want to recycle aren’t going to recycle and no one can force them to, least of all Apple. Someone that doesn’t want to recycle is going to toss their device in the landfill, regardless of how many slots are in it!

What you're missing is that a Mac that can be easily upgraded has resale value, even if you don't want to do that yourself. People will take money for something instead of throwing it away. And if they DO throw it away, someone downstream will salvage it if it can be upgraded/repaired and then sold. By adding upgradeability and utility, you're adding an economic incentive to keep a device in use.

 

[ignatius345]

I’ve recently upgraded my MacBook Air m1. I replaced 256gb nand to 512gb. The process kinda tricky. But it works flawlessly.

I would love to be able to do this. My M1 Air is working perfectly but lately I've been forced to plug in a flash drive (ugh) to make room for a huge lot of files synced for work. I'm actually looking at selling it and getting an identical machine but with a 512 GB or 1 TB SSD.