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Thunderbolt 3 M.2 NVMe SSD Enclosures

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The first post of this thread is a WikiPost and can be edited by anyone with the appropiate permissions. Your edits will be public.
Stay away from ACASIS products. I have a few ACASIS products that either stopped working altogether within 2-3 months or started cause problems. I reached out to ACASIS for replacement, but they never responded.

Their customer service is non-existent.
 
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Chancha said:
If you have a pre-T2 Mac around, checking SMART is a bit easier without the kernel extension block. Also needs macOS Monterey or before, I think.
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I tried a 2010 27" iMac with 10.13 High Sierra. Same problem without a third party driver of course.

However, after installing the driver, I couldn't see that USB 3 drive in DriveDx at all, even though it still worked fine in macOS. I erased the driver, and I still couldn't see the USB 3 drive in DriveDx. I wonder what DriveDx did to my system. :(

While I was there though, I checked my decade-old Samsung 850 EVO SATA SSD that I finally had the courage to install in the iMac a few years ago. The drive is still in great shape, despite having been in an old MacBook Pro for years before that. This 2010 iMac isn't used much though.

DriveDxReport_Samsung SSD 850 EVO 250 GB 2024-12-13 at 8.21.11 AM - No serial.png

I've since uninstalled DriveDX on the M4 Mac mini. BTW, does anyone know where all the associated DriveDx files are? The DriveDx uninstall instructions were incomplete. So, I went though ~/Library + /Library + /System + /System/Library and looked for as many instances of DriveDx I could find and deleted them, but I'm not sure if I've missed anything.

EDIT:

Bleah. Didn't like that DriveDx's driver changed the behaviour of my 2010 iMac even after the driver was uninstalled. I wanted to clear some junk off that machine anyway, so I ended up just wiping the machine and reinstalling 10.13 High Sierra. 😳
 
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yukari said:
Stay away from ACASIS products. I have a few ACASIS products that either stopped working altogether within 2-3 months or started cause problems. I reached out to ACASIS for replacement, but they never responded.
Click to expand...

which products? what problems? Haven't been too many reports on this thread about issues with Acasis so if you could elaborate, that would be helpful (be sure to tell us what SSD models you put in your enclosure - WD Black SN770 is what I use)

I've had no issues with my Acasis products: TBU42 Thunderbolt Hub with NVMe, CMO73 hub, TBU401. I just received some Acasis Air (Thunderbolt only) enclosures but have barely used and that's been fine so far too.

I don't use any of these for a boot drive or all-day server so they are not used intensively. Is your use case much more intensive than occasional backups and/or large transfers?
 
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FilterJoe said:
which products? what problems? Haven't been too many reports on this thread about issues with Acasis so if you could elaborate, that would be helpful (be sure to tell us what SSD models you put in your enclosure - WD Black SN770 is what I use)

I've had no issues with my Acasis products: TBU42 Thunderbolt Hub with NVMe, CMO73 hub, TBU401. I just received some Acasis Air (Thunderbolt only) enclosures but have barely used and that's been fine so far too.

I don't use any of these for a boot drive or all-day server so they are not used intensively. Is your use case much more intensive than occasional backups and/or large transfers?
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21-in-1 TB4 hub and TBU405 ProM1 (SSD enclosure with air fan, with 4TB Lexar NVMe).
The hub stopped working after 2-3 months.
The fan on the SSD enclosure started making loud noises after about a month.
 
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NM790

That is not the issue here. The issue the enclosure's fan noise.
 
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yukari said:
NM790

That is not the issue here. The issue for SSD is fan noise.
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Thanks for lettings us know the details. I don't have any of your Acasis models. Perhaps quality varies among the different models?

I haven't needed a fan for my use case. I recently started monitoring temps. Typically around 40° C on any of my Acasis enclosures when at rest, and rising to high 40s when copying large amounts of data (over 100GB). Never seen above 50° C yet.
 
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yukari said:
21-in-1 TB4 hub and TBU405 ProM1 (SSD enclosure with air fan, with 4TB Lexar NVMe).
The hub stopped working after 2-3 months.
The fan on the SSD enclosure started making loud noises after about a month.
Click to expand...
If you read Amazon reviews for their hubs there are reports for that issue IIRC.
 
Unfortunately, I bought it directly from ACASIS not through Amazon.

I noticed the review in Amazon after mine broke down.
 
yukari said:
Stay away from ACASIS products. I have a few ACASIS products that either stopped working altogether within 2-3 months or started cause problems. I reached out to ACASIS for replacement, but they never responded.

Their customer service is non-existent.
Click to expand...
Two Acasis cases working here over a year without problems.

TBU401 with Sabrent Rocket 1 TB
TBU405 with WD SN850X 4 TB
 
Two TBU405's [fan-less] here (one of which is connected to teh Studio 24/7 (the other is ad-hoc for SD! duties)).

I almost reached 50C during a recent copy-fest on one, but the units have been extremely stable, and reliable.

Consistently ~42C most of the time.

Can't say I am whole-heartedly satisfied with the USD88/per price point; but, they definitely earn their keep ;)
 
Anyone here using the Acasis TBU405 Pro M1 with a 2TB Samsung 990 Pro?

I'm waiting on this SSD but out of curiosity tried it with a 512GB Samsung 970 EVO Plus that I has in a USB 3.2 enclosure.

....The Acasis enclosure is completely unusable (unstable / disconnects / poor speeds) with the 970 EVO Plus. I know this is "not recommended" by Acasis, but it is worse than that - it is flat out unusable.

I'm aware there are two version of the 970 EVO Plus with different firmware, and I assume I have the older one. Sadly it seems to not be upgradable via an external enclosure on a Mac with Samsung Magician software.
 
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Levina said:
I bought the Acasis TBU401E, put my Samsung 970 EVO Plus 2TB in there and it works. Speeds are nice. Although it's half as fast as the internal SSD (Mac Mini Pro M2 32GB/1TB), transfer of files is really fast. The case does get fairly hot though (I know this is a thing with the Samsung, but right now it's the only NVMe blade I have) and the thermal pad is very thin so I would like something a bit more substantial. I just don't know what thermal pad to get and how thick. Any advice? Thanks.
View attachment 2235562
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Interesting...I tried the Samsung 970 EVO Plus (pre-2021 model) in the Acasis TBU405 Pro M1 enclosure and it is unusable - randomly disconnects after a few minutes.
 
Fomalhaut said:
You can turn the fan off, which I know isn't exactly a "solution", but won't make it any worse than the fanless version.
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That is how I am using it now. But the point is, they sell the product at a higher cost with the fan than without. If I wanted to use it without a fan, I would have bought a cheaper one to begin with.

Fortunately, I bought it with a credit card. So now the credit card company is involved. Another reason not to pay anything using a debit card or other payment system.
 
yukari said:
21-in-1 TB4 hub and TBU405 ProM1 (SSD enclosure with air fan, with 4TB Lexar NVMe).
The hub stopped working after 2-3 months.
The fan on the SSD enclosure started making loud noises after about a month.
Click to expand...
How hot was the dock getting? Wonder if heat caused it to fail? Their Thunderbolt 5 one is out too
 
FilterJoe said:
which products? what problems? Haven't been too many reports on this thread about issues with Acasis so if you could elaborate, that would be helpful (be sure to tell us what SSD models you put in your enclosure - WD Black SN770 is what I use)

I've had no issues with my Acasis products: TBU42 Thunderbolt Hub with NVMe, CMO73 hub, TBU401. I just received some Acasis Air (Thunderbolt only) enclosures but have barely used and that's been fine so far too.

I don't use any of these for a boot drive or all-day server so they are not used intensively. Is your use case much more intensive than occasional backups and/or large transfers?
Click to expand...

i think the real issue he is calling out here is that when he needed help they ghosted.
 
TzunamiOSX said:
Two Acasis cases working here over a year without problems.

TBU401 with Sabrent Rocket 1 TB
TBU405 with WD SN850X 4 TB
Click to expand...

that great but that person bought direct, had an issue, and got ghosted. screw that, i wont buy from them on principle.
 
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Any initial consideration regarding the new TB5 enclosures?

Speed was never the issue with the AS2464-powered enclosures.
It was mostly poor power management from MacOS. If the new enclosures with the new chip can fix that while getting reasonably cheap that's progress.
 
ChadGippidy said:
Any initial consideration regarding the new TB5 enclosures?

Speed was never the issue with the AS2464-powered enclosures.
It was mostly poor power management from MacOS. If the new enclosures with the new chip can fix that while getting reasonably cheap that's progress.
Click to expand...
Don’t the Thunderbolt 3 enclosures offer a bit less power draw?
 
FilterJoe said:
Thanks for lettings us know the details. I don't have any of your Acasis models. Perhaps quality varies among the different models?

I haven't needed a fan for my use case. I recently started monitoring temps. Typically around 40° C on any of my Acasis enclosures when at rest, and rising to high 40s when copying large amounts of data (over 100GB). Never seen above 50° C yet.
Click to expand...

splifingate said:
Two TBU405's [fan-less] here (one of which is connected to teh Studio 24/7 (the other is ad-hoc for SD! duties)).

I almost reached 50C during a recent copy-fest on one, but the units have been extremely stable, and reliable.

Consistently ~42C most of the time.

Can't say I am whole-heartedly satisfied with the USD88/per price point; but, they definitely earn their keep ;)
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I had never read from failures about their JHL7440 Based Cases like the TBU401 / TBU405 / TBU405 AIR.
I am also using 2x TBU405 AIR direct purchased from Acasis and have no experience with their Customer Support.

@yukari
For the Hubs i would only buy OWC for Mac devices because of the weird Power Management behaviour with Mac´s.
I would not wonder that both of your failures are related to this.

ChadGippidy said:
Any initial consideration regarding the new TB5 enclosures?

Speed was never the issue with the AS2464-powered enclosures.
It was mostly poor power management from MacOS. If the new enclosures with the new chip can fix that while getting reasonably cheap that's progress.
Click to expand...

That is the reason (beside that using ASMEDIA2464 based Cases are maybe no good idea to boot from what is my Plan) i waited to buy any.
 
genexx said:
@yukari
For the Hubs i would only buy OWC for Mac devices because of the weird Power Management behaviour with Mac´s.
I would not wonder that both of your failures are related to this.



That is the reason (beside that using ASMEDIA2464 based Cases are maybe no good idea to boot from what is my Plan) i waited to buy any.
Click to expand...
Why would you expect OWC hubs to behave any differently than other hubs?
 
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