iPad Pro What determines transfer speed?

[Kyle76]

I’m looking forward to faster transfer speeds on the iPad Pro, but will my peripherals like a Samsung external SSD, be able to keep up? How about card readers? Is speed determined by the reader or the chip it’s reading? Am I going to have to upgrade everything to take advantage of the higher speeds?

 

[marty1980]

There’s a lot that goes into it, but you probably just need to know the basics.

The main thing to worry about for best performance is the connection. USB-C 3.1/3.2 and Thunderbolt 3 or, for wireless, WiFi 6 or Bluetooth 5.0.

You may use older standards, but you will only get the most out of it with these latest technologies both on the iPad and from the device connecting to it.

 

[Digitalguy]

the current iPad pro goes to 10Gb/s on USB C, so you need a NVME external drive that can support at least the 3.2 gen 2, like the Samsung T7. The new pro will support USB 4 / Thunderbolt 3, so you'll need to buy the much more expensive TB3 drives to take advantage of that
Having said that there is no benchmark that can test USB drives speed on iPadOS, at least I have found no app that can do that...

 

[AutomaticApple]

I’m looking forward to faster transfer speeds on the iPad Pro, but will my peripherals like a Samsung external SSD, be able to keep up? How about card readers? Is speed determined by the reader or the chip it’s reading? Am I going to have to upgrade everything to take advantage of the higher speeds?

Yes, they will easily be able to keep up. Thunderbolt 3 is a blessing.

 

[rui no onna]

I’m looking forward to faster transfer speeds on the iPad Pro, but will my peripherals like a Samsung external SSD, be able to keep up? How about card readers? Is speed determined by the reader or the chip it’s reading? Am I going to have to upgrade everything to take advantage of the higher speeds?

Samsung T5? Nope, that won't saturate Thunderbolt. That's SATA-based and only does ~500 MB/s. Even the Samsung T7 only does ~1GB/s. Most SD cards are even slower than SATA, iirc.

You might actually need to DIY the external to get top speeds: high-end M.2 NVMe 2280 + Thunderbolt enclosure.

With that said, do you really need to have the fastest storage speeds possible for what you intend to do on the iPad?

 

[doboy]

Samsung T5? Nope, that won't saturate Thunderbolt. That's SATA-based and only does ~500 MB/s. Even the Samsung T7 only does ~1GB/s. Most SD cards are even slower than SATA, iirc.

You might actually need to DIY the external to get top speeds: high-end M.2 NVMe 2280 + Thunderbolt enclosure.

With that said, do you really need to have the fastest storage speeds possible for what you intend to do on the iPad?

There's Samsung X5, but too expensive in my view.

 

[Kyle76]

Samsung T5? Nope, that won't saturate Thunderbolt. That's SATA-based and only does ~500 MB/s. Even the Samsung T7 only does ~1GB/s. Most SD cards are even slower than SATA, iirc.

You might actually need to DIY the external to get top speeds: high-end M.2 NVMe 2280 + Thunderbolt enclosure.

With that said, do you really need to have the fastest storage speeds possible for what you intend to do on the iPad?

I’d like to be able to take advantage of LumaFusion’s new capability of editing video off of a HDD, rather than have to download entire clips in order to use portions of them.

 

[Digitalguy]

I’d like to be able to take advantage of LumaFusion’s new capability of editing video off of a HDD, rather than have to download entire clips in order to use portions of them.

Good luck with iPad OS corrupting files on external storage, I talk from experience... (hopefully this will change with iPadOS 15)

 

[Digitalguy]

Samsung T5? Nope, that won't saturate Thunderbolt. That's SATA-based and only does ~500 MB/s. Even the Samsung T7 only does ~1GB/s. Most SD cards are even slower than SATA, iirc.

You might actually need to DIY the external to get top speeds: high-end M.2 NVMe 2280 + Thunderbolt enclosure.

With that said, do you really need to have the fastest storage speeds possible for what you intend to do on the iPad?

I have an NVME enclosure and it gets so hot that my NVME SSD throttles after a few minutes to HDD speeds... I think prebuilt external drives are better for NVME disks (my T7 does not throttle...)

 

[rui no onna]

I have an NVME enclosure and it gets so hot that my NVME SSD throttles after a few minutes to HDD speeds... I think prebuilt external drives are better for NVME disks (my T7 does not throttle...)

I remember reading a review that the high performance Samsung X5 gets super hot, too. I think we'll need large heatsinks or maybe even fans to fix the heat issues with heavy read/write workloads to get 2+ GB/s speeds.

 

[sparksd]

Good luck with iPad OS corrupting files on external storage, I talk from experience... (hopefully this will change with iPadOS 15)

Yeah, this was my long thread on the problem -

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/file-corruption-on-copy-to-external-storage.2235171/

I would definitely make a backup before using it.

 

[Digitalguy]

Yeah, this was my long thread on the problem -

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/file-corruption-on-copy-to-external-storage.2235171/

I would definitely make a backup before using it.

I should have read it before I tried watching a video from and external SSD... Fortunately I managed to recover my movie collection, but man the time I wasted. Now I only used SSDs to transfer files, I don't open anything from an external drive anymore

 

[sparksd]

I should have read it before I tried watching a video from and external SSD... Fortunately I managed to recover my movie collection, but man the time I wasted. Now I only used SSDs to transfer files, I don't open anything from an external drive anymore

Yeah, I've been working through this problem for some time now - as a retired engineer, there's a certain fascination with it. It's one of the reasons I still strongly rely on my laptop.

 

[Digitalguy]

Yeah, I've been working through this problem for some time now - as a retired engineer, there's a certain fascination with it. It's one of the reasons I still strongly rely on my laptop.

I rely on my desktop for managing files (multi TB drive) and on my desktop + laptop for working (all Windows).
But I watch videos and movies on my tablets. For movies (local ones, I have a lot) I have moved entirely to my Tab S7+, which has the best display and it's much better with file transfers and, when I desire, it connects easily to external monitors and I can still use the tablet (and then unplug and continue to watch on the tablet). Hopefully iPadOS will catch up with this this year...

 

[Digitalguy]

I remember reading a review that the high performance Samsung X5 gets super hot, too. I think we'll need large heatsinks or maybe even fans to fix the heat issues with heavy read/write workloads to get 2+ GB/s speeds.

I was looking into buying the OWC Envoy Express. It seems that it doesn't throttle, but to avoid overheating it limits the speed to around 1500 MB/S, which is only 50% more than a 10GB/s drive, so way below TB3, which should not be saturated by any gen 3 NVME drive. It costs around $90 but I really wonder if it is worth it over my 1TB T7 (I have a 1TB spare NVME that cost me as much as this enclosure...)

 

[sparksd]

I rely on my desktop for managing files (multi TB drive) and on my desktop + laptop for working (all Windows).
But I watch videos and movies on my tablets. For movies (local ones, I have a lot) I have moved entirely to my Tab S7+, which has the best display and it's much better with file transfers and, when I desire, it connects easily to external monitors and I can still use the tablet (and then unplug and continue to watch on the tablet). Hopefully iPadOS will catch up with this this year...

We are close in our usage. My desktop and laptop are both Windows and I have well over 1000 movies/videos (primarily ripped Blu-Ray) on a NAS and portable drives. I watch a lot on my 12.9 Pro but with a 4K TV, I split viewing. My laptop is a 256GB/16GB/i7 Surface Pro 7 and is powerful enough and reliable enough to supplant my desktop. The iPad is very much a superior tablet but it also can't do things the SP7 can. If I had to choose to keep just one device, it would be the SP7 because I can live with the inferior tablet experience but not the loss of functionality I have with the iPad. For me, I still see them as complementary devices. Some reasons why I would keep the SP7 over the iPad –

• Proper external monitor support
• Better multi-tasking
• Full Office 365 functionality
• Better memory mgmt. (e.g., Safari tabs reloading on iPad)
• Ability to connect to and update other devices via USB
• Ability to format external drives
• SP7 has a landscape-centered front camera and supports a webcam
• Ability to add to music library with other than iTunes or music store
• Floating windows
• Browser extension support
• Better file management
• Ability to designate default apps for file types
• 16GB RAM without having to buy 1TB or more on-board storage

But now my iPad has basically become just a consumption device of convenience.

 

[Digitalguy]

We are close in our usage. My desktop and laptop are both Windows and I have well over 1000 movies/videos (primarily ripped Blu-Ray) on a NAS and portable drives. I watch a lot on my 12.9 Pro but with a 4K TV, I split viewing. My laptop is a 256GB/16GB/i7 Surface Pro 7 and is powerful enough and reliable enough to supplant my desktop. The iPad is very much a superior tablet but it also can't do things the SP7 can. If I had to choose to keep just one device, it would be the SP7 because I can live with the inferior tablet experience but not the loss of functionality I have with the iPad. For me, I still see them as complementary devices. Some reasons why I would keep the SP7 over the iPad –

• Proper external monitor support
• Better multi-tasking
• Full Office 365 functionality
• Better memory mgmt. (e.g., Safari tabs reloading on iPad)
• Ability to connect to and update other devices via USB
• Ability to format external drives
• SP7 has a landscape-centered front camera and supports a webcam
• Ability to add to music library with other than iTunes or music store
• Floating windows
• Browser extension support
• Better file management
• Ability to designate default apps for file types
• 16GB RAM without having to buy 1TB or more on-board storage

But now my iPad has basically become just a consumption device of convenience.

I'll be short since I am going to bed (1.30am here in Europe)
I have 2 main laptops a Surface Book 2 15 for home use and a clone of the Surface pro from HP for when I am out (but I also use it often at home too with an external monitor). I went with it instead of getting a successor to my old SP3 since it has TB3, LTE and removable battery and SSD (I upgraded the 512 SATA to 1TB NVME and I have already changed the battery). I know that the new SP7+ made some improvements with LTE and removable SSD, but no TB3 is not great. Also I much prefer the keyboard in the HP... My iPads are for watching video, reading and annotating, which is also part of my work, but my main devices are Windows for many of the reasons you mention and more (Windows only software)

 

[rui no onna]

I was looking into buying the OWC Envoy Express. It seems that it doesn't throttle, but to avoid overheating it limits the speed to around 1500 MB/S, which is only 50% more than a 10GB/s drive, so way below TB3, which should not be saturated by any gen 3 NVME drive. It costs around $90 but I really wonder if it is worth it over my 1TB T7 (I have a 1TB spare NVME that cost me as much as this enclosure...)

Given I'm mostly on Windows and there's general slowness and file corruption issues with exFAT on iPadOS, I'm loathe to risk the T7 on the iPad. I just got a SanDisk 256GB Ultra Dual Drive for quick sneaker-net transfers between my PCs and iPads. I use either that or Dropbox.

For "portable" DIY Netflix and SMB share, I've been playing around with a Raspberry Pi 4 + 4TB portable HDD + openmediavault + mini router setup.

Alas, most of my Blu-ray/UHD rips are 1:1 MKV (around 25-80GB each) and haven't been converted to a more manageable size yet.

 

[sparksd]

Given I'm mostly on Windows and there's general slowness and file corruption issues with exFAT on iPadOS, I'm loathe to risk the T7 on the iPad. I just got a SanDisk 256GB Ultra Dual Drive for quick sneaker-net transfers between my PCs and iPads. I use either that or Dropbox.

For "portable" DIY Netflix and SMB share, I've been playing around with a Raspberry Pi 4 + 4TB portable HDD + openmediavault + mini router setup.

Alas, most of my Blu-ray/UHD rips are 1:1 MKV (around 25-80GB each) and haven't been converted to a more manageable size yet.

Out of my too-long thread noted above, I switched over to using FileBrowser Pro for actual transfers to/from exFAT storage (Samsung SSD & multiple HDDs up to 4TB) and not had any corruption. If read-only, I haven't had an issue with video players, etc. But having architected command & control systems, I know that the worse problem you can have is user distrust of the system in use.

 

[doboy]

Out of my too-long thread noted above, I switched over to using FileBrowser Pro for actual transfers to/from exFAT storage (Samsung SSD & multiple HDDs up to 4TB) and not had any corruption. If read-only, I haven't had an issue with video players, etc. But having architected command & control systems, I know that the worse problem you can have is user distrust of the system in use.

I second the comment regarding FB Pro.

 

[sparksd]

I second the comment regarding FB Pro.

In my last post on that thread, I re-ran my original copy test using Files and FB Pro on 14.5 (2018 12.9 Pro, OSB-C SSD). With the Files app, I still had about 5% corruption rate; with FB Pro, it was zero.

 

[Digitalguy]

Out of my too-long thread noted above, I switched over to using FileBrowser Pro for actual transfers to/from exFAT storage (Samsung SSD & multiple HDDs up to 4TB) and not had any corruption. If read-only, I haven't had an issue with video players, etc. But having architected command & control systems, I know that the worse problem you can have is user distrust of the system in use.

Interesting... I'll wait for iPadOS 15, but if the file app is not improved I may buy FB pro. Having said that I have never had corruption with transfers, only when I have opened files from external drives (but then it corrupted the whole folder, not just the file...)

 

[Digitalguy]

I remember reading a review that the high performance Samsung X5 gets super hot, too. I think we'll need large heatsinks or maybe even fans to fix the heat issues with heavy read/write workloads to get 2+ GB/s speeds.

there are already enclosures with fans that work well.... my issue is that I want something that is backward compatible with USB C, for the iPads and laptops that don't have TB3

 

[Slartibart]

I have Samsung’s T5 and T7 in daily use with iPad Pros 2020 and the write speeds are far from the specs. Rule of thumb is ”5 times slower than with a Macbook”.

 

[rui no onna]

I have Samsung’s T5 and T7 in daily use with iPad Pros 2020 and the write speeds are far from the specs. Rule of thumb is ”5 times slower than with a Macbook”.

File system? I tested a Crucial MX500 2TB and with APFS, iPad Pro 2020 was just 1/2 the write speed compared to the same drive on M1 MacBook Air.