Hey, all--
I'm migrating from an MP3,1 to either an iMac (currently evaluating one) or nMP. As a result, I've had to move to some form of external storage.
After much deliberation I settled on the Sonnet Echo Express III-D enclosure (3 PCI slots; free upgrade to TB2) along with the Tempo Pro SSD card. Initially I liked that I could enable TRIM over TB, although based on further discussions it is unclear to me if TRIM (a) even matters with modern drives and (b) whether it works at all in a RAID0 configuration.
I first popped the Tempo Pro in my MP3,1 to transfer data and get a benchmark. 2x840 Evos (1TB) on the Tempo Pro card (RAID0) scored 943/850 MB/s read & write (BlackMagic). I thought this was pretty good. Sonnet claims 960 & 810 in a Mac Pro.
I then moved the Tempo Pro into the Sonnet enclosure and attached it to the iMac: 801/655 Mb/s. Yes, this is a 20-25% hit; Sonnet claims 700 & 560.
I'm new to Thunderbolt so I don't really know if this is typical, but Sonnet claims that read speed via Thunderbolt is 90% of the rated speed over an internal Mac Pro solution; the rule of thumb for writes is 80%.
They also claim that 2 SSDs in RAID0 start to bump up against TB bandwidth limits @ 700/560.
As a point of reference, the internal iMac SSD (512GB) scored 719/713 MB/s.
I wanted to post this real-world info as I had been unable to find good info when I was searching a few weeks ago.
I'm not sure how much faster things might be under TB2 (the 27" late-2013 iMac i7 couldn't take advantage of this, of course), but I suspect it will still be less than the 943/850 MB/s I saw internally in the MP3,1. The TB bandwidth limit will not be an issue, but my gut tells me there is some additional overhead.
Sonnet staff told me they had gone to great pains to make the fans quieter than previous generations. One PCIe card and 2 SSDs should require minimal cooling, I figured. Unfortunately, it seems that one of the fans in my enclosure is noisy. If I mechanically block it, noise drops to almost nothing. I'd have to send it in for repair and being without the unit for 1-2 weeks makes me wonder what I should do if the unit ever needed repair at critical time.
Neither the iMac nor the nMP offer a solution for the PCIe card, and most enclosures do not permit a full-length card. I could remove the 2 SSDs, but what do I connect them to? Does this mean I need to have 2 spare USB3 enclosures on hand? Will 2 drives in 2 enclosures be recognized with the software RAID0?
I'd ruled out the Promise R4 TB2 diskless (seemed pretty big; possibly noisier; also not available for 2-3 weeks), and a few others (e.g., J4, DataTale, etc.) because they might not be as fast or they were TB1 only.
Maybe I should reconsider all options. Maybe TB2 is not something I should care too much about.
Hope this helps someone out. Also, thanks for any input.
I'm migrating from an MP3,1 to either an iMac (currently evaluating one) or nMP. As a result, I've had to move to some form of external storage.
After much deliberation I settled on the Sonnet Echo Express III-D enclosure (3 PCI slots; free upgrade to TB2) along with the Tempo Pro SSD card. Initially I liked that I could enable TRIM over TB, although based on further discussions it is unclear to me if TRIM (a) even matters with modern drives and (b) whether it works at all in a RAID0 configuration.
I first popped the Tempo Pro in my MP3,1 to transfer data and get a benchmark. 2x840 Evos (1TB) on the Tempo Pro card (RAID0) scored 943/850 MB/s read & write (BlackMagic). I thought this was pretty good. Sonnet claims 960 & 810 in a Mac Pro.
I then moved the Tempo Pro into the Sonnet enclosure and attached it to the iMac: 801/655 Mb/s. Yes, this is a 20-25% hit; Sonnet claims 700 & 560.
I'm new to Thunderbolt so I don't really know if this is typical, but Sonnet claims that read speed via Thunderbolt is 90% of the rated speed over an internal Mac Pro solution; the rule of thumb for writes is 80%.
They also claim that 2 SSDs in RAID0 start to bump up against TB bandwidth limits @ 700/560.
As a point of reference, the internal iMac SSD (512GB) scored 719/713 MB/s.
I wanted to post this real-world info as I had been unable to find good info when I was searching a few weeks ago.
I'm not sure how much faster things might be under TB2 (the 27" late-2013 iMac i7 couldn't take advantage of this, of course), but I suspect it will still be less than the 943/850 MB/s I saw internally in the MP3,1. The TB bandwidth limit will not be an issue, but my gut tells me there is some additional overhead.
Sonnet staff told me they had gone to great pains to make the fans quieter than previous generations. One PCIe card and 2 SSDs should require minimal cooling, I figured. Unfortunately, it seems that one of the fans in my enclosure is noisy. If I mechanically block it, noise drops to almost nothing. I'd have to send it in for repair and being without the unit for 1-2 weeks makes me wonder what I should do if the unit ever needed repair at critical time.
Neither the iMac nor the nMP offer a solution for the PCIe card, and most enclosures do not permit a full-length card. I could remove the 2 SSDs, but what do I connect them to? Does this mean I need to have 2 spare USB3 enclosures on hand? Will 2 drives in 2 enclosures be recognized with the software RAID0?
I'd ruled out the Promise R4 TB2 diskless (seemed pretty big; possibly noisier; also not available for 2-3 weeks), and a few others (e.g., J4, DataTale, etc.) because they might not be as fast or they were TB1 only.
Maybe I should reconsider all options. Maybe TB2 is not something I should care too much about.
Hope this helps someone out. Also, thanks for any input.