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SSD Drive with Buffalo Ministation and Seagate GoFlex

M

md63

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jun 11, 2007
264
0
I've spent the last week trying to put together a portable SSD Thunderbolt drive with very limited success. I started with the Seagate GoFlex portable adapter and used the following drives. Later I purchased a Buffalo Ministation and tried a couple of the drives through the Buffalo. I hooked up the drives directly to my MBA as well as through a GoFlex adapter (Direct and Daisychanined).

OCZ Verte 3 (120GB) - Used on Seagate Adapters. Drive appeared to work in all configurations, however, the drive was slow (~195 MB/s read and write.) I say it was slow only because I'm seeing over 200MB/s from my Seagate Goflex desktop drive. I did not have the drive available when I purchased the buffalo enclosure.

Crucial M4 (256GB) - Nothing but problems. The drive kept disconnecting in most configurations and a call to Crucial did not help. When I was able to get a reading the speed was approximately 230 write, 350 read, however it was too unreliable to use.

OCZ Vertex 4 (256) - This drive is fasted 360MB/s in read and write, however, it appears very unstable and I constantly get disconnect messages when its connected directly to my MBA. When I connect through a daisy chain then it seems to work. It seems like a nice drive but not stable enough to rely on. Also, when using the Buffalo, the Vertex 4 did not get recognized when using the USB port.

Intel 520 (180GB) - This has been the most stable drive has not disconnected in any configuration. Speeds are 235 MB/s write and 360 MB/S read. The drive also works when using the Buffalo enclosure in USB mode.

I hope others find this information useful. I've decided to use the Buffalo thunderbolt enclosure and would be interested in hearing from anyone else who has had success in using SSD with this or the Seagate.
 
Thanks. I saw your original post which made me try the Buffalo. I like the drive and the fact that it comes with both Thunderbolt and USB 3.0. I'll look into the Corsair drive that you have used. Thanks
 
I got Buffalo MiniStation hd-patu3 and installed OWC 480GB Mercury EXTREME Pro 6G SSD. Connecting though Thunderbolt to my iMac is really fast but very unreliable, to the extend of being unusable. I end up using it as USB 2.0, and Mountain Lion upgrade did not help. Very sad because it seems like a great technology and it costs a lot of money, but Buffalo says it's Apple's fault, Apple says there is nothing wrong on their side and OWC does not help much neither.
 
Dimka said:
I got Buffalo MiniStation hd-patu3 and installed OWC 480GB Mercury EXTREME Pro 6G SSD. Connecting though Thunderbolt to my iMac is really fast but very unreliable, to the extend of being unusable. I end up using it as USB 2.0, and Mountain Lion upgrade did not help. Very sad because it seems like a great technology and it costs a lot of money, but Buffalo says it's Apple's fault, Apple says there is nothing wrong on their side and OWC does not help much neither.
Click to expand...

I've read on MR forums that larger capacity SSD's (over 256GB) caused problems with the Buffalo MiniStation. I had some success in running problematic drives through the Seagate Desk Adapter and then into the Buffalo. I ended up using an Intel 330 240GB drive which has been trouble free for several weeks.
 
Sounds like the Intel SSDs are the best for Ministation. Also seems like keeping at or below 256GB will be stable, maybe enclosures with separate power supply can handle larger drives but seems bus-powered can go beyond 256 or you start getting disconnections. Any one else have insights or recommendations?

I am planning on getting the 500 Ministation and replacing the drive with a Intel 520 or 330.
 
mario24601 said:
Sounds like the Intel SSDs are the best for Ministation. Also seems like keeping at or below 256GB will be stable, maybe enclosures with separate power supply can handle larger drives but seems bus-powered can go beyond 256 or you start getting disconnections. Any one else have insights or recommendations?

I am planning on getting the 500 Ministation and replacing the drive with a Intel 520 or 330.
Click to expand...

I have a Vertex 4 128GB SSD and SeaGate Thunderbolt adapter. No disconnects here, although sometimes my iMac will beep a couple of times (think clicking on iTunes when it is processing files "beep"). Not a big deal and doesn't happen every time, so I haven't really looked into what is causing it.
 
I have an OCZ Agility3 360GB running my iMac for a couple of months now with zero issues. I'm using the Seagate Thunderbolt GoFlex Desktop Adapter as it has it's own power supply which I assume is helping with the stability on the bigger drives. It doesn't bench as the fastest out there but it's substantially quicker than the internal drive in the real world. Cheers!

James
 
joudbren said:
I have an OCZ Agility3 360GB running my iMac for a couple of months now with zero issues. I'm using the Seagate Thunderbolt GoFlex Desktop Adapter as it has it's own power supply which I assume is helping with the stability on the bigger drives. It doesn't bench as the fastest out there but it's substantially quicker than the internal drive in the real world. Cheers!

James
Click to expand...

How are you attaching the SSD to the desktop adapter?
 
mario24601 said:
Sounds like the Intel SSDs are the best for Ministation. Also seems like keeping at or below 256GB will be stable, maybe enclosures with separate power supply can handle larger drives but seems bus-powered can go beyond 256 or you start getting disconnections. Any one else have insights or recommendations?

I am planning on getting the 500 Ministation and replacing the drive with a Intel 520 or 330.
Click to expand...

It sounds like 1 person has had rock solid TB connection using a 500Gb Samsung 840 SSD in Buffalo Ministation TB enclosure.
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1500388/

I would love to know if anyone has been using the new Samsung 840 Pro SSD (256Gb) in the Buffalo TB. The power consumption requirements seem lower than any of the other SSDs except maybe Intel 520 in some write tests.
 
Using Seagate Thunderbolt adapter STAE128 with ssds

I have a 27" iMac with two Thunderbolt inputs. I've been using the Seagate Thunderbolt adapter "STAE128 with two different ssd's. I have the Crucial M4 256GB and the Samsung 840 series 500GB. They are connected to the two Thunderbolt connectors on my iMac. I use the Crucial M4 256GB as my boot drive and application drive and I use the Samsung 840 series 500gb for my iPhoto Library (which is very large) and my documents. Everything else is kept on usb external drives. I've been using this configurations for about eight months now and have never had a boot problem or speed problem from either ssd.
If anyone has any questions just give me a yell.
 
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