Apple Studio Display, external SSDs, and 2 Macs

[roguefury]

After giving it a lot of thought, I decided to buy the ASD. I’ll post a thread on that adventure later - managed to pay a lot less than I anticipated - but I love it!

I have one question, challenge. A primary reason for me to get the ASD was to simplify my setup for using 2 computers. Computer one is a MacBook Pro, last Intel
Model, and is a work issued machine. Computer two is a new MBA, fully loaded and personal.

The upside of the ASD is the single cord power & connectivity. For computer 2, I have 2 SSDs setup for carbon copy cloner and Time Machine. Connecting these drives to the ASD is great, and clean.

The problem/challenge is that I don't want to connect the SSDs to computer 1 when I switch the connection over to a work laptop.

How can I prevent the external drives from mounting on computer 1?

If they have to mount, how can I password protect them so they aren't searchable on computer 1?

Generally speaking there's personal content that I do not wish to expose to a work laptop.

Any thoughts on how to handle this situation?

 

[xraydoc]

After giving it a lot of thought, I decided to buy the ASD. I’ll post a thread on that adventure later - managed to pay a lot less than I anticipated - but I love it!

I have one question, challenge. A primary reason for me to get the ASD was to simplify my setup for using 2 computers. Computer one is a MacBook Pro, last Intel
Model, and is a work issued machine. Computer two is a new MBA, fully loaded and personal.

The upside of the ASD is the single cord power & connectivity. For computer 2, I have 2 SSDs setup for carbon copy cloner and Time Machine. Connecting these drives to the ASD is great, and clean.

The problem/challenge is that I don't want to connect the SSDs to computer 1 when I switch the connection over to a work laptop.

How can I prevent the external drives from mounting on computer 1?

If they have to mount, how can I password protect them so they aren't searchable on computer 1?

Generally speaking there's personal content that I do not wish to expose to a work laptop.

Any thoughts on how to handle this situation?

I can't think of a simple solution, not if the drives are plugged into the back of the Studio Display.

Easiest solution would be to plug the drives in to a hub and plug that hub only into the proper laptop. Won't be a single-cable connection any more, but there's no other good way to stop a drive from being mounted upon plugging it in. Not unless you eject the drives immediately after they mount on the work computer.

This isn't specific to the Studio Display, of course. If you had drives connected to the USB ports of any monitor, you'd be facing the same situation upon plugging that monitor into a second computer.

You may want to consider a monitor that has a separate HDMI or DisplayPort connection for the work computer instead of the Studio Display. If that's a critical feature for you, then the Studio Display may not meet your needs. Apple's external monitors have never had a second set of inputs.

 

[roguefury]

Thanks for the feedback. I figured as much. I already have, and love the ASD, so I'll take a look at an approach where I connect and disconnect the drives through a hub.