Having bought a 2018 Mini a few months' back, I was looking for an external drive that offered higher performance than what is achieved with USB3 external SSDs.
A USB3 SSD will generally yield reads in the 420-430mbps range, with writes usually 300-380mbps (writes vary considerably depending on drive make, model and size).
For the fastest external SSD possible there is the Samsung X5 thunderbolt3 drive, but they're quite pricey yet, more than I cared to spend (and more than I needed).
So... as a "compromise" between speed and price, I decided to put together a USB3.1 gen2 drive, since there are few (any?) pre-assembled USB3.1 gen2 drives out there yet.
I used a Crucial nvme 500gb blade drive:
https://www.amazon.com/Crucial-500G...+nvme+m.2&qid=1550413985&s=electronics&sr=1-6
... and an Orico enclosure:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B...scom&camp=1789&creative=9325&m=A2S4EXOOJ8Z82D
The enclosure:
Disassembled, it looks like this:
Here's the drive as it comes out of the package:
The drive mounts to the controller board, and is secured with a retainer and screw:
The case cover slides on and is intended to be secured with a screw. But since the cover stays in place nicely by itself, I left the screw in the box for now.
Disk Utility saw the drive and I initialized it to Mac OS extended with journaling enabled, GUID partition format.
Then I ran a speed test with AJA System Test Lite:
I discovered that the enclosure/drive I have runs quite warm, even when "just idling" (connected with no data moving in either direction).
The Orrico case doesn't have "vents" on the side, although it has what look to be heat-transferring pads on the top inside and bottom inside of the case. Although not so hot you can't grab it and hold it, it still gets pretty warm.
Conclusion:
It's okay, quite speedy, and cost me about $92 (I used some amazon credits, and there was also sales tax). In comparison, a 500gb Samsung X5 runs about $202 on amazon.
This will probably become the "primary backup drive" for the Mini, which has a 500gb SSD inside.
As such, it will only be run to create/maintain the backup, and occasionally now and then when I need to "boot externally" for this reason or that.
I'm wondering if the USB3.1 gen2 nvme enclosures "with vents" would deal with heat any better. They'll probably get quite warm as well. Since the drive heats up even "at idle", this may be coming from either the drive itself, the controller board, or both.
One other thing:
The Orico enclosure came with two connecting cables:
- USBc to USBc
- USBc to USBa
The USBc cable works as intended, yielding high speed performance.
But the USBc to USBa cable seemed no good at all, giving only about 40mbps. So I wouldn't use that one!
A USB3 SSD will generally yield reads in the 420-430mbps range, with writes usually 300-380mbps (writes vary considerably depending on drive make, model and size).
For the fastest external SSD possible there is the Samsung X5 thunderbolt3 drive, but they're quite pricey yet, more than I cared to spend (and more than I needed).
So... as a "compromise" between speed and price, I decided to put together a USB3.1 gen2 drive, since there are few (any?) pre-assembled USB3.1 gen2 drives out there yet.
I used a Crucial nvme 500gb blade drive:
https://www.amazon.com/Crucial-500G...+nvme+m.2&qid=1550413985&s=electronics&sr=1-6
... and an Orico enclosure:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B...scom&camp=1789&creative=9325&m=A2S4EXOOJ8Z82D
The enclosure:
Disassembled, it looks like this:
Here's the drive as it comes out of the package:
The drive mounts to the controller board, and is secured with a retainer and screw:
The case cover slides on and is intended to be secured with a screw. But since the cover stays in place nicely by itself, I left the screw in the box for now.
Disk Utility saw the drive and I initialized it to Mac OS extended with journaling enabled, GUID partition format.
Then I ran a speed test with AJA System Test Lite:
I discovered that the enclosure/drive I have runs quite warm, even when "just idling" (connected with no data moving in either direction).
The Orrico case doesn't have "vents" on the side, although it has what look to be heat-transferring pads on the top inside and bottom inside of the case. Although not so hot you can't grab it and hold it, it still gets pretty warm.
Conclusion:
It's okay, quite speedy, and cost me about $92 (I used some amazon credits, and there was also sales tax). In comparison, a 500gb Samsung X5 runs about $202 on amazon.
This will probably become the "primary backup drive" for the Mini, which has a 500gb SSD inside.
As such, it will only be run to create/maintain the backup, and occasionally now and then when I need to "boot externally" for this reason or that.
I'm wondering if the USB3.1 gen2 nvme enclosures "with vents" would deal with heat any better. They'll probably get quite warm as well. Since the drive heats up even "at idle", this may be coming from either the drive itself, the controller board, or both.
One other thing:
The Orico enclosure came with two connecting cables:
- USBc to USBc
- USBc to USBa
The USBc cable works as intended, yielding high speed performance.
But the USBc to USBa cable seemed no good at all, giving only about 40mbps. So I wouldn't use that one!
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