Drive Enclosure for Late 2012 Mac Mini running Mavericks

[ColdCase]

Now for something different.... Just checking in for vintage Mini external drive enclosure options. I run Mavericks (10.9) on a late 2012 Mac Mini. It has a TB2 and firewire port and a couple USB ports. For convenience, I use a five disk TB2 enclosure for 3.5 inch drives that I want to be prepared to replace. But I don’t see new TB2 compatible multi drive enclosures available now days. I've read that TB2 host to TB3 enclosure adapters need Sierra to work.

From what I’ve read, multi drive USB enclosures seem to hiccup when multiple drives are accessed at the same time. I could always revert to stacking up multiple USB enclosures, or the used enclosure market. But what have I missed.

 

[jackerin]

Unless you need the fastest interface I'd look into a NAS solution.

I ran a 2-bay WD TB2 for a long time but retired it when moving to a 2018 mini. I've moved enough data between harddrives during system upgrades that it just started making more sense to have something not tied to a specific host.

 

[DeltaMac]

Your 2012 Mac mini has TB1, not TB2. Connections are interchangeable, but TB2 is capable of double the bandwidth/speed, up to 20 Gbit/sec. Your 2012 mini is limited to 10 Gbit/sec on the TB1 bus.
If a TB2 to TB3 works to allow you to use an external TB3 device, you won't get the full performance from that external drive, because it will be limited by the TB1 port.