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Mini HDD question...

G

GBNova

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 19, 2009
118
47
I'm thinking of buying the mid tier mini with the 1TB 5400 drive to save a bit of cash. I was wondering if later on I wanted to buy a USB external SSD to run the OS and frequently used apps off of and use the internal HD for just file storage could I do that?
 
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GBNova said:
I'm thinking of buying the mid tier mini with the 1TB 5400 drive to save a bit of cash. I was wondering if later on I wanted to buy a USB external SSD to run the OS and frequently used apps off of and use the internal HD for just file storage could I do that?
Click to expand...

I'm running an SSD as a boot drive in an external USB 3.0 enclosure, and I'm getting both read and write speeds of about 430 MB/sec, which is 3 to 4 times what you would get with a HDD. Other forum members have gotten similar results with a quality SSD. So, based on my experience, the answer to your question is yes, and it works quite well.

https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/18546414/
 
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Thanks, I thought I had heard others doing it. The other option would be to replace the internal drive which I would rather not have to do. OR, just spend $200 more up front and get a fusion drive. I currently use a 5400 rpm drive on my windows 7 machine and I'm not bothered by the speed.
 
GBNova said:
Thanks, I thought I had heard others doing it. The other option would be to replace the internal drive which I would rather not have to do. OR, just spend $200 more up front and get a fusion drive. I currently use a 5400 rpm drive on my windows 7 machine and I'm not bothered by the speed.
Click to expand...

Why not use the Thunderbolt port instead of the USB port?
 
jwp2222 said:
Running off of the USB would be too slow. You can do a bit of work inside the Mac Mini yourself if you feel comfortable with such things: https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Mac+Mini+Late+2014+Teardown/30410
Click to expand...

Putting an SSD in the SATA bay is still quite difficult, and PCIe SSDs are still very expensive. If the OP doesn't want to deal with these hassles, then an external over USB 3 should work just fine.

ixxx69 said:
If you're truly not bothered by the HDD speed on W7, you won't be bothered by it on OS X. But I think that's a case of "Ignorance is bliss". ;)
Click to expand...

Exactly. Even the 7200 RPM in a 2010 iMac is noticeably slow to me, but that is mainly due to the fact I use SSDs every day. Coming from a mini with a 5400 RPM it would seem quite fast.
 
Well I went for the i5 2.6gz, 8mb ram mini with the 1TB 5400. If I find it's too slow I'll either take it back or attach an SSD external to it. I could have managed the 256mb SSD version of the mini, but that was $220 more and I probably wouldn't have had enough space and would have been left buying an external anyway.
 
GBNova said:
Well I went for the i5 2.6gz, 8mb ram mini with the 1TB 5400. If I find it's too slow I'll either take it back or attach an SSD external to it. I could have managed the 256mb SSD version of the mini, but that was $220 more and I probably wouldn't have had enough space and would have been left buying an external anyway.
Click to expand...

Better to have an internal SSD + external storage than external SSD + internal storage.

At least you get pure speed and TRIM support with the former.
 
jwp wrote above:
[[ Running off of the USB would be too slow. ]]

This is nonsense, pure nonsense.

There is nothing "slow" about running a Mini via an SSD mounted in an external USB3 enclosure or USB3/SATA docking station. Granted, 430mbps read speeds do not match the 730mbps (or so) speed of a "blade" type SSD mounted internally. But 430mbps is a world apart from the speeds you'll see of a 5400rpm HDD internal drive.

Attached below are the speeds I get on mine (Crucial m500 mounted in a plugable.com USB3/SATA docking station. System has been up and running this way since March 2014):

Also -- from others' postings here, it looks downright easy to add a "blade" SSD to a 2014 Mini, IF you have both the blade AND the proper ribbon cable/mounting platform parts. The ribbon can be "detached" from the mounting platform and re-located into the Mini with minimal fuss and bother...
 

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GBNova said:
Thanks, I thought I had heard others doing it. The other option would be to replace the internal drive which I would rather not have to do. OR, just spend $200 more up front and get a fusion drive. I currently use a 5400 rpm drive on my windows 7 machine and I'm not bothered by the speed.
Click to expand...

You can also buy the PCIE cable (applecomponents) for about $40 and get a Apple blade PCIE SSD from ebay when you are ready. This requires almost no tear down (other than removing the base plate) to put in and will allow you to keep your hard drive for data. There's a whole thread on it.... It isn't much cheaper than buying a Fusion drive from Apple at the get go, but at least it gives you some flexibility with your cash flow (i.e. you don't have to buy it up front).
 
paulrbeers said:
You can also buy the PCIE cable (applecomponents) for about $40 and get a Apple blade PCIE SSD from ebay when you are ready. This requires almost no tear down (other than removing the base plate) to put in and will allow you to keep your hard drive for data. There's a whole thread on it.... It isn't much cheaper than buying a Fusion drive from Apple at the get go, but at least it gives you some flexibility with your cash flow (i.e. you don't have to buy it up front).
Click to expand...

Thanks guys.

I thought you had to take everything out of the mini to get to the HDD? Or are you saying would just need to take the base plate off to connect the cable and the SSD would still sit outside the mini?
 
GBNova said:
Thanks guys.

I thought you had to take everything out of the mini to get to the HDD? Or are you saying would just need to take the base plate off to connect the cable and the SSD would still sit outside the mini?
Click to expand...

NOT if you are adding a PCIE. The PCIE sits "under" the hard drive (which when you take the plate off it is right in front of you). Go to iFixit and you can see the tear down and where the PCIE blade sits.

Now if you want to replace the mechanical drive with an SSD, then yes you have to tear the whole thing apart.
 
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