Just realized you pay 460 EUR per TB when you upgrade the mini to 1 TB in the EU store. That's three times the price for a comparable high end NVMe stick from Samsung.
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New 256GB Mac Mini and 512GB MacBook Pro Have Slower SSD Speeds Than Previous Models
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You can easily take that Samsung stick, put it in a 10gbps, 20gbps, or 40gbps enclosure, and use it with your Mac. Not a problem at all!
How to start up your M1 or M2 Mac from an external drive
Need to boot your M-series Mac with an external drive? It's not as easy as it used to be, as it likely requires you purchase new hardware.
www.macworld.com
You see malice behind every bush apparently. I read the page you linked and it conveys nothing to controvert what I said. Sorry your feelings are so brittle.
Another timely, well balanced Mac Mini M2 / Mac Mini M2 Pro review by Dave2D who addresses the slower 256GB SSD speed issue. He deals primarily with the base Mac Mini M2 model, but he does mention the 1,500 MB/s slower SSD speed. Presented to balance views of those like myself who are more Pro users of the Mac Mini, and who have a need for SSD speed:
Wait so is 512gb also slower than 1TB for Mac Mini? I guess fastest would be using 4 NAND chips right?
Sure. But I would prefer to have it inside the case. Also, the non-Pro has only two Thunderbolt ports. If you hook up a monitor you're already out of TB ports.
You are correct when it comes to the Mac Mini M2 Pro 512GB vs. the Mac Mini M2 Pro 1TB model. There is an opinion that on the regular Mac Mini M2 (non Pro) model that anything 512GB or above (1 TB or 2TB) may suffer from the 3,000 MB/s SSD speed limitation, while the Pro versions of the Mac Mini M2 Pro at 1TB or above have 4 or more SSD nand chips, so they can run at the full 6000 MB/s SSD read and write speeds.
Mac Mini M2 (non Pro) at 256GB SSD is about 1,500 MB/s. (1 x 256GB SSD nand chip)
Mac Mini M2 (non Pro) at 512GB SSD is about 3,000 MB/s. (2 x 256GB SSD nand chip)
Mac Mini M2 (non Pro) at 1TB or 2TB SSD *MAY BE* about 3,000 MB/s. (This needs to be confirmed.)
Mac Mini M2 Pro at 512GB SSD is about 3,000 MB/s. (2 x 256GB SSD nand chip)
Mac Mini M2 Pro at 1TB SSD is about 6,000 MB/s. (4 x 256GB SSD nand chip)
Mac Mini M2 Pro at 2TB, 4TB, or 8TB SSD is about 6,000 MB/s. (This needs to be confirmed.)
14" MacBook M2 Pro with 512GB SSD is about 3,000 MB/s. (1 X 512GB SSD nand chip)
14" MacBook M2 Pro with 1TB SSD is about 6,000 MB/s. (2 X 512GB SSD nand chip)
14" MacBook M2 Max with 512GB SSD is about 3,000 MB/s. (1 X 512GB SSD nand chip)
14" MacBook M2 Max with 1TB SSD is about 6,000 MB/s. (2 X 512GB SSD nand chip)
Other M2 Pro chip configs larger than 1TB for Mac Mini M2 Pro and 14" and 16" MacBook Pro machines should be at least 6,000 MB/s (with varying number of SSD chips.) The only real unknown is with the regular Mac Mini M2 (non Pro) model upgraded to a 1TB or 2TB SSD drive. Some say it will be limited to 3,000 MB/s due to PCI bus limitations that the M2 chips have, but which the M2 Pro models do not have. Time will tell. Hope this helps!
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Here's Samsung's 980 & 980 Pro SSD brochure/spec sheet:
https://semiconductor.samsung.com/resources/brochure/980_Series_Brochure.pdf
It's no surprise the lower capacity drives are slower. Why is this news surprising? This is simply how SSDs work if you cannot parallel path with multiple chips. With that said this is explicitly specced because this is an SSD product. Apple does not provide specs on its SSD performance. With that said 1500 MB/sec is faster than 99.99% of Mac Mini users will care about
https://semiconductor.samsung.com/resources/brochure/980_Series_Brochure.pdf
It's no surprise the lower capacity drives are slower. Why is this news surprising? This is simply how SSDs work if you cannot parallel path with multiple chips. With that said this is explicitly specced because this is an SSD product. Apple does not provide specs on its SSD performance. With that said 1500 MB/sec is faster than 99.99% of Mac Mini users will care about
To me, it feels like you’re the one being dishonest in your argument. There was a very complete answer as to why a company might decide not to bind themselves to very specific specs simply to take into account adjustment to supply chain and to reflect the frequent need for multiple design iterations throughout the life cycle of a product and you completely disregarded it as:"it doesn’t explain.”
I also feel it’s a misrepresentation to consider this thread as a “simple consumer” consideration. Simple consumers don’t care, as much, about SSD exact speed. If I were to go into my office cafeteria and ask what they thought of the SSD read/write speed of a product, I’d be met with blank stares and some might think I’m “having a moment.” Truth is, this site isn’t geared towards “simple consumers,” but more towards “enthusiasts.” I still value those specs and I still like to know those things when I make up my mind about a purchase, but every company has to draw a line as to how deep they’re willing to go into their spec description and deciding to refrain from going into specs that could be misinterpreted or tricky to understand, for the average consumer, seems to be a safe choice.
If I’m being completely honest, although I consider myself an enthusiast, my understanding of the real impact of a 1,500 MB/s vs. a 3,000 MB/s architecture comes from people who took the time to do real life testing and document their results. My metric to those things is really just: “how long does it take me to do…” and “is this faster than that?” I don’t care that much about some numbers generated by a tool specifically made to test very specific aspects of a component. And that, to me, is an indication that having SSD speed on the product description would most likely simply bring a risk of confusion. We have to remind ourselves where the industry came from… Not so long ago, there was this number (GHz) that the whole industry revolved around but was, in many ways, misleading and not that meaningful. I’m glad we moved away from very specific specs and more towards the overall performance of a product.
Oh interesting. Why is the non-pro limited to 3000 MB/sec? That's just how the SoC is designed?
See my previous post to you on this thread. Yes, it is believe to be a M2 chip limitation that does not exist on the M2 Pro chip.
It appears the 14" and 16" MacBook M2 Pro models have 4 total SSD nand chip slots, and the Mac Mini M2 Pro has 8 total SSD nand chip slots. That is why the Mac Mini M2 Pro uses 256GB SSD chips to fill the slots (for sure up to 1TB with 4 chips) and the 14" MacBook M2 Pro (and perhaps the 14" MacBook Pro M2 Max models) use 512GB SSD chips to fill their slots (likely for up to 2TB.) Above those sizes, and for the Mac Mini M2 (non Pro) larger SSD models we do not currently know.
OH wow thank you. This is very helpful. Somehow 1x SSD NAND chip on MBPs are faster (3000 MB/s vs 1500 MB/s) than 1x SSD on Mac Mini?
That is what is appears like. The 512GB appear to be double the 256GB SSD chip speeds from various benchmarks on YouTube.
He didn't demonstrate anything he said. He just said cache over and over. That's the tell or something.
Since we are discussing the slower SSD speeds on the Mac Mini M2 Pro, I just got this in my email from Costco Online Store where they are blowing out the prices on the M1 Max Studio 512GB SSD model that is normally $1,999 retail priced elsewhere, for only $1,699.99! This may be of interest to anyone worried about the slower Mac Mini M2 or Mac Mini M2 Pro SSD drives, and for a bit more than the Mac Mini M1 Pro who wants a M1 Max Mac Studio instead for a much better price with more ports, more GPU cores, and an included 10 GB Ethernet port. (Valid 1/25/23 through 1/31/23. While supplies last.) Costco Online Only! Do you think they are draining inventory to get ready for the Mac Studio M2 Max and/or M2 Ultra Studio models?
What is it with the car analogies? The wheels for the Mac mini haven’t even been announced yet!
I’m wondering about this. From the pics we’ve seen, the M2 Pro mini’s logic board has room for 8 NAND chips, to support up to 8TB. Will the throughput go up to 12,000MB/s with 8 chips, or is 6,000MB/s the ceiling for the chipset?
I have not heard anything about greater than 6,000 MB/s on a M2 Pro chip Mac, perhaps the M2 Max can go a bit higher with 8TB. Does anyone have a 2TB, 4TB, or 8TB Mac Mini M2 Pro until to test with. If so, please post SSD disk speed results for all of us. Thanks.
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