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OWC Announces First Thunderbolt 3 Certified Bus-Powered Storage Enclosure
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TB3 supports 22 Gbps of PCIe traffic. The rest of the 40 Gbps is usable only by DisplayPort traffic. 22 Gbps = 2750 MB/s.
The OWC is too slow at 1500 MB/s. Maybe they are reporting write speed instead of read speed? Or maybe they're saving power by limited it to PCIe 2.0 x4 or PCIe 3.0 x2?
I'm currently using a Trebleet Thunderbolt 3 to NVMe enclosure as an eGPU (with Sapphire RX 580) connected to a Mac mini 2018. It does 1963 MB/s write and 2704 MB/s read (using CL!ng.app Memory Bandwidth benchmark).
The USB 3.1 gen 2 to NVMe enclosures I have (Plugable and Orico) allow up to 990 MB/s.
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Yes. But I got it working eventually... There are few guides on Youtube and/or the web if you Google. I don't remember exactly which method it was that I used, but it did involve using the WinToUSB software from a Bootcamp partition on my internal SSD.
Once it is set up it works great. I'm running it via USB-C on a Samsung T5. I'm sure it would be even better over a much faster TB3.
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I wish Apple still allowed for internal upgrades so things like this wouldn't be necessary. I'm also still mourning the vaporware that was the OWC DEC. I'm currently on a non-retina 2012 MBP with a 2TB internal SSD, and a 5TB internal regular hard drive. No way to get that kind of storage on modern Macs without dropping close to $5k.
You do know that Intel sold it's Modem business to Apple, right? So there are no "Intel radios" to use. And that Apple signed an agreement to use Qualcomm for the next iPhone.
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Well, Apple was a partner in developing Thunderbolt, so there's that. And Intel granted a royalty free license for Thunderbolt, so there's that. And USB4 standard includes Thunderbolt. So there's that ...
I agree with you that about ruining the look of the MacBook, but for an iMac that faces against the wall, I think this would be a great solution for a hidden drive.
It won't need to (specifically) if they (Apple) implement USB 4 and include the TB3 element, which I certainly imagine Apple would do.
Nobody says you have to affix it to your MacBook. Just, you know, connect as needed? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
SSDs I've used in these Thunderbolt 3 m.2 enclosures get extremely hot due to inadequate airflow. The first Thunderbolt 3 m.2 SSD enclosure with a fan (that doesn't make a racket) gets my buy. It's likely they throttle performance for this reason.M.2 NVMe SSDs are usually around 3,400MB/s for reads and 3,000MB/s for writes.
Shouldn't Thunderbolt 3 be able to reach those speeds?
Hell... you can now get USB 3.2 drives that are at least 1,000MB/s... so this Thunderbolt drive doesn't seem too impressive.
EDIT: And the user above me agrees!
This product sums up Timmy's Apple perfectly. Meanwhile, windows laptops give you a Native NVMe port internally, and many have a 2.5" bay in addition. Maybe the next MBP can have an external box for ram and a box for a GPU glued to the screen too.
The speed must be a price/speed tradeoff. That's a really cheap price point for that speed.
In fact, it's worth it to buy a Mac with the lowest-sized storage and use this OWC drive for everything, because it's just as fast, cheaper, and doesn't interact with the T2 chip.
In fact, it's worth it to buy a Mac with the lowest-sized storage and use this OWC drive for everything, because it's just as fast, cheaper, and doesn't interact with the T2 chip.
You do realize this is a sponsored post right? They are gaged about the downside.M.2 NVMe SSDs are usually around 3,400MB/s for reads and 3,000MB/s for writes.
Shouldn't Thunderbolt 3 be able to reach those speeds?
Hell... you can now get USB 3.2 drives that are at least 1,000MB/s... so this Thunderbolt drive doesn't seem too impressive.
EDIT: And the user above me agrees!
For at least some of us, an internal M2 slot wouldn't be as useful. I specifically use an external SSD so I can swap between computers with it.
That's not to say that modular SSDs in MBP's wouldn't be nice - it would of course, but its a different problem than what this type of device solves, for me at least.
There are numerous existing bus powered M2 TB3 cases. The "certification" seems to be all thats new but certified what? The others are already using Intel TB3 chips anyway.
Seems to me you should get PCIe 3.0 x4 for free with any Thunderbolt 3 controller. Is there a PCIe 3.0 x2 variety that is a lot cheaper?
That's cool. Makes my my perma-inserted SD card look really lame, but at least mine isn't visible.
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Look, I'm PO'd about the USB-C ports too. Docks for it don't tend to "just work," and the compatibility is confusing as heck, making the whole setup a lot more problem-prone than the 2015 MBP's ports. Maybe Jobs wouldn't have let it happen. Don't know, I'm not a spirit medium.
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Timmy's Apple as opposed to whose, Scully's? Jobs wasn't about internal expansion ports on laptops. The iMacs always only had a single SATA or IDE port.
Look, I'm PO'd about the USB-C ports too. Docks for it don't tend to "just work," and the compatibility is confusing as heck, making the whole setup a lot more problem-prone than the 2015 MBP's ports. Maybe Jobs wouldn't have let it happen. Don't know, I'm not a spirit medium.
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Oh man. I hope it was at least possible to open in case the disc inside broke, if it was an HDD.
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Speed on that can’t be great though? The last MacBook Pro with an SD slot had it wired via a usb2 bus.
The express card slot on 17” was good for an SSD. Did get mighty warm though.
Why not? You just download it... I mean the upgrade 😉My intel MBP isn’t going to magically upgrade itself to Apple Silicon.
Also not true. Several others also bus powered 40Gbps NVMe BYOD. The only unique “first” thing is their internal cable mechanism that makes it replaceable.
