Please help choose M.2 NVMe 4.0 4TB SSD

[rjalex]

Dear friend,
I want to assemble a 4TB NVMe 4.0 to host my Documents folder and music production libraries and project for both my M1 Mini and my M2 Macbook Pro.

After a lot of reading I would be inclined to use this Acasis TBU405PRO enclosure at 160 euros.

Can anyone help me decide amongst the following 4 SSD drives? They look similar to my untrained eyes but there's a 100 euro difference between the first and last in terms of price.

Of course I need them to be dependable since they will be storing my documents and projects. Here they are:

Samsung 990 Pro 4TB - 339E
WD Black SN850X 4TB - 304E
Crucial P3 Plus 4 TB - 260E
Lexar NM790 4TB - 230E

There's a mention of the memory cell technology and bit storage stuff which I really don't understand.

Of course I'd go with the least expensive if it had the same reliability and nearly the same speed in that enclosure but these are the most important criteria.

 

[Ifti]

I have personal experience with the WD SN850X drives - although in the 2TB variation - great drive. Speedy. Never had any issues with them.
I have just last week installed a Samsung 990 4TB drive into my OWC Express 1M2 enclosure - no issues so far and its very fast (link in sig to review).

I would go for either of the above - whichever you can get cheaper!

Although Ive never used one, the Seagate Firecuda 530 series is meant to be a great drive too......

EDIT : Looking at your enclosure, I would consider the OWC Express 1M2 as well - no fan, no noise, super large heatsink, and super fast speeds thanks to that ASMedia chipset!

 

[rjalex]

Thank you. As you suggest I have ended up with the WD SN850X 2TB chip. It lives in a Ziketech Z666 enclosure and is faster than my Mac's Mini (M1 2020) internal SSD as reported by the blackmagic test It runs quite cool with a SMART reported temperature of 41 degC.

I am struggling a bit with apparently random disconnects of this assembly though.

Troubleshooting with Apple including fresh Sonoma install did not change things.

New cable still the same (boy how much does the cable change the speeds!!!).

Now it's almost 32 hours since the last disconnect. Cross fingers.

 

[chars1ub0w]

I have the Lexar 4TB with the Zike enclosure. It runs hot for me. But it's very fast. https://sandiway.arizona.edu/lexar/index.html

 

[rjalex]

• Do you ever experience unwanted disconnects?
• What cable are you using?
• To what port did you connect it?
• What type of Mac are you using?
  • Apple Silicon or Intel?
  • MacOS Version?
• Other external SSDs?

Thanks a lot.

 

[Ifti]

I had disconnects with one drive a year or so ago now - it came down to the actual cable in the back of the drive that was very flakey - the slightest movement and it would disconnect - very frustrating when trying to edit a video!
I replaced the cable with a longer one and it was fine after that.

 

[rjalex]

I changed two cables and it's still disconecting Thank you