Running Ventura on thunderbolt SSD drive with M1 mini

[VitoBotta]

I have an M1 mini with just 256GB of internal storage since I spent more on memory when I bought it. That's nowhere near enough for me so I have a Samsung X5 (on Thunderbolt) with a capacity of 1TB and a Samsung T5 (USB3) also of 1TB. Until now I was using the internal storage for the OS, the X5 for the most important data and the T5 for unimportant stuff. I have been running with this setup for a while because I have always read that it is not possible to set up macOS on an external drive with M1 minis. And I often ran into issues with the intenral storage not being enough due to the stuff I need to run as some things don't work properly if not on the OS drive.

I should have ignored those people because yesterday I decided to try and now I have Ventura installed on the X5 and it works just beautifully and I no longer have to worry about storage on the main drive. I don't understand why so many people spread misinformation.

So if you are wondering if you can run Ventura out of an external drive with an M1, the answer is a solid yes.

 

[Fishrrman]

Just wondering...

Have you tried doing an OS update while booted from the external drive?

With the bootable clone drive I have, creating the original clone seems to "lock in" the sealed system volume, which cannot be updated through software update afterwards..

 

[thebart]

I don't think i would do this since the internal drive is faster than any external, but it's good to know it's possible

 

[VitoBotta]

Just wondering...

Have you tried doing an OS update while booted from the external drive?

With the bootable clone drive I have, creating the original clone seems to "lock in" the sealed system volume, which cannot be updated through software update afterwards..

I haven't tried with a clone. I guess macOS does "something" on the main drive that explains if booting from a clone doesn't work. Not sure

I don't think i would do this since the internal drive is faster than any external, but it's good to know it's possible

There is a difference: my 256GB internal drive is supposed to reach 3.4GB/sec while the Samsung X5 I use now as root drive can reach 2.8GB/sec in reads and 2.3GB/sec in writes. But the Samsung X5 is still plenty fast, who can really notice the difference in normal usage? I am not noticing any real difference in day to day use as a developer.