Sharing HDDs between two Macs via Thunderbolt 3 dock — not possible?

[wills11]

Hope this isn't a dumb question...

But I have a number of USB and TB3 HDDs attached to my iMac—and I would love to be able to plug in my MacBook Pro and be able to access them simultaneously. The better TB3 docks have 2 TB3 inputs, one for the computer and the other "downstream", and I had thought/hoped that connecting one to my MacBook and the other to my iMac would allow both to use the HDDs—but I've been told that's not the case.

Is there any way to have two computers simultaneously connected to two HDDs (other than by network share)? It would be a bonus to have them both be able to use my scanner and even external monitor, as well.

Thanks in advance!

 

[ght56]

It is not possible to have more than one host at the same time. However, you can accomplish this with NAS and you can get pretty reasonable working speeds from NAS. With the docks, the downstream port is not another input but rather it is an 'output'. The upstream port goes to the host device, whereas downstream ports go to peripherals. You can also potentially use some USB switching devices for your displays and scanner but it would not allow simultaneous access.

This would get you simultaneous HDD access across multiple devices.

 

[justashooter]

Nope. Network sharing is the only way to get simultaneously access. I would plug them in to the computer where the speed of thunderbolt is usefull, such as if you use the iMac to edit video, etc., and access the drive via network from the second computer.

 

[wills11]

Thanks to you both! I was thinking it might be possible to use IP over Thunderbolt to network my MacBook Pro to my iMac, then share an external SSD that's attached to the iMac. Wouldn't that theoretically connect my MacBook to the SSD at Thunderbolt speed? I saw this (possibly dated) article, that seems to suggest that the speeds on the Mac directly attached to and sharing the drive would only be a bit faster than those on the Mac using the shared drive:

https://www.macworld.com/article/2142073/connecting-two-macs-using-thunderbolt.html

I appreciate the Synology suggestion, and have also heard they're terrific, but since I don't have this need all that often and have substantial DAS, I really don't want to lay out a significant amount of money on a NAS.

And I'd prefer to simply use a short TB3 cable to connect them as opposed to running another (quite long) ethernet cable to my desk and using a TB3-Ethernet adapter on the MacBook.

I guess the next step would be to try the IP over TB3 setup—the reason I'm researching this thoroughly is that, to do so, I'll really need to buy a TB3 dock as the two ports on the iMac are full up.

Appreciatively,

Wm

 

[IowaLynn]

Files not to have a way to set a flag to know if another user has accessed or modified a file. Before anything can be written out. Extra overhead.

Your own personal local cloud.