SSD for i5 Mini

[sfphoto]

In shopping for an SSD for a 2011/12 Mini should I assume that a drive offering 550MB/s is fine?

Not sure how fast these model Mini's can handle.

 

[Che Castro]

Yes I had a 500gb SSD on 2012 Mac mini since 2015 still going strong
I would recommend getting a 2tb or 1tb if you can afford it

 

[Boyd01]

I think the OP is asking about the read/write speed of the SSD and not the capacity. But yes, that is about as fast as the interface on these old Macs can handle. I have a 2012 i7 2.6ghz quad Mini with an original Apple internal 256gb SSD. This is how it clocks.

 

[T'hain Esh Kelch]

The best it can do is SATA3, which tops out at around 600 MB/s theoretically. There's a little bit to gain on random read/write speeds, if you buy more expensive ones, but don't expect much in real life results.

 

[Fishrrman]

For a 2011 ... any SSD you put in there will be fine.

 

[Boyd01]

don't expect much in real life results.

The 2011 Mini doesn't have USB3 IIRC, but the 2012 does. I booted that same Mini with Catalina on an external USB3 Samsung T3 SSD and used it pretty heavily with Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro for awhile. I didn't notice much, if any, difference, although it did take about 30 seconds longer to boot. On a 2012 Mini, the external SSD made more sense to me. I didn't want to take it apart and an external SSD is a good thing to have for other things in the future.

 

[sfphoto]

Thanks much everyone.