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SSD of M4/M4 Pro Mac Mini
- Thread starter hajime
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You will have to wait until next week. They'll be plenty of articles and videos showing off benchmarks.
This. I have several of these, and it would be silly not to use them that's all. After all, that's sort of what I bought them for. Unsightly, yes.
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Thunderbolt4 isn't really a thing, it's effectively just shorthand for a port that is both USB4 and Thunderbolt3 compatible. USB4 is also electrically identical to Thunderbolt3.
The max speed of USB-C ports hasn't changed since 2016... because USB4 and Thunderbolt4 was just a bunch of rebranding and license changes(e.g. all TB3 cables are USB4 cables, all USB4 hubs are TB3 hubs, and all TB4 devices work at full speed on TB3 ports)
TB5 and USB4v2 are twice as fast as the old ports.
TB5 and USB4v2 are also the same thing except that the minimum requirements for a TB5 host are higher than a USB4v2 host computer. TB5 has a higher minimum bandwidth, more power required to be available for devices, and oddly USB4 doesn't require USB3 backwards compatibility where Thunderbolt does(both require USB2 compatibility).
USB4 is targeted as a cheaper version of Thunderbolt that is 99% compatible.
The USB consortium is also REALLY bad at naming ; I had hoped they would name the public successor of USB4 as USB5... but here we are... with USB4v2... just like with all those USB3 standards nobody understands(remember "USB 3.2 Gen 2x1" which is incompatible with "USB 3.2 Gen 1x2" even though they are both 10Gbit USB-C)
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except no one makes said enclosures yet and thunderbolt 4 enclosures are just finally getting more prevalent this year
How do you handle the external storage as it relates to MacOS? For example, do I need to move my Photos library to the external volume to have sufficient space on the internal SSD drive/volume?
That's what I do. I'm not a creative, so outside of Photo's/Videos, I could live off a 256 GB drive just fine, though I choose to go to 512. Regardless, my Photos library sits near a full terabyte at this point. I got a 2GB Sandisk USB-C SSD ($125) and have my Photo's library stored on said SSD.
Not only does this make it to where I don't have to pay ridiculous Apple upgrade charges for a larger SSD, but I now also have the benefit of all my photos and videos not being tied directly to my device in case of a catastrophic board failure.
If I didn't do this, I'd have to upgrade to a 2GB SSD for any computer I would buy, and that would cost me big time.
there's one
https://www.owc.com/solutions/envoy-ultra
and there's another one
https://www.newsshooter.com/2024/08...t-thunderbolt-5-external-ssd-drive-announced/
I discovered to my surprise a few years ago that even over a 5Gbps speed SSD, I was able to edit in Photos and Capture One Pro with few issues. I had a loaner 8GB M1 that didn't have space for the almost 1TB size of my photo libraries.
It was really eye opening how much I was able to do with such an under-powered setup.
TB3 enclosures are 100% the same as a TB4 enclosure except for the branding and have been around for almost a decade.
TB5 enclosures are already announced. https://www.ssi.com.tw/product/pcie-expansion/thunderbolt-5-pcie-gen4x4-expansion-enclosure
@Gabebear "TB3 enclosures are 100% the same as a TB4 enclosure..."
That's somewhat misleading.
There is no TB4 device enclosure controller chip, as Intel only makes a TB4 dock/hub controller chip.
That TB4 dock controller chip only allocates one lane of PCIe 3 (~800MB/s) to the NVMe slot (the rest are allocated to downstream TB4 hub ports etc).
So there can be TB4 enclosures (which are also docks/hubs) that are NVMe enclosures. but slower...
USB4 allows the full 40Gb/s (less some for alt-mode bandwidth) to NVMe and other device enclosures.
TB3's '40Gb'/s only has up to 22Gb/s allocated to storage data.
So enclosure manufacturers who are branding 'TB4' enclosures are either selling USB4 controller devices (TB3 compatible), or in the past have been selling TB3 controller devices with a USB 3.2 Gen 2 controller as well.
As usual with the USB-IF, clear as mud.
Edit: According to Linus (of LTT on YT) there are no fully functioning USB4 cables longer than 0.8 metres, only Intel certified active-TB4 ones work at longer lengths.
That's somewhat misleading.
There is no TB4 device enclosure controller chip, as Intel only makes a TB4 dock/hub controller chip.
That TB4 dock controller chip only allocates one lane of PCIe 3 (~800MB/s) to the NVMe slot (the rest are allocated to downstream TB4 hub ports etc).
So there can be TB4 enclosures (which are also docks/hubs) that are NVMe enclosures. but slower...
USB4 allows the full 40Gb/s (less some for alt-mode bandwidth) to NVMe and other device enclosures.
TB3's '40Gb'/s only has up to 22Gb/s allocated to storage data.
So enclosure manufacturers who are branding 'TB4' enclosures are either selling USB4 controller devices (TB3 compatible), or in the past have been selling TB3 controller devices with a USB 3.2 Gen 2 controller as well.
As usual with the USB-IF, clear as mud.
Edit: According to Linus (of LTT on YT) there are no fully functioning USB4 cables longer than 0.8 metres, only Intel certified active-TB4 ones work at longer lengths.
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I'm just talking about 40gbps enclosures. last year there were only like 2 on amazon when I went to buy one, this year there are more. Those TB5 enclosures aren't available yet and they look large and expensive
I had a ugreen 40gbps enclosure and it hit just over 3200 with a Hynix P31 2TB NVMe. Problem was the little PWM fan in it clicked and whined so returned it.
I have an acacis one with no fan that goes that fast. All my data is stored on it and it's been great. I don't know why slow sata drives still exist considering what this cost to put together with a wd black
I think you are confusing a few of things. The 22Gbps limit on Thunderbolt4 and Thunderbolt3 is for bridging PCIe. That limit is unchanged between TB3 and TB4 because the spec is identical for both. It comes from the fact that TB3 uses PCIe3x4 which is 32Gbps and reserve 10Gbps for USB(leaving 22Gbps). TB3 and TB4 can't use the faster PCIe4 specs because the official spec doesn't allow it.
USB4 can kinda do whatever because the spec doesn't disallow it. It's possible to use the new 64Gbps PCIe4x4 with USB4 if the host supports it and utilize more bandwidth... but I have no idea how many "USB4" ports would actually work with that. I would expect most USB4 hosts would just default back to PCIe3x4 and you'd get the same speed as TB3/TB4.
A USB4 enclosure using PCIe4x4 would not be able to be called a TB4 enclosure because it would be incompatible with a large number of TB4 hosts.
Hey man,
Neither of those are enclosures though, just external ssd’s. Sure a tB5 enclosure will be out soon. 😀
works great for my setup, plus has 2 usb a ports, 1 usb c and 2 DP ports.
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I agree with you, to a certain extent. But they are not the same at all. Yes they both reach 40Gps.
- There are three primary Thunderbolt 40Gb/s chipsets for external devices.
- Two of these chipsets are Thunderbolt 3, while one is Thunderbolt 4. The differences in Thunderbolt 3 and Thunderbolt 4 are reflected in these chipset designs and layouts as they apply to the different functions and capabilities all three uniquely support and enable.
- Thunderbolt 3 can be used to consume and distribute bandwidth, allowing it to be used in both docking and storage solutions.
- Thunderbolt 4 is rigidly designed to hub bandwidth. As a result, its primarily used in docks and hubs.
For instance, if you connect a Thunderbolt drive to a Thunderbolt 3 dock it will receive the same amount of bandwidth and thus reach the same potential read/write speeds as if you connected it to a Thunderbolt 4 dock―if you don’t connect anything else to the Thunderbolt 4 dock. More on that in a bit.
This common bandwidth rating is the primary contributor to confusion surrounding Thunderbolt 3 and Thunderbolt 4.
These bandwidth capabilities are unique to three Intel chipsets: Alpine Ridge, Titan Ridge, and Goshen Ridge. Alpine Ridge and Titan Ridge are Thunderbolt 3 chipsets and primarily differ in how they support video transmission and provide power to connected devices.
Goshen Ridge is Intel’s Thunderbolt 4 chipset. And though it supports 40Gbps of bandwidth like the Alpine Ridge and Titan Ridge chipsets that came before it, Intel developed Goshen Ridge not to improve performance over the Thunderbolt 3 chipsets, but to provide the ability to connect a greater number of Thunderbolt devices.
As a result, Thunderbolt 3 and Thunderbolt 4 differ greatly in how they allocate the 40Gbps of PCIe bandwidth available to them.
While Thunderbolt 3 devices can both consume data at Thunderbolt speeds and pass data downstream to a single additional Thunderbolt device at those same Thunderbolt speeds, Thunderbolt 4 can only pass data downstream. But thanks to that Goshen Ridge chipset design, Thunderbolt 4 can pass that data to as many as three devices.
Because Thunderbolt 4’s purpose was to add more available downstream Thunderbolt ports, the Thunderbolt 4 chipset layout is designed to hub and/or disperse that 40 Gbps of bandwidth traveling down the four PCIe Gen3 lanes. Unlike Thunderbolt 4, Thunderbolt 3’s chipset layout is designed to allow a Thunderbolt 3 device to consume bandwidth first.
While Thunderbolt 4 passes along most of its bandwidth to the other three Thunderbolt connections it supports, Thunderbolt 3 devices have a choice: they can pass that bandwidth along to the single additional Thunderbolt port, they can consume that bandwidth themselves, or both.
TB5 devices are not ready yet for primetime. But I agree art the true successor to TB3. TB4 is mostly aimed for enclosures and allow the full speed of 40Gbps to it's fullest. So they are not the same.
The TB part of TB3 and TB4 are very literally the same. TB4 made some optional stuff mandatory, but that’s it.
TB4 doesn’t support hubs very well, TB3/TB4 are designed for daisy chaining devices. TB4 now requires hosts to supports at least 4 ports in a hub, where TB3 hosts only required 3 ports. To support a bunch of devices on a single TB3/TB4 port you will always need to daisy-chain devices(this uses a 3-port TB hub). Many TB3/TB4 devices have two thunderbolt ports and it only matters which one you use if you want the port to supply power. These 2-port devices have an internal 3-port TB3/TB4 hub.
here’s a vid I watched the other day, if you want extra storage get a Thunderbolt 4 enclosure and put an NVMe SSD in it which is faster than the Internal SSD.Any new SSD benchmark info on m4 mini, especially 256GB vs 512GB?
I’m probably buying the base model (16GB / 256GB) but I hope to confirm the 256GB isn’t slower like it was on the m2 models.
Thanks