Thunderbolt 2 drive options?

[seeth]

My son has the last MacBook Pro 15" model with the thunderbolt 2 ports.

He's looking to expand his storage past the 512GB SSD so he can install Windows via bootcamp (the FPGA programming board he just got doesn't have a Mac compatible development kit).

Most of the world seems to have moved on to thunderbolt 3. Looks like I can get a thunderbolt 2 M/M cable (approximately $35), a thunderbolt 2 to thunderbolt 3 adapter (approximately $45), and some kind of thunderbolt 3 to SATA drive adapter ($20 to $70). He has a 750GB SATA drive (not SSD) from another computer that he can use.

Is this the best that I can do? I'm concerned about price and complexity.

Thanks!

 

[cyclingplatypus]

I bought an empty Lacie Rugged Thunderbolt enclosure and dropped an SSD in it, works like a charm.

 

[ZapNZs]

IMHO, a better investment is a USB enclosure + a SSD if a very affordable Thunderbolt option is not available. For the money you are considering to spend just to utilize a vanilla HDD, this would be sufficient to purchase a good USB enclosure + a 256 GB Samsung 850 EVO SSD. This will be many, many, many times more enjoyable to run an OS off of than on a HDD.

For a single SATA drive (HDD or SSD), the cost of Thunderbolt is not justifiable IMO, because you won't get working speeds much different than you will from a USB-A 3.1 gen 1 enclosure with a decent chipset (which is like $20.) The exceptions would be if you are running a RAID setup that allows higher speeds (ex: 0, 5, 6), wish to daisychain, are using PCIe SSDs, are having issues with USB 3.1 interfering with 2.4 GHz wifi signals, or absolutely must have TRIM.

 

[seeth]

Thanks all. Looks like an external USB drive is the way to go.

 

[Wackery]

Thanks all. Looks like an external USB drive is the way to go.

go for a LaCie rugged thunderbolt SSD, trust me you won't regret it

 

[hfg]

go for a LaCie rugged thunderbolt SSD, trust me you won't regret it

You can often find these refurbished with an enclosed hard disk very cheap ... it is easy to open them up and swap the hard drive for a SSD and end up with a really nice Thunderbolt bus powered SSD drive.

 

[SaSaSushi]

I've been using a Delock 42510 enclosure with a Samsung EVO SSD for years and can recommend it highly. I used to use it to boot my Late 2013 iMac and now it's dedicated to BootCamp.

It's a really well-made piece of hardware.

One caveat: This particular model is not bus-powered. The Lacie option above is best if you require bus-power. Sadly, Delock seems to have discontinued their bus-powered model for some reason.