Hey, thanks for this test! I have a Mac Studio myself and use an OWC Thunderbolt with 4 TB, which gives excellent results. But I need another fast 4TB and had the same plan as you. 2 x 2TB nvme are cheaper in USB-C gen 2 enclosures than a 4TB nvme in a Thunderbolt enclosure. And around 1500 for read and write is enough for me. In fact, I was wondering if I could achieve Raid 0 at the double speed with 2 external USB-C 3.2 gen2 with nvme drives on the front USB-C ports of the Mac Studio. I had already tried it with 2 old Sata SSDs in USB 3.0 cases and they were with about 730 read speed as fast as on the two USB-A ports. Interestingly, these two, connected to the Thunderbolt ports only came to about 650 read as Raid 0. So there they were actually significantly slower. I also have an OWC Mercury Elite Mini and ran that as Raid 0 on the USB-C and Thunderbolt ports, via a one USB-C cable, and got the same result. It was slower on the Thunderbolt port - 720 vs 630. Sata SSD individually via USB 3.0 enclosure manages about 380 - 410 read speed. With the OWC Mercury Elite (this is a dual USB-C 3.2 gen 2 SATA enclosure) on the front USB-C ports 510 read speed. So I'm surprised that your test with the two external USB-C 3.2 gen2 as Raid 0 on the Thunderbolt ports gave the result I would have expected from the front USB-C ports. That's a bit crazy, but due to the higher speed of the nvme drives the results on the Thunderbolt ports are as expected. However, it is highly disappointing that both USB-C ports on the front share the same bus and thus act like a HUB which results in low speeds. Thanks, that was really a test that helped me a lot! 👍
Yes it’s disappointing that my two front ports remain unused due to poor performance. In my testing, I could only achieve better performance by using the rear 4 ports. Neither hub or front ports could get me faster speed, which was expected.
It would be a nice performance test to see, in which time the data integrity the first time crashes, if someone shares his TB-RAID with Monitors and/or Sound Card (i.e. Universal Audio with their external SHARK uP's System inside) ;))
I know there are choices of those expensive enclosures, but the topic of this video is how to build it in a cheap way. And 1 port or 2 ports usage does not matter to me, because I have many of them.
This won't work for M.2 NVMe SSDs, which is what you're talking about. You need two Thunderbolt 3/4 connections for an effective RAID 0 with those SSDs. Otherwise, you are capped at the speed of a single Thunderbolt 3/4 port, which in real world terms is about 2.7GB/s. You can get that with a single M.2 NVMe without RAID 0. It would be a complete waste of money.
@@roryonabike5863 2.7 is what he is getting now, and yes as I said above the speed is capped at 2800MB/S but only wasting one thunderbolt port instead of 3.
@@pbrigham For a lot of people, Samsung T7 drives just make more sense. They are also a less expensive route. I use both of the following SSDs, both 1TB and 2TB... A Samsung 1TB T7 costs US$115, less on sale. It is more than adequate for most purposes. A Samsung 1TB 980 Pro M.2 NVMe costs $145. A Samsung 970 EVO Plus, while cheaper than a 980 Pro, is not a replacement because its write function is dismal with Thunderbolt 3/4. An enclosure and Thunderbolt cable costs another $150 to $200. Some enclosures, like the OWC brand that you recommend, are a lot more. In addition to costing more, an M.2 NVMe requires heat management and can have reliability issues. I think that these drives are more hassle than they're worth for most people. I think that this is a very useful video for real people in the real world who occasionally could use some additional speed, but aren't chasing speed for the sake of speed.
Question for you (or anyone) - in this scenario, could you attach both these drives to another computer and would they still work as configured (raid, etc.) or is the RAID only tied to the original machine? Many thanks.
Good to see this demonstrated, and the video is very clear. I've posted links to it on two sites.
Awesome. But if you used Thunderbolt enclosures, it would be faster, much more expensive though
thank you. best video in youtube about this topic
had little knowledge about raid and didn't know you could do this with Mac OS. Definitely will buy base model Mac studio now
Thank you for making this video. I am now interested to see if I can match internal speeds using two external thunderbolt drives.
I see that your version of the Disk Speed Test has an option for stress tests higher than 5GB. How did you achieve this? I could really use this.
bro ur awesome thank you!
Very enlightning, thank you.
Hey, thanks for this test! I have a Mac Studio myself and use an OWC Thunderbolt with 4 TB, which gives excellent results. But I need another fast 4TB and had the same plan as you. 2 x 2TB nvme are cheaper in USB-C gen 2 enclosures than a 4TB nvme in a Thunderbolt enclosure. And around 1500 for read and write is enough for me.
In fact, I was wondering if I could achieve Raid 0 at the double speed with 2 external USB-C 3.2 gen2 with nvme drives on the front USB-C ports of the Mac Studio.
I had already tried it with 2 old Sata SSDs in USB 3.0 cases and they were with about 730 read speed as fast as on the two USB-A ports. Interestingly, these two, connected to the Thunderbolt ports only came to about 650 read as Raid 0. So there they were actually significantly slower.
I also have an OWC Mercury Elite Mini and ran that as Raid 0 on the USB-C and Thunderbolt ports, via a one USB-C cable, and got the same result. It was slower on the Thunderbolt port - 720 vs 630.
Sata SSD individually via USB 3.0 enclosure manages about 380 - 410 read speed.
With the OWC Mercury Elite (this is a dual USB-C 3.2 gen 2 SATA enclosure) on the front USB-C ports 510 read speed.
So I'm surprised that your test with the two external USB-C 3.2 gen2 as Raid 0 on the Thunderbolt ports gave the result I would have expected from the front USB-C ports.
That's a bit crazy, but due to the higher speed of the nvme drives the results on the Thunderbolt ports are as expected.
However, it is highly disappointing that both USB-C ports on the front share the same bus and thus act like a HUB which results in low speeds.
Thanks, that was really a test that helped me a lot!
👍
Yes it’s disappointing that my two front ports remain unused due to poor performance. In my testing, I could only achieve better performance by using the rear 4 ports. Neither hub or front ports could get me faster speed, which was expected.
Nice vid, thanks
It would be a nice performance test to see, in which time the data integrity the first time crashes, if someone shares his TB-RAID with Monitors and/or Sound Card (i.e. Universal Audio with their external SHARK uP's System inside) ;))
Great video! ✌️❤️
Thanks for this excellent vid. Can I daisy-chain 2 NVMe enclosures on one Thunderbolt 4 port on the back of my Mac Mini? What about power supply?
I don’t have such types of enclosures so am not sure, but I heard daisy chain displays is not supported.
Just check the EXPRESS 4M2 or the THUNDERBLADE from OWC for speeds of 2800MB/S using only one Thunderbolt 3/4 connection.
I know there are choices of those expensive enclosures, but the topic of this video is how to build it in a cheap way. And 1 port or 2 ports usage does not matter to me, because I have many of them.
@@hz777 ok, the EXPRESS 4M2 is selling for 300 USD.
This won't work for M.2 NVMe SSDs, which is what you're talking about. You need two Thunderbolt 3/4 connections for an effective RAID 0 with those SSDs. Otherwise, you are capped at the speed of a single Thunderbolt 3/4 port, which in real world terms is about 2.7GB/s. You can get that with a single M.2 NVMe without RAID 0. It would be a complete waste of money.
@@roryonabike5863 2.7 is what he is getting now, and yes as I said above the speed is capped at 2800MB/S but only wasting one thunderbolt port instead of 3.
@@pbrigham For a lot of people, Samsung T7 drives just make more sense. They are also a less expensive route. I use both of the following SSDs, both 1TB and 2TB...
A Samsung 1TB T7 costs US$115, less on sale. It is more than adequate for most purposes. A Samsung 1TB 980 Pro M.2 NVMe costs $145. A Samsung 970 EVO Plus, while cheaper than a 980 Pro, is not a replacement because its write function is dismal with Thunderbolt 3/4.
An enclosure and Thunderbolt cable costs another $150 to $200. Some enclosures, like the OWC brand that you recommend, are a lot more. In addition to costing more, an M.2 NVMe requires heat management and can have reliability issues. I think that these drives are more hassle than they're worth for most people.
I think that this is a very useful video for real people in the real world who occasionally could use some additional speed, but aren't chasing speed for the sake of speed.
Question for you (or anyone) - in this scenario, could you attach both these drives to another computer and would they still work as configured (raid, etc.) or is the RAID only tied to the original machine? Many thanks.
To another Mac, yes.
Extremely unreliable doing raid0 over usb3
Been using 4x1T RAID0 with 4xThunderbolt ports for a while. Zero issues with 3000+MB read/write speed. Cannot be more satisfied.