SinTech NGFF M.2 PCIe/NVMe Adapter and M2 SSD
Can I use one of these to upgrade my SSD with one larger than 2TB?
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There are a few issues here that I really don’t recommend going so large with a blade type of SSD.
First the denser the chips the hotter the SSD tends to get and the given placement of the SSD in this system is not where there is much air flow it will likely suffer both performance and life span.
Then we have the difference between an Apple or one of the 3rd party makers of pin compatible SSDs. Remember this is not a M2 port it’s a custom Apple port. They have a few additional lines the adapter and the M2 SSD don’t have access to. While you will find people using these adapters anyone who is pushing their system hard tend to rip them out as a waste as either the adapter and/or the SSD fails!
The last point is iMacs are not easy to get into to replace the blade SSD.
I can tell you I’ve pulled out quite a few and either put in a real Apple, OWC or Transcend SSD. And I won’t install an M2 SSD in a Mac. Now you might say he’s anti M2, that far from the truth as I have two RAID boxes which use them and I love them both, my use is on the heavy side so I would really look at your needs before making this journey.
For performance I recommend a 1TB (2TB for video work) blade SSD and a larger 2.5” SATA HDD/ SSD. If you are working on small projects. If you have large projects then I recommend going with external RAID drives. The blade SSD is setup as your boot drive holding your OS as well as your Apps, a good portion is left unused for the system to leverage for Virtual RAM, Caching and if running Windows Paging. If your application uses scratch space I would set it for this drive as well. The internal HDD/SSD will hold your work and other media files, or you use the externals for the very big stuff.
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For reference here’s a similar case Kernal Panic when running zoom 1 year after SSD Replacement
Thank you! My iMac is nearly 4 years old. I have a 1Tb drive that’s at 3/4 capacity, so I’m not in a rush. But I do plan to install a larger SSD in the next few years, and since it’s not an easy procedure I’d like the largest possible. Hoping a 4Tb or bigger will come out by then.
@erasmoacosta - I would just boost the SATA drive. I have a few clients which have 16TB SSD’s internally. They do TV & Radio advertisements, they also use a set of external RAID drives to backup daily and even have a safety deposit at a bank so they have an off site backup of everything just in case!
Not suggesting you go to this level, just don’t press your luck on the PCIe/NVMe idea as Apple won’t be producing any systems that use this interface. In fact Apple’s current Removable Storage is not even an SSD at all! It’s just a collection of raw flash chips within a custom module! Give this a read https://www.ifixit.com/News/57898/mac-st.... As the market for custom SSD’s will dwindle I don’t see the 3rd party houses making the jump to 4TB.
Frankly, if speed is your concern then make the jump to external RAID drives! While a single M2 maybe fast, a RAID set of M2 SSD’s is like Warp 10! I had produced ultra large images which are a mosaic of discrete images making a unitized scene at high pixel density. COVID killed my business, I only do smaller jobs for my clients now as my arthritis now makes it hard.
