4 ms·
As someone who bought a 2TB Mac mini - this is frustrating to see. Because it is in fact upgradeable, but only to Apple since this is a custom module.
by tiffanyh 2y ago
As someone who bought a 2TB Mac mini - this is frustrating to see. Because it is in fact upgradeable, but only to Apple since this is a custom module.
- scosman 2y agolooks like a standard M2 ssd, no?
- bongobingo1 2y agoIt has a different pinout in my experience. The exact spec changes between models, I think one or two models of macbook have a standard M2, some (most?) have what looks like an M2 but has extra pins when not actually soldered on. My experience is only around trying to help a friend get the data off a fried board in a macbook, the desktops might be more standard.
- cogman10 2y agoYup. Looks like a 2230. Edit: not a 2230. Different pins.
- tiffanyh 2y agoI don't believe so. I don't think the "U" notch and pins are the same. But happy to be wrong :)
- cogman10 2y agoYou aren't wrong, you can count the pins on the small nub. Standard has 4 this one has 11(?)
- sofixa 2y agoNope, I'll try to find the source, but it's a very custom thing since the controller is actually on the chip, so the thing you connect via M.2-ish is just the storage module. Therefore no non-Apple specific SSD will work on it, even if you can physically connect it because the connector is the same.
- WithinReason 2y agoI would have expected to see chinese copies flooding the market
- Cthulhu_ 2y agoApple's invested heavily in component security though, especially for e.g. the iPhone. For good reason of course, a stolen iphone in itself has little value as it can be bricked by the owner, but there is / was a huge market in parts, so Apple built in security in the parts or the main board/OS to make that a problem as well.
- NikkiA 2y agoTBF even golden era macs had standard SCSI drives but with custom firmware so you couldn't just use any old drive.
- tambourine_man 2y agoI don’t remember that. I upgraded several SCSI drives back then.
- snakeyjake 2y agoThe custom firmware (really just a magic string) was required for "Apple HD SC Setup" or the later "Drive Setup" to recognize, partition, and format the drive. In order to upgrade the hard drive in a classic 68k or PPC Mac you had to either buy an Apple drive, or buy a third party disk utility capable of setting up a non-Apple drive. Many Apple-specific retailers would bundle in the software needed to use a new hard drive with the purchase of one but you'd better believe they baked the cost in to the price of the drive. If all you had was a Mac, your System disks, and a new non-Apple hard drive you 100% could not use it. I used FWB Hard Disk Toolkit, but it was >$100. Both Apple HD SC Setup and Drive Setup have been patched by the retro community to work with any drive, but in the 80s and 90s this was not the case.
- detourdog 2y agoI definitely used FWB but never experienced the need for magic strings or thought FWB was required. Third party disk utilities could often recover files Apples tools could not.
- snakeyjake 2y agoThe user doesn't need the string the Apple software scanned the ROM of the hard drive and looked for specific vendor IDs before proceeding. For the most part (there were EXTREMELY rare exceptions) the only strings that would pass were specific custom models of widely-available drives that were only sold to apple. FWB did not check. You could use ResEdit to haxxor the list: http://www.euronet.nl/users/ernstoud/drvsetup.html http://www.euronet.nl/users/ernstoud/drvsetup.html I cannot believe that page is still online. I first referenced it ON a PPC Mac running netscape. My flabbers are gasted.
- jsheard 2y agoThis isn't new, the Mac Studios and Mac Pros use similar proprietary modules. Apple even sells the Mac Pro modules separately so you can technically upgrade the primary storage in an officially supported way - for a ludicrous mark-up of course. https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MR393AM/A/apple-2tb-ssd-upgrade-kit-for-mac-pro https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MR393AM/A/apple-2tb-ssd-u... In practice if you have a Mac Pro you're better off just getting a PCIe SSD instead for a fraction of the price. Retail for a very fast 2TB SSD is ~$150 while Apple wants $1000.
- mikae1 2y agoHahaha, this is too obvious. $1000!
- lotsofpulp 2y agoI am not frustrated to see it, because I would not expect Apple products to have upgrade-able parts. I still buy Apple anyway, since the amortized cost over the life of owning the produce is lower in my experience. Plus it runs a lot cooler and quieter.
- talldayo 2y ago"They can do all of the work required to add a feature and then stop short in software because we never expected them to do any better in the first place." Words are not enough to eulogize how far Apple has fallen. Woz couldn't leave that dumpster fire fast enough.
- yapyap 2y agothats the “garden” for you