Fastest External SSD Storage Enclosure Tested For M1, M2, M3 Macs and Win

In this video we build the fastest external M.2 Storage SSD Enclosure that we tested at over 3,300 MB/s. If you are looking to add external SSD storage to your M1, M2, and M3 Mac mini, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, or even Mac Studio and Win PC then this is a perfect external M.2 NVMe SSD enclosure to build. This is the Satechi 40 Gbps USB4 NVMe SSD Pro Enclosure (Model: ST-EU4NPM).

This external storage enclosure will also be perfect for the M3 Mac mini when that comes out and provides up to 16 TB of extremely fast external storage. So if you need a ton of external storage for your Mac and especially Mac mini then watch this video. This will also work on Win PCs as long as you format the drives correctly.

In this video we discuss the following products:
(Satechi ST-EU4NPM External M.2 USB4 Enclosure)

(WD SN850X - Recommended Drive)

(WD SN770 - Drive Used and Tested in Video)

(Other Possible Drives)

Other items to note:

Watch my other videos on Thunderbolt SSD Enclosures:

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[zkampyman]

Hello Craig, I have watched several other reviewers and I protest your characterization of yourself as a small YouTube reviewer. Your videos are consistently excellent and very easy to understand. I put you at the top of the list!!

[bryans]

Thanks for the review Craig. Those are some pretty impressive speeds for an external enclosure.

[andriybashta]

Just bought this Satechi with SN850X 1TB, got the 2500MB/s for both reading and writing on my Macbook Pro M1 8gb RAM :) Thanks for this video

[medunkt]

Hi. Craig. These drive enclosures are going for the Aus $ equivalent of 94 US$ here in Australia now. I’ve ordered one and a 4TB Crucial P3 which seems to be the best bang for your buck for this amount of storage. I really appreciate your down-to-earth common-sense reviews. Best wishes for your venture.

[stevenwaldstein]

Thank you for the video. Last year I built two 2TB SSD, need a new enclosure for a 4TB but I think I will go with the Samsung 990. Very leery of WD these days with all the HD drive and SD card issues they have had and supposedly hid from the public and failed to recall.

[cuate]

Hi Craig, thanks for the thorough and unbiased info/review! Came across your channel as I was looking for this exact content. Watched your video a couple of times and did some research. Just ordered this Satechi! Thank you for such a review. New Sub here!

[AreThereHerosAnymore]

Posting here to Confirm the contents of this Video. I have a Mac Mini M2, 8GB Memory, with 256 GB Hard Drive. I needed some space. Used the links in this video and set it up today. This thing hums! I moved a lot of my files and non-Mac apps over to my 2TB SSD, and it has made a difference! My Machine is faster and everything opens up much quicker. I use MS Excel, for work on this Machine and it handles the heavy data I am running through it. This is by far one of the best and most useful recommendations for any of my Apple Products! If you are running out of space or your machine is bogged down....get this set and yes, I speed-tested this bad boy, and honestly, my results were even a little faster! I'm not sure if the links offered here are Affiliate links, but just in case, toss Craig some credit and click on his links to buy this set up. And I just clicked subscribe!

[EltonHo]

Great review! I am trying to find faster m.2 SSD enclosure, and your video popped up! I have a SN850X 2T, definitively gonna test it once I get this enclosure!

[dbrunda]

Since my original questions to you, I took the leap and bought the Zike z666 enclosure, with the ASM2464PD main control chip. Installed the WD SN850X 2TB NVME. I set it up as the boot drive 2 months ago and it's working great. I set up my video editing applications to use my internal drive as the cache drive to take that load off the external drive. Black Magic reports that is running around 3100 read/writes. Boots up just as fast as the 500 GB internal drive. The enclosure runs just a little warm under loads. My only complaint is that there is a firmware update available for the enclosure but the update only comes as a windows .exe file. I've tried writing their tech support but the don't seem to understand my english questions. I asked if it would be safe to unplug my enclosure and update the firmware from my windows PC. But they didn't seem to understand my question. Since it's running smoothly, I'll just keep it the way it is. My thanks to everybody that made comments.

[yannbourdeau]

Hi Graig, thanks for making this video. It helps me to find thing that fit my needs. I needed a fast external SSD for Mac games. I bought it with a Crucial NVME pci4 SSD drive. Second time that I buy something from your recommendations (the BenQ was the previous purchase)

[Stralnikov]

Another great video. I’ll probably buy this drive enclosure. Thanks!

[Moesamy]

thank you for this amazing review Craig.
Is there an external enclosure for Samsung 990 PRO with Heatsink installed to the drive?

[TheRiffeReport]

Craig I did this exact setup. Thank you for the recommendation!

[BetThisNotThat]

Hello! Love your channel. What mic do you use for recording ? The sound is always clear and crisp.

[zaltzband]

Does anyone know where I can find the 8tb version? Any links? Thank you!

[mkaufmandev]

Hi. Thanks for testing. One request is to tell us the number of files making up each test and use error correction once on a 100 gig transfer for a better real world test for some.

[therasmet]

there's a reason why the Satechi is the fastest. It is the only one that has a pcie4x4 controller. The others have a pcie3x4 and with overhead you are limited below 3 GB/s. Imo, I tried the Maiwo one which is slightly slower but has a detachable fan but it is currently almost $50usd and half the price of the Satechi which is a big deal considering the USB4 enclosures are mostly around the $80-100 mark

[xmoep]

Fantastic Video. Is this also possible on a Mac Mini M2 ?

[yuriflynn]

Hi, great review, , have you tested the Acasis tuv 405 pro enclosure, wonder how it would compare with this ??

[LocustAndWildHoney]

Hey Craig, How does having such a fast read and write speed effect editing a video on final cut pro? Also, could you link me one with more storage than 4TB. Would love an 8TB. Feel free to have it be an affiliate link. TY!