New New Favorite M.2 SSD - Samsung 990 EVO PLUS - with External Enclosure Speed Test on Mac

[@heirtothethrone000]

I ran into this drive while pricing some drives for a new build. I ran across your video looking for how well this drive works so great info.

[@craigneidel]

You got it and good luck with everything.

[@pkpnyt4711]

For 7 Bucks ($145.99 vs $138.20) more I'd take the Crucial T500 over the 990 Evo Plus any day and everyday. It runs faster, cooler and beats the 990 EVO Plus in every metric (heck it beats up the 990 Pro as well). The most important metric for me though is temps and DRAM cache. It's the coolest running Gen4 drive in the market and has DRAM on it (990 EVO Plus doesn't have DRAM). EDIT: Forgot to mention that the T500 when ran (10 minute loop stress test) without a heatsink and no air only hit 50-65*C max temp (Techtesters YT channel). With a heatsink on, it ran a cool 52*C. Heck the 990 Pro hit almost 100*C in a few minutes, this stayed cool.

[@craigneidel]

That is a nice drive too.

[@arifbanday5556]

Why is most important metric for you are temps and DRAM cache? Are they important for external SSD Drives? What role/s do they play in External Portable SSD drives?

[@toddbornholtz6758]

I just ordered both items on Amazon! Many thanks for another great review!

[@craigneidel]

Great and good luck with everything.

[@toddbornholtz6758]

@ Thanks!

[@LarryFasnacht]

I’d like to see this in your TB 5 enclosure.

[@craigneidel]

I'll text it eventually once I get a good thunderbolt 5 enclosure.

[@arifbanday5556]

Thanks for the video. Just needed to clarify one thing - it says NVMe Internal Solid State Drive - does it mean it goes inside the computer or can it be used in external enclosure as a portable external drive for Apple Mini Mac?

[@craigneidel]

They can be used in external SSDs.

[@arifbanday5556]

@@craigneidel thank you for clarification

[@davidtindell950]

YES ! Thank YOU !! I am ordering one when it is on Amazon !!!

[@craigneidel]

Great thanks for watching

[@DeVious-Azz]

I just purchased the 2TB version of this on Amazon for $140 today right after I ordered my Mac Mini M4.

[@tincans87]

Worth checking out, thanks for sharing the video Craig!

[@craigneidel]

Thank you

[@chi.marvine]

What enclosure can take advantage of these speeds?

[@poko8746]

From my understanding, currently, no enclosure can fully take advantage of the speeds of this ssd due to the limitation of TB4 but whenever TB5 enclosures come out it will be a completely new ball game. ( take what I'm saying with a grain of salt as I'm not an expert on this topic)

[@craigneidel]

The Thunderbolt 4 enclosures can. Watch my latest video on November 19th and I have put that drive into a external SSD enclosure on the Mac mini M4.

[@FOTOGRAFMATSO]

Thanks for your great content. :) Is it really any speed differences between the drives in these external enclosures? I watched your video with the Satechi enclosure and your WD Black 770 1TB with great speed results. Isn´t the enclosure a bottleneck preventing the faster speed of newer, more expensive drives?

[@craigneidel]

Yes, the speeds will be within about 200 MB/s for most of these higher tier drives. Thank you.

[@ThirdEyePix]

Thanks for yet another clearly explained real-world review. My question is whether this Samsung 990 EVO PLUS would work well in a Thunderbolt 5 enclosure please. But I would want a 4TB version if Samsung offer one. I am a photographer exclusively shooting RAW (not JPEG) with a Mac mini M4 Pro and currently upload my image files to a LaCie USB-C SSD where I edit them in ON1 Photo RAW 2025 installed in my M4 Pro with 48GB RAM. I then export finished keepers as JPEGs back to organised folders on my M4 Pro. All edits are non-destructive. Thanks for any advice ~ It is very much appreciated (and trusted!). Robin.

[@craigneidel]

I'm guessing it should but all Thunderbolt 5 enclosures are a bit different so without testing can't say for sure. Thanks and good luck with everything especially your photos.

[@NigelBassman]

Wait… doesn’t the “smart thermal solution” chart at 3:18 show the throughput drop from about 6500 MB/sec to about 1500 once the temp reaches 60 degrees?

[@craigneidel]

I tested this drive up to 500 GB and I didn't get any drop off in real world testing so not sure what that is saying. The time to transfer the 500 GB was consistent at around the 3,000 MB/s.

[@EugWanker]

@@craigneidel That's great! However, what mix of file sizes was there in that 500 GB? Large files, small files, or a mix of both?

[@craigneidel]

Mix of both

[@xlr82nrg666]

Great video, subscribed. I'm thinking about getting the OWC Express 1M2 enclosure with either the Samsung 990 Evo Plus 4TB or Samsung 990 Pro 4TB. Do you know if you can update Samsung SSD firmware while it's in the OWC Express 1M2 enclosure with Samsung Magician Software on M4/M4 Pro Macs? If not, then you're better off using OWC SSDs. Thanks in advance.

[@craigneidel]

I have not tested that enclosure but should in future so not 100 percent sure. Thanks for watching the channel.

[@trignite]

You should mention how using PCIE 5.0x2 means that you can have more drives without running out of lanes. If everyone moved to 5.0x2 drives you could have stacks of these. I think PCIE5.0x4 isn't ready for mass adoption, the current controllers on drives use too much power at full bandwidth that they require active cooling. I want to see some new motherboards with way more m.2 NVME slots running 5.0X2, having a bunch of these and replacing mechanical drives as costs come down would be awesome (I say this as someone with 140TB).

[@craigneidel]

Yes, thanks for the addition on that and for watching.

[@schadlarry]

With your YT channel you must have tremendous storage needs. Do you use or thought about a NAS or DAS setup?

[@craigneidel]

Yes I did a few videos on them. I use a terramaster after reviewing it since it's simple and I like simple.

[@darrylhoward3284]

Great review!

[@craigneidel]

@@darrylhoward3284 thank you

[@mkizzzo]

Did you try in your Satechi enclosure? If so, any performance difference?

[@craigneidel]

I have not tried that one yet.

[@nick066hu]

How does it compare to the 990 Pro ? Am I right for assuming that in these two main issues: 1. less heat generated, so no thermal thottling even without a heatsink. 2. This is Gen5, so it can be eqaul fast but uses 2 PCIE lanes only. so more lane left for other things. Or do I get it wrong?

[@craigneidel]

The Pro is a little better I would say but different. Yes, this will be cable of working with PCIe 5.0 so it's kind of future-proofs it and that is nice but the Pro is the real Pro drive if you are using PCIe 4 still. But, cost and many other factors come into play like ability to cool drives etc.

[@trignite]

990 Pro is faster but only if you have a PCIE 5.0 NVME Slot on your motherboard. But that speed comes with a cost. 1: Higher temperatures due to increased power draw when running at such high bandwidth. 2: More lanes, this one isn't too impactful if you dont have a tonn of PCI-E devices, but the 990 Evo Plus means you can use half as many PCIE Lanes. E.g some motherboards such as any z790 motherboard from intel will NOT allow you to have a PCI-E gen 5 SSD running at 4lanes when you have a PCI-E GPU running at x16 lanes. It will result in your GPU running at HALF the pci-e bandwith at x8 lanes. Its a massive issue and a lot of people who bought a PCIE 5.0x4 SSD run it at PCI-E 4.0 X4 just so they can run their GPU at full speed - Or there's other people running their GPU at slower speeds without noticing their SSD is causing their gpu to run slower because its using the lanes up! This is a good reason why PCIE 5.0X2 is best, it uses half the lanes and allows you to have more devices running full speed. As new motherboards/CPUs come out they will come with more and more PCIE 5.0 lanes so it will be less of an issue, but its still an advantage.

[@gaboguerra950]

thanks for sharing. Is this Samsung PLUS more advance than the Samsung PRO ?

[@craigneidel]

Not really but it depends on what you mean I guess. It's just another option and the costs should settle out a bit below the pros.

[@gaboguerra950]

@@craigneidel for video editing and color correction (8K RAW video using heavy plugins and realtime play would be a must)

[@craigneidel]

The Pro will be a step above in most cases.

[@gaboguerra950]

@@craigneidel great. Thank you

[@asan1050]

Thanks for posting this video, Craig! Have a fantastic day!

[@craigneidel]

Thanks

[@jjpcorona]

Have you found a dock with an M.2 SSD slot suitable for the new M4/M4 Pro Mac minis? I have a Hagibis dock which you’ve reviewed in the past with my M1 Mac minis but am looking for something with the M4/M4 Pro form factor. Reached out to Satechi only for them to respond it’s in development and cannot disclose a release date. 😡

[@craigneidel]

Watch my video today november 19th. I showcase a good external ssd setup.

[@duyddafo]

Hi Craig, nice video. I'm also in the direction of ordering a 4TB 990 EVO plus and cope it with the Satechi USB4 Thunderbolt 4 enclosure, and have it connected to my on-the-way Mac Mini M4. I'm having a concern as I have seen many comments in reddit stating that the DRAM less drives should not be driven in any enclosure, as HMB would not work and that would shorten the life span of the drive and/or the drive would not work at all. However, along with those comments, I also saw some stating that HMB would work with USB4/Thunderbolt 4. I'm not knowledgeable about this and it'd be great to hear an advice from you or anyone here that might have knowledge/experience or a chance to test this combination. If it's not advisable, I'd go canceling the order of the 990 EVO plus and get a DRAM drive, instead 😬.

[@craigneidel]

I have used Dramless drives and not really noticed the difference too much especially with modern drives. That is something most will say but in reality I feel the performance if similar with these modern drives and based on real world use. But get the drive that matches the features you need.

[@jaymeez]

Any Thunderbolt 5 enclosures out there to go with the new Apple Mac Mini?

[@craigneidel]

I think one from owc.

[@_lumpy8859]

Recommend enclosure no longer available! Any suggestions? Thanks

[@craigneidel]

I did a video on like 6 or 7 enclosures so check out that video from a month or 2 ago. I have also done like 20 on other enclosures if you check out my channel. Many work fine overall so it's hard to say one or the other.

[@benk4881]

I just got a imac desk top, with OS X YOSEMITE, HOW DO I UPGRADE TO NEW VERSION OF SOFTWARE, IT SAYS NO UPDATES AVAILABLE.

[@craigneidel]

You may not be able to depending on the age of the Macbook you bought. I would do research on Google.

[@Ninjacarvers]

am i supposed to rip that black label off the SSD during installation? or do I keep it on?

[@craigneidel]

I keep it on.

[@bitcoinjc]

Great video as always thanks Craig.

[@craigneidel]

Thanks you got it

[@rsecor]

Thanks for all the information from this and the enclosures. What about the Samsung 990 PRO w/ Heatsink PCIe® 4.0 NVMe™ -- it seems to be better and only a tiny bit more money.

[@craigneidel]

The samsung pro is nice just beware that with heatsink it may not fit into a bunch of the enclosures.

[@kri8edmediagroup]

i understand these get very hot, can I use it for editing safely? Lets say I'm editing 6-8 hours a day on it.

[@craigneidel]

I don't see why not as they are meant to be used and are quality drives from Samsung. Just make sure you put proper heat tape etc. on the enclosures.

[@36bounce]

Craig, I don't think these drives will handle running large files. The price will come down in time and it will be a better purchase

[@craigneidel]

They work great and I'm using mine for editing.

[@digitalmarketinghumans]

A rare Craig no hat sighting. PS: That is one fast SSD! Love Samsung's SSD. It was one of my first ever long ago.

[@craigneidel]

This is pretty fast and is a good option for many things. Yes, Samsung seems to last quite a long time from the many I have tested.

[@jansix4287]

Isn’t EVO the cheap model with a short lifespan?

[@craigneidel]

Lifespan is the same but you might be talking about DRAM - But they are getting so good now as this is the info from Samsung - "Plus, random performance nearly rivals that of SSD products with DRAM, despite not using a DRAM cache, making it an optimal solution for high-spec gaming, 8K video editing, high-definition graphics work, data analysis and more."

[@jaymeez]

How does it compare to the 980 Pro?

[@craigneidel]

That's a hard one to answer I guess but similar and maybe a bit faster.

[@garynagle3093]

Looks pretty good. Thanks

[@craigneidel]

Not bad for sure

[@NYC_MidnightVibes]

Would this SAMSUNG 990 EVO Plus + ACASIS 40Gbps M.2 NVMe SSD Enclosure with Cooling Fan, TBU 405 Pro be good for the Mac Mini M4?

[@NirHason]

It won’t give you the full speed, only 40% of what this NVMe is capable of…you’ll have to wait for the TB5 enclosures

[@craigneidel]

It will be plenty fast. Not sure if the drive will fit if it has any heatsink but as far as speed it would be around 3100 MB/s and fast enough.

[@johngwheeler]

Be careful getting an EVO plus for use with the Acasis enclosure. This drive is not on Acasis’ list of SSDs tested for compatibility. I have the Acasis TBU405 Pro M1 and tried an older Samsung 970 EVO Plus, and it constantly disconnects and is basically unusable. The newer Samsung EVO Plus firmware *may* work with the Acasis, but it’s not on their list. I have ordered 990 Pro, which is on the Acasis approved list, so I’m hoping it will work as advertised!

[@artur_media780]

Whats the best solution to get 12TB - 16TB of SSD ?

[@craigneidel]

I mean nothing now except spinng hard drive.

[@AM-fw4hy]

Good video!

[@craigneidel]

Thank you

[@nuurnwui]

Why use a fast disk on a slow usb external drive?

[@craigneidel]

Just an example and you do get a bit more out of them with a really fast drive but only a few hundred MB/s

[@hms350]

Is a simpler solution rather than assembling your own external USB SSDs to use SanDisk Professional Thunderbolt 3 4TB? -I am a nerd and use the Mac for recreational FCPX video editing. -I have 3 SanDisk Professional Thunderbolt 3, 4TB SSDs and I get 2,650 MB/s write and 2,750 MB/s Read with Black Magic Disk Speed Test; drive is formatted for APFS and last purchase price in July 2024 was $320 from Amazon during Prime day. -I am using a Apple MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max with 32 GB RAM and 4TB internal SSD. -Also have 2 SanDisk Extreme Pro 4 TB SSDs and they are materially slower 985 MB/s write and 910 MB/s Read Drive is formatted for ExFat. -Last few times I was looking at getting DIY Thunderbolt but went with the SanDisk Professional Thunderbolt 3 as simpler solution. -The Mac internal 4 TB drive is materially faster 7,100 MB/s write and 5,600 MB/s Read. -The SanDisk Extreme Pro while slower are still adequate.

[@craigneidel]

Yes, but if one part fails you are out of luck and you can't put new drives in that. I like to build them myself because as the drive fills up I can store it for safe keeping and put a new drive in.

[@ericrudoph3471]

am i searching wrong? I'm finding it on amazon $365 for 1 tb and $585 2tb !? (11/3/24)

[@craigneidel]

Not sure what is going on with the price right now but maybe check their website. It is not worth that cost for sure.

[@robertstad8796]

So it’s nowhere near 50% faster in an external thunderbolt 4 enclosure. What’s the fuzz then?

[@craigneidel]

Of course that has limits but new gen 5 enclosures or adding directly to motherboard and this will fly

[@moamenelsayedelhattab5448]

does it work with ps5

[@craigneidel]

I would check Amazon's page and it should say on there as I didn't test it with that.

[@rorywalters1614]

Samsung NVMe drives are probably not the most ideal for enclosures or laptops, because they run the hottest. I’ve seen 990 Evo Plus reaching 105 degree Celsius running in a laptop, this is a temperature other brands couldn’t even reach. Crucial P5 Plus only reaches 57 degrees under the same stress, Kioxia G2, a drive known for running hot, only reaches about 82 degrees. In fact, all Samsung NVMe drives have the same issue in recent years.

[@craigneidel]

I mean who is staying this. Most people feel Samsung is one of the best SSD providers now.

[@rorywalters1614]

@@craigneidelGamers love Samsung, because Samsung drives are good performing, but they build desktop PCs, which give them a chance to put in some serious heat sinks onto drives and use more effective funs. For more enclosed environments such as laptops or enclosures, that much heat could be a problem, there’s just not enough cooling.

[@craigneidel]

Yeah, but I still use them and just make sure I use proper heat tape etc. and they work good.

[@juddharms2377]

Great external boot drive for a Mac!

[@craigneidel]

It could be I would guess.

[@asan1050]

Wait a minute!!!! Craig Neidel without a CAP!!! No! No! I want my money back now!

[@craigneidel]

No cap today

[@RickTheClipper]

HMB can never replace an integrated DRAM Cache Buffer

[@craigneidel]

This works great as a storage drive based on my testing and I'll test booting off it soon.

[@smokeyyunick2675]

You do present good information and thanks for taking your hat off while doing your presentations inside your internet room…all the best!

[@craigneidel]

Thanks for watching the channel.

[@dieselphiend]

I don't get it. The price to performance ratio just isn't there with Samsung drives.

[@craigneidel]

They just last a very long time in my opinion and after using some for years.

[@dieselphiend]

@@craigneidel Try something from Hynix, Teamgroup, Kioxia, etc, sometime. Very good drives. Samsung's failure rate is higher than the price reflects- jmo.

[@DRAM-68]

Thanks Craig. Great info. We’re you able to compare speed test results between the Plus and the regular EVO in the same enclosure?

[@craigneidel]

In the external enclosure they will be close but this thing is more capable in motherboard on win PCs or thunderbolt 5 enclosures when they come out.

[@LuisJimenez-rq6wk]

Amazing!

[@craigneidel]

Nice little drive.

[@BoboMedia007]

exactly what I need

[@craigneidel]

It's a nice drive

[@benk4881]

IMAC 14.2 WITH 8 GB OR MEMORY PROCESSOR IS 3.2 GHz INTEL CORE i5

[@craigneidel]

Ok, please research on Google and it will tell you the newest OS you can upgrade to.

[@hstrinzel]

And WHY don't you make that drive the INTERNAL drive in the Mac? That would show the REAL speed and your whole computer should be faster, right?

[@craigneidel]

Just introducing drive. You can add to a motherboard if you have one to test.

[@MysterCannabis]

I expected you to be bold

[@craigneidel]

Not sure what you are talking about about

[@DarthVader1977]

No hat?!?!?!?!? 😮

[@craigneidel]

No today.. 5 percent no hat

[@brothermunkdrums]

What the hell, no hat. Sorry couldn't help myself.

[@craigneidel]

No hat today

[@mmsk1717]

A comment

[@craigneidel]

Wow thanks.

[@ВладимирБалашов-б2о]

Kinston KC3000 Faster and Cheaper

[@craigneidel]

This just came out so may come down.