Mac Studio Storage Upgrade - Made EASY with Custom Parts

[@JeffGeerling]

This is awesome. Though having to know how to use a hot air station and source custom new NAND chips just to upgrade storage is a bit crazy (that's on Apple!)

[@dosdude1]

Yep. Though, the eventual goal is to be able to sell these to others with NAND already installed, so the user can simply install the upgrade with relative ease.

[@jbloodwo]

Don’t let Redshirt Jeff see this. I can see him trying to use a map gas touch to do SMD work

[@axelgenus]

​@@dosdude1just take my money dude! 🎉

[@FLH3official]

@@dosdude1 You'll have a market for that, sure!

[@IdiotRace]

@@dosdude1 Oh thats great, I'm planning on buying a studio on the next refresh. I do hope Apple won't change this when they update them. Do you know if this would work on the M2 versions of the Studio?

[@lululombard]

This is huge! Aftermarket Mac Studio/Mac Pro storage should exist!

[@SymRuX]

Politicians should rule that it is a must!

[@ShamblerDK]

But how else will Apple persuade you to just buy a newer model?

[@vanCaldenborgh]

@@ShamblerDK They will at some point block updates for all M1 models.

[@Crimsonoverlord.]

why i wont buy apple product's

[@sethborne]

@@vanCaldenborgh It has enough power to emulate windows 10/11 if they were to do that it would incentiveize people to make it happen.

[@Wannes_]

So you not only need a DOSdude in the cellar, you also need a Frenchman reverse engineering custom PCBs in your mansarde Thanks Tim Crook !

[@TatsuZZmage]

In a country where the person is less likely to get sued to death by apple.

[@ceqell]

im 15, and sometimes i wonder why i exist here on this planet on this universe, but i know now, soldering bga chips, one day i wanna just like you sir. you are my inspiration to keep going and one day ill have enough money to be able to afford to do these cool stuff i promise myself.

[@Randzhabar]

Protect this man at all cost

[@mikehathaway2842]

If someone like Rossmann Associates could do a mail service where I ship my Studio and get it returned with the 8TB upgrade for under a grand I would jump on it.

[@JOHNSMITH-ve3rq]

Same. Absolutely a market for this.

[@artiumnihamkin9206]

He can just send you the modules and you do a simple restore, no need to send the whole studio.

[@yoshikinanami7434]

Yooo if someone starts selling pre soldered modules we’d almost be back to the old Mac Mini days!

[@dosdude1]

That's the intention eventually. I'll be buying the modules from Gilles, soldering NANDs on them, and selling them. Gilles himself will likely do the same for European customers.

[@TWFactory]

@@dosdude1French rules the world :D

[@773JA]

@@dosdude1 Will this also work on M2 Mac Studios?

[@yoshikinanami7434]

@@dosdude1 Yesssss thank you!

[@rdisteven]

This will works on a m1 Mac mini too????

[@Xlander111]

Once Gilles has these boards available for sale, I will add appropriate links here. Looking forward to it👍

[@sssloe]

I've seen China make 315 to 110 adapters but custom boards for nand blanks are actually ingenious. Not sure who the guy behind the design is but major props to him for the idea. Not sure if commercial push for such a project is legally clean but such boards would also be a great DIY project if the designs were leaked and "open source" Great work as always Colin ❤

[@hishnash]

Would be completely legal so long as you do not claim it is first party. Building a compatible board is completely legal, but if you then put an apple logo on it then it is not. This is the issue that lots of third party iPhone screens have were they are stopped by customs as the screen makers feel they can sell for more money if they pretend to be first party screens.

[@bobweiram6321]

It's a replica of the original board. Ig it's patented, it would be illegal.

[@MrSeanroberts1969]

@@bobweiram6321 Not if there were differences in the design, which this has, if you notice there are extra capacitors ( I think ) above the nand chip on the right compared to apples, so there must be a design change. Companies have been doing this for years, a slight change and it's a new design.

[@famitory]

@@bobweiram6321 you can't copyright a circuit design nor a board design, especially if the design itself is not novel (which a couple of nands and some power management certantly is not). you CAN copyright the insides of a chip or complex component. there's a very weird legal history around why the two are considered differently in the eyes of the law that's worth reading about if you get the chance.

[@shadowtheimpure]

@@bobweiram6321 Except it's not. He specifically stated that there were design differences between the boards, so they are not identical.

[@readtedium]

I hope someone mass-commercializes this process. (Polysoft should get OWC on the line!) Apple should not have a monopoly on storage. Great stuff, Collin.

[@bennaambo2716]

OWC hell no. They are ripoff selling cheap parts exreamly overpriced

[@readtedium]

@@bennaambo2716 they are one of the few companies that sells a lot of obscure Mac hardware of this nature.

[@Wannes_]

OWC charge just a bit less than Apple themselves

[@UONeal]

They don't have Monopoly on storage...I get what you're trying to say but that's not what a monopoly is. They do charge a crazy amount and it's not user replaceable. But there's many other companies that specialize in storage that have a much bigger footprint. WD and Seagate just to name a few

[@readtedium]

@@UONeal They have a monopoly on storage in their own machines. That is clearly what I meant.

[@bekim137]

Apples worst nightmare

[@hishnash]

I do not think apple cares at all.

[@4GuitarTrance]

@@hishnash Oh they care... you can bet your @$$ they care! That's why Apple went completely proprietary once again... soldering everything to the motherboard. So if you want a Mac you are forced to purchase Apple's absolute ridiculously priced storage and memory. Not to mention, if your memory, storage, or pretty much anything else goes bad, you're screwed and must purchase a brand new or refurbished Mac from Apple again. You Mac becomes absolute garbage... unless you have the skills this brilliant and patient guy has. Apple has become so petty [and apparently greedy] you can surely bet THEY CARE!

[@cheap25]

@@4GuitarTrance I really don’t think they care if a couple random guys are doing this. Seriously, how many people have the skills to do this kind of stuff on their own? Not only do you have to have the skills you have to have somebody making custom boards for you. how many times is that going to happen? So yeah I don’t think they’re crapping their pants. 😂

[@slizgi86]

M4 studio will have storage soldered :D, because of... speed, yes super mega speed, because soldered SSD are so faster than slotted one! ;-) No, not really, take a look at PCIE 5.0 speed or ver. 6.0 probably around the corner.

[@bassyey]

@@4GuitarTrance They don't care. They have enough suckers to buy from them lol. Stop being delusional.

[@Mbro-dq2do]

How the fuck does Colin only have 100K watchers?? Hes a genius. Thanks for teaching me some dope shit bro.

[@mizinoinovermyhead.7523]

I just realized, yeah thats insane there should be more people watching...

[@Mbro-dq2do]

@@mizinoinovermyhead.7523 Dude is a bonifide master. All the stupid shit on youtube but Colin is the shit

[@Mbro-dq2do]

@@mizinoinovermyhead.7523 I do somethings but fuck man I have huge hands and its so har grabbing things and holding tools

[@autobahngringo]

I love the "just like thats" and "simplys" Let's all go out and get our NANDS and modules!

[@themysteriousspeeddemon]

Now my hopes of upgrading my M2 storage has been slowly but surely, becoming a reality I look forward to seeing the progress of these SSDs becoming common place.

[@cesarespinozaspain]

SWEET BABY JEZUS!!!!!!!!!!!! Congrats! I'm having a drink on your behalf!!!!

[@lopwidth7343]

Great news. Time to get the market flooded with quality modules for people to upgrade or replace broken ones and keep those machines going

[@bsvenss2]

Great video and great work! I've always been a fan of yours since your first macOS patcher. Thanks mate.

[@dosdude1]

Thanks!

[@MrPnew1]

8TB, it's a beautiful thing Collin. Thanks for all your work, you are a real trailblazer

[@francoisdemeyer4825]

any hope to push further ? 2x8TB, 2x16TB ? ;-)

[@britishagent]

I don’t even own a MAC and found this fascinating

[@sokoloft3]

Man you make BGA stuff look easy. I de-soldered a 980 YFC SMC from a 820-3435 board/laptop I got for $20. Has corrosion damage, and it was under that SMC. I need to order a new SMC now and a stencil (just in case, it comes pre-ball with lead-free). Got a little spooked when my wick stuck to the BGA pads, but none ripped. First time doing BGA and had to get a new hot air station to be able to do it.

[@timb7085]

Awesome! While I'm a huge fan of Apple equipment overall - their policies lately (and the fact that everything is soldered at the factory) is a real downer. Back in the day, you could do upgrades on various things - even in the laptops - but now they're just big throw-away phones. It's refreshing to see some bold moves on the aftermarket professionals doing such things - thanks!

[@samsowden]

by lately you mean the last 25 years?

[@RichardJohnson-GW]

Utterly ridiculous that anyone would have to these lengths to merely upgrade the storage in the Studio. While this upgrade is clearly out of the reach of the majority of Mac owners, I am hoping your experimentation (and the work of the gentleman who designed the board) can drive an affordable aftermarket solution.

[@UAVier]

BROOOOOOOO THIS A BIG DEAL

[@MilesLabrador]

man, y'all in this community are legends. I was stoked when I found you through the 2021 Macbook Pro SSD Upgrade videos. Thanks for the quality content!

[@mikepxg6406]

THE MAC Brain surgeon. So talented. Love these videos. Thank you.

[@deheiligebron]

This is incredible! You should seriously consider to start selling these as a set. 😎

[@Nicefisher]

Idkk what it is but there is something very calming / soothing / satisfying about your voice here lol

[@MarkSnop]

That is really cool! I don’t think I would try it even though it looked easy the way you did it. I’m sure you have a lot of knowledge in making sure that works properly. Thank you for a great video.

[@kylorokx1552]

BRO THIS IS MIND BLOWING

[@georgeorwell2062]

Hey Dosdude, I appreciate your efforts to enable Mac users to upgrade their memory. I've been working on the Mac for 20 years and it's very difficult for me to change my routines, I've been getting more and more frustrated with Apple over the past few years. I just don't feel free on the Mac anymore, which has led me to switch to Linux and run macOS as a virtual machine for a while until I can replace the programs I've purchased and used there.

[@Gmon750]

This is pretty amazing. There needs to be 3rd-party options (Hello OWC, Crucial, Kingston?) to provide these modules. I would completely go this route on a future Mac Studio purchase.

[@user-pk4hn1uz1k]

Why has no one made custom NAND sockets for the apple silicon computers? Sure it'd probably be very expensive, but even a proof of concept. We know apple uses NAND sockets internally for testing (not meant for production obviously) so theoretically it's doable.

[@hishnash]

Every company uses sockets internaly for testing on prototype boards. Even laptop cpus etc are all first prototyped on LGA sockets. The issue with doing this on a production board is finding space for the through hole screens to the back, your not going to be able to have a presser attached socket (LGA) without a backbrace to hold it in place. Production boards tend to be rather dense I would be supplied if there are 4 nicely spaced voids within the PCB internals for each NAND.

[@nickthaskater]

I love your passive aggressive approach to fixing Apple's anti-consumer bullshit. Just keep calm and carry on.

[@zmix]

Incredible. Please make a batch of these..!

[@flyguy8791]

This is incredible! Amazing work Gilles and you made the installation look easy Colin! Amazing work.

[@timb7085]

And the fact that the Studio has these "SSD" slots says that Apple could make their devices upgradable - if they wanted to. I'd be glad to accept 2mm of more thickness in a laptop if it had swappable internals. (rather than having to decide a configuration for the life of the device at purchase time)

[@TanjiroNaofumi]

Don't forget not being able to change the storage if it suddenly fails and apple says it's your fault.

[@darwiniandude]

I'm watching this on an M1 Ultra I CTO'd with 4TB storage. I'm now feeling a lot better about keeping this system long term, if in the future I can swap the NANDs out or upgrade outside of Apple's parts availability window, and cost. Thank you for all your effort :)

[@vadimmartynyuk]

rewatch this video multiple times, it deserves it

[@Hussein621]

Vous êtes un champion dans le hardware et software, merci de montrer le chemin de la liberté du circuit fermé d'Apple.

[@HalfOgre0520]

It's like watching a sorcerer work his magic!!!

[@Muhammed-nani964]

Omg this guy just slapped Apple in the face lol The funny part is it’s even faster 😂😂

[@TheMamon66]

DUDE U ARE THE FREACKIN GOAT. I am a big fan of your work. Congrats to you and your fiend. No joke i would buy these from u. Again, amazing work!!!

[@jaegan438]

You never cease to amaze me. Excellent work on this. You're going to keep at least some of these machines out of the trash, and that's a lot more than Apple is doing these days.

[@Mainyehc]

Yes! YES! Finally sticking it to the man, I see… This is so cool, I may just move my boot volume back into the internal NAND module. I’ve used an NVMe drive in an external Thunderbolt 3 enclosure ever since I’ve bought my M1 Max Studio to preserve the former, but with this development, that’s no longer a problem.

[@mrlithium69]

Absolutely Groundbreaking! Truly! innovative and legendary at the same time

[@HighMansx]

The mac studio is huge, at first I thought it was something from the 2000s lmao Love the videos!

[@dbbbbbbb1952]

It’s two Mac minis stacked on top of each other. He has small hands

[@TheDefpom]

Excellent, this lack of upgradability is why I was reluctant to buy a Studio, if this solves it then I might change my mind

[@CX3Productions]

This is bonkers! I freaking love it! 🚀 This whole process was spy thriller music worthy 😎

[@joshgreendesign]

Love how casually you just perform a huge upgrade like this like it's no big deal, well done!

[@gabrielferrazdetetivehardware]

Great video, i have a technical question though, those NAND Flashs KICM223 1TB (8Tb), they're from Samsung correct? Do you know exactly which dies is it packed it? Like is it Samsung V-NAND V6, V7, V8? Do you have any clues? i cant find any ways to decode those part numbers.

[@asafblasbergvideographer]

Excellent video! And thanks for not having any background music :)

[@christopherhood9241]

This is fantastic - can’t wait to be able to acquire these in the UK. I can here Tim Crook telling the engineers to work harder to stop users undertaking these sorts of things on future hardware.

[@brygram]

Off Subject....What a great sounding voice! Colin, your voice is comfort food for my ears. I then wonder, "Do you sing?"

[@hearingtheuniverse]

This is so awesome! The future is looking bright

[@6CauseO6FDeath6]

Wow this is actually very impressive. I love when people does this kind of content. Apple can stop many things to happen, but never a human mind. Superb job new sub

[@masterdoge17]

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="55">0:55</a> “Despite this machine not having soldered storage, you still have to treat this storage as if it were soldered storage.” Classic apple lmfao

[@_spidget]

This is actually exactly what I was thinking you could do to get more storage on this thing! I didn’t really say much because I thought people would call me crazy, but looks like I’m not crazy.

[@usagold8]

Is it possible to zero out NANDs from existing machines in order to reuse using a chip programmer?

[@dosdude1]

Unfortunately not... Once these chips are programmed, they can never be restored back to a "blank" state ever again.

[@usagold8]

​@@dosdude1 Ah, that sucks... hopefully someone finds a hack or workaround or tool, especially with new chips costing so much.

[@Numfuddle]

Flash-Chips have a number of OTP (one time programmable) sectors that are usually used for logistics data and security information. I reckon that Apple‘s SW restore process „marries“ the NAND chips to a particular PCB and uses the Security and OTP regions on those NAND chips for that purpose. In short once that process is finished you cannot revert those chips back to factory state because you can’t reset/erase the OTP data (hence the name)

[@cjstout1]

@@dosdude1 Sounds like a good challenge for you...

[@florinlazar2678]

Genius at work. A treat to watch.

[@AIRWOLFMovie]

Wow. DosDude1 kudos hits stratosphere again. Amazing.

[@nnrecord]

Very looking forward video to upgrading SSD for Mac Studio M2

[@w1zent91]

You are really the GOAT, thanks for doing all of this research

[@everlasts]

That is great news! So that means we can buy the upgradable NAND module from the awesome gentleman like you and Gilles!

[@manlioyllades]

You rock dude! 💯 Looking forward when those custom SSDs are available (I mean with the NANDs already soldered, ´cause I wouldn't be able to do it) 😅

[@mitfreundlichengrussen1234]

Awesome! Thanks for sharing! Your "the next thing we need to do is simply solder each of these chips onto these modules...." made me smile at 8 o clock in the morning, especially thanks for that! Btw.: of course you don´t have the screw to lock the module into the mac, you are a Solderer not a Screwer.

[@OscarTroya]

Mind blown! Great work dude!

[@mllarson]

Absolutely disgusting how much Apple charges for upgrades from the base model. Boards like this one are a real game-changer for sure. I am assuming that Apple will happily void your warranty for using "unauthorized parts"? I see locking these memory modules behind a serial number like they do for other parts in the future as this will cut into Apple's bottom line. Excellent work!

[@johnpaullennon1199]

Every November Black Friday Prime day I buy a new nvme double the size of the old one and shift all others and place the oldest or most used into a 3.2usb case. This takes me less time then this video including copy time. 😂 Although SMD soldering sounds fun for Turkey Day break I like to save money and time.

[@domdecosa]

And just like that, another great video!

[@cambike]

You should buy all the stock he has of the custom boards before the Apple mafia serve him with cease and desist stuff. Another epic video, don’t own a studio but love how you and the wider community fix the issues that shouldn’t be there

[@Ratchetto]

Honestly, so thankful for this video existence. I’ve Looked for Exactly This Video Right After Luke miani uploaded the Video where he Swapped out the Storage in between two Mac Studios.

[@fmarinosfromafar9512]

A maassive storage increase and read and write speeds are 130% of the 512GB chips, awesome work!

[@jsamusicsociety]

Its awesome job! Congratulations!

[@peetiegonzalez1845]

I'm surprised it took this long, but what a great job. I hope there's some way this can be commercially viable without getting slapped with patent suits for the barebones raw control circuitry.

[@olafschermann1592]

Awesome, you are the man! I hope some of these assembled cards appear on the market.

[@superviewer]

Thanks. Very enjoyable to see solutions from talented people like you guys.

[@tobyglyn]

Super cool stuff as usual!

[@jangerhard4039]

Danke!

[@adilsonsoares76]

That’s awesome. I love your videos 👏🏻👏🏻 thanks for sharing.

[@PlayStefan_misc]

Insane that this is finally kind of possible. Sure I may not do it by myself because of missing skills but other than that, great news.

[@GregSimon]

This is amazing!! Looking forward to Giles' store.

[@Shamino0]

Great work. Now that the ice has been broken, maybe we'll be able to see someone selling similar parts retail. I would like to think that companies like OWC, iFixit and even Crucial would like to start selling parts like these/ Hopefully one or more of them will pay Gilles handsomely for his hard work in designing the board.

[@mitschiewaldmann9450]

Watching your videos are inspiring. Thanks for the hard work!

[@flamingkillermc2806]

W Dosdude1 as always

[@JohanSchmidt]

If you see a red laser dot on your chest / head, duck for cover!🤣

[@alextirrellRI]

Absolutely amazing. Presently hanging onto Hackintosh as long as I can but I was thinking about getting a used Studio sometime in the future. I'm glad to know this kind of upgrade is now possible. Also, very nice demonstration. I've only done a little bit of work with a hot air machine but you make me feel like I can do this! (That ball removal looked tricky tho!)

[@AndrewMackoul]

What happens to the old nands that were in the system? Is it possible to reuse them? Maybe take them back for some money/discount?

[@ftt2757]

Love that you share that knowledge with us ! Great job mate!!

[@v3rlon]

It's been almost 24 hours. You aren't mass producing these things yet? Sheesh. 😈

[@reverendcarter]

looking forward to seeing this develop into a viable product someone can buy.

[@batiandanielliu3598]

when you have something serious need to install, like production files of a film or a software project, it's not good idea 😂

[@TinyWorkshop]

amazing new development :), I think I will get one soon

[@henryperezarias7070]

Buddy 5772 mb/s of 4300 mb/s it's a huge change. Great video and work.

[@VANDYKEDAN]

Perhaps a dumb question, but... is it possible to partition that 8TB into say... 4, 2TB drives? On my M1 Mac Studio Ulta, I got it with the 1TB storage option. I bought two OWC Express 4M2 Thunderbolt enclosures ($249.99 each) and put four, 1TB M.2 drives in one, and four, 2TB M.2 drives in the other. Max storage per enclosure is 32TB.

[@eertmann]

Curious to see how much the custom new modules would sell for even if I think I'll stick with my current set-up (1TB internal for system and apps, 4TB external SSD for data, 4TB external HDD for nightly data clone and 6TB external HDD for Time Machine).

[@transittoronto]

"Just like so" - So long as you have the steady hands of a brain surgeon! Seriously, though: awesome video!

[@clebbington]

You should get a gold sharpie and start signing the motherboards - these builds are works of art!

[@GuillaumeLortie]

You know you can ask 1500$ for a set right? That’s a huge market opening for you man!

[@eliteman7685]

Nicely done. I’d love to see this for the M2 studio!

[@TuxedoPanther]

Amazing work and many thanks for sharing this. By the way, what is the cute symbol on the chips? Thanks 😀👍

[@MrAnon-g7m]

DosDude strikes again ! Its a knockout.