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Comment by rsynnott | Hacker News Reader

Given that it's a desktop, most people should just get it with the default size and get an external thunderbolt NVMe disk. Only if you need >Thunderbolt 5 speeds (ie 80 Gbit/sec) do you really need the internal drive, and most NVMe is slower than this in any case.

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I did this recently with a new Mac Mini that I set up. MacOS recently added the ability to locate the home directories on any volume. There's a somewhat hidden feature too that if you drag the Applications directory onto an external drive it will move selected apps there (the larger ones like Pages, etc.); combine that with the option in the App Store to keep large downloads on a separate disk.

So far it's been working quite well with the exception that VSCode does not seem to understand how to update itself if you keep it in the external Applications folder: every time it tries to update itself it just deletes itself instead. Moved it back into the /Applications folder and it's been fine.

You can just use it as a boot drive, IIRC.

> MacOS recently added the ability to locate the home directories on any volume

Mac OS has always been able to do this.

Instead of dragging them over you should create a link. This way it's the same as before for Applications like VS Code.

Last I tried this, Spotlight didn't play well with symlinked application bundles.

Or if you don't want ugly ass external boxes cluttering up your desk.

I don't get why they couldn't be arsed to stuff a few m.2 slots in there. They could keep the main nand their weird soldered on BS with the firmware stuffed in a special partition if they want. Just give us more room!

You seriously don't get why?

MONEY!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mac_Pro#Apple_silicon_(2023), kinda. The most ultra-niche of Apple's products.

I remember this but never looked into it enough to get what the point is. They still sell it with an M2 chip.

"includes six internal PCIe 4.0 slots for expansion. It does not support discrete GPUs over PCIe." uhhh, so in case people want an AS chip with most stuff soldered on but also really need certain PCIe cards that aren't GPUs?

Audio interfaces, video capture interfaces, network interfaces, etc etc etc.

Would a TB-PCIe enclosure like the Sonnet ones not cut it? I get that it's still easier to have PCIe built in, but that's a big premium to pay.

Those cost hundreds of dollars and often only have 1 slot. The premium can’t be avoided.

Yeah, but it's either that or buying outdated hardware at this point because they don't refresh the Mac Pro. Idk why Apple didn't just make their own expansion add-on.

I don't know about thunderbolt, but the Apple Silicon macs I help my clients with have something really wrong and screwed up with how macOS or the firmware deals with USB 3.1+ external drives with constant disconnects despite sleeping hard-drives setting turned off etc. Searching on forums leads to similar issues others are having.

What brand and model of drive? This sounds similar to a hardware defect in some SanDisk Extreme SSDs; IIRC it was caused by firmware and/or overheating.

This is also quite convenient when you buy a new laptop and just unplug/plug and that's it, you have everything.

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