Gen5 SSDs on Hackintosh

[TripleYoThreat]

Any consensus on em?

Surprised there isn't much about it
Found someone having kernel panics and reboots with a T700, just like me with the Aorus Gen5 12000 :/. someone mentioned some stability with a Teamgroup Z540 so bought one now

Happy to try any other things while I have this Aorus

 

[ori69]

I looked at PCIe 5 gen drives, there are 34. Most of them are on Phison E26. They only differ in transfers.

SSDs

Master List Brand,Model,Interface,Form Factor,Capacities,Controller,Configuration,DRAM,HMB,NAND Brand,NAND Type,Layers,R/W (Up to, in MB/s),Categories,Notes (*),Product Page,Product Page 2,Affiliate Link Acer,SA100,SATA/AHCI,2.5",120GB-1.92TB,Maxio MAS0902A,Dual-core, 4-Ch, 8-CE/ch,No,N/A,TLC,56...

docs.google.com

 

[etorix]

For PCIe 4.0, beside forum knowledge, there is this compatibility list from Sonnet.
The trend is generally not good: PCIe 3.0 drives generally work, but PCIe 4.0 drives from Intel/Solidigm, Kioxia and Micron do not work with macOS; Samsung is somewhat mixed (PM1733 yes, PM9A3 no). The happy exception is WD (hence the general recommendation for SN850 drives, in M.2 format).

No real Mac supports PCIe 5.0. Of course, it is possible to test, and use, PCIe 5.0 devices at PCIe 4.0 speed but I suspect we will have to rely on user testing—knowing that there's a fairly high risk that the shiny new and expensive PCIe 5.0 drive will just not work, or, much worse, will work until it doesn't and self-immolate the way Samsung 980 drives did.

 

[Edhawk]

I could use some more light here. I have drives with the Phison E16 (Sabrent Rocket), E18 (Team A440), and the E21T (Silicon Power UD90) - which all work fine with macOS. How do these work / why does mac have drivers for them?

The fact these controllers ‘work in macOS’ is probably more luck than judgement, in my opinion. As Apple haven’t added drivers to macOS for these controllers, as they don’t use them.

To my mind these other Phison controllers working simply means they don’t clash as much with the macOS setup as the Phison 26 NVMe controllers. Hence they don’t cause the same KP’s as the 5th Gen controllers.

There is also the fact that Apple will never implement PCIe 5.0 on any of their Intel Macs. So the expectation that any 5th Gen M.2 drive will work to a similar level as it does in Windows or Linux is currently to my mind wishful thinking.

My hope is that Western Digital/SanDisk produce a 5th Gen drive that uses a controller that is compatible with macOS. Incorporating the features that make their current 4th Gen drives work so much better a more consistently than the other manufacturers drives.

 

[ori69]

Apple has long used RAID to connect NAND chips. Therefore, PCIe Gen 5 may not be supported for a long time.

Any consensus on em?

Surprised there isn't much about it
Found someone having kernel panics and reboots with a T700, just like me with the Aorus Gen5 12000 :/. someone mentioned some stability with a Teamgroup Z540 so bought one now

Happy to try any other things while I have this Aorus

I'm waiting for the tests Z540.

 

[TripleYoThreat]

Z540 crashes / KP less than Aorus Gen5, but still does it frequently.

T700 was tested by another user as well to crash as much as Aorus Gen5

MP700 hasn't been tested yet

Will pre order the Team GE Pro on Amazon which will be the first gen5 SSD not having the Phison E26 controller

The fact these controllers ‘work in macOS’ is probably more luck than judgement, in my opinion.

Interesting. Hopefully some controller of the gen5 SSDs works well with macOS. Wishful thinking maybe, sure, but wishes can come true

 

[ori69]

Z540 crashes / KP less than Aorus Gen5, but still does it frequently.

T700 was tested by another user as well to crash as much as Aorus Gen5

MP700 hasn't been tested yet

Will pre order the Team GE Pro on Amazon which will be the first gen5 SSD not having the Phison E26 controller



Interesting. Hopefully some controller of the gen5 SSDs works well with macOS. Wishful thinking maybe, sure, but wishes can come true

Are you using this SSD as a system or for data?
Can you paste the tests with AmorphousDiskMark or Aja Lite?

 

[TripleYoThreat]

Excuse me for the delay, rolled my ankle bad, etc.

I used it as an OS drive, for system, for both of them. I could imagine it faring differently as a data drive, but it's still likely to cause the KP here and there. I could be wrong on this, but in fact, I do remember even the Gen4 drive OS crashing with the same KP, just while the Phison E26 drive was plugged in. It did have an OS on it so who knows if it would fare differently as strictly a secondary data drive, with no OS on it. In fact I still have the Z540 here, I can test it for you if you'd like. Returned the Aorus Gen5 12000

Amorphous was making it KP, ran it through Windows CrystalDiskMark and here are the results

Z540:

Aorus Gen5 12000:

An important note, though I believe this may have been established by others before:

A Gen5 SSD without a heatsink performs far worse than a Gen4 SSD without a heatsink. So if space is a concern, or a heatsink is not desired for whatever reason, a Gen4 is a must

It seems the Innogrit is promising to provide better thermals without heatsinks as well. It seems to be a better controller overall, macOS compatibility is the only question mark

Eagerly awaiting February 9th to pre order it. No MSRP yet, but I doubt it's more than $160 / 1TB

Hope all have been well!

 

[etorix]

Another negative report for Crucial T700 at macos86.it.

 

[trs96]

At $85 per TB the SN850X is still the best choice for any hackintosh.
Random reads and writes will be very close to the fastest Gen 5 NVMe.
Why spend double to get fractions of a second improvements in the
things that matter ? Even NVMe SSDs are subject to the law of
diminishing returns.