Trim for external SSD (M1 mini)

[Significant1]

The manufacturer's don't seem very concerned as above.

What can any Mac user do if they do care?

The Spaceman thing in the other thread may be useful but does not seem an easily applicable tool at this point.

Otherwise stick to Thunderbolt connected SSDs.

Enable UASP (USB Attached SCSI Protocol). Some links indicate it is built and you can check if it is activated by checking System Report > Software > Extensions > IOUSBAttachedSCSI. But I have never seen it on my machines.

My 2TB WD My Passport SSD supports it though WD own utilities.But only HFS+ or exfat and keep it as single partition IIRC. Best to format through the WD utility to be sure. It is still possible to toggle the UASP switch on APFS formatted drive, but file operations become unusably slow.

I ended up buying an nvme adapter and upgrading the internal ssd on my old MBA, because connection was unstable, when having it permanently attached as intended. That solved stability and trim with APFS. Now I just need to find a new purpose for my 2TB external ssd.

 

[white7561]

Enable UASP (USB Attached SCSI Protocol). Some links indicate it is built and you can check if it is activated by checking System Report > Software > Extensions > IOUSBAttachedSCSI. But I have never seen it on my machines.

My 2TB WD My Passport SSD supports it though WD own utilities.But only HFS+ or exfat and keep it as single partition IIRC. Best to format through the WD utility to be sure. It is still possible to toggle the UASP switch on APFS formatted drive, but file operations become unusably slow.

I ended up buying an nvme adapter and upgrading the internal ssd on my old MBA, because connection was unstable, when having it permanently attached as intended. That solved stability and trim with APFS. Now I just need to find a new purpose for my 2TB external ssd.

To check if UASP is enabled on the currently connected USB devices. Just do " ioreg | grep UAS "

If it shows results then yeah it's enabled if it's empty. Then it's not using UASP. If you grep "mass" etc it's prob gonna show that it's using the usual mass storage driver.

Regarding UASP support on Mac OS. It depends on the chipset though. VL716Q4 doesn't support UASP on Mac. Jmicron one does. My NVMe enclosure with ASM2362 does too

 

[Mike Boreham]

Enable UASP (USB Attached SCSI Protocol). Some links indicate it is built and you can check if it is activated by checking System Report > Software > Extensions > IOUSBAttachedSCSI. But I have never seen it on my machines.

My 2TB WD My Passport SSD supports it though WD own utilities.But only HFS+ or exfat and keep it as single partition IIRC. Best to format through the WD utility to be sure. It is still possible to toggle the UASP switch on APFS formatted drive, but file operations become unusably slow.

I ended up buying an nvme adapter and upgrading the internal ssd on my old MBA, because connection was unstable, when having it permanently attached as intended. That solved stability and trim with APFS. Now I just need to find a new purpose for my 2TB external ssd.

So in summary, the answer to my question..."What can a Mac user do about it?" ..... the answer seems to be not much!

Moving to full thunderbolt externals is one way. I have 3TB on two Thunderbolt NVMe externals and will probably not get anymore USB SSD devices, not just for this reason, which as I have said I think is not as important as made out.

(BTW That extension doesn't appear on either of my Macs)

 

[Significant1]

So in summary, the answer to my question..."What can a Mac user do about it?" ..... the answer seems to be not much!

Installing and running the intended support apps from the manufacturer, if available, is very much something a Mac user can do. But built-in native OS support is nicer, much nicer in case of WD with its outdated file-system support (unless they have improved on this in the meantime), and white7561's answer gives me hope.

 

[Mike Boreham]

Installing and running the intended support apps from the manufacturer is very much something a Mac user can do. But built-in native OS support is nicer, much nicer in case of WD with its outdated file-system support (unless they have improved on this in the meantime), and white7561's answer gives me hope.

Yes lack of APFS support would rule it out for me.

 

[Ethosik]

This has been an ongoing discussion for years. But I still have an older Samsung SSD in my 2010 Mac Pro and have never enabled TRIM and have never had any issues. I never enabled TRIM on my Samsung T5s and don't experience issues and I constantly fill it up and clear it out on a weekly basis.

 

[white7561]

Installing and running the intended support apps from the manufacturer, if available, is very much something a Mac user can do. But built-in native OS support is nicer, much nicer in case of WD with its outdated file-system support (unless they have improved on this in the meantime), and white7561's answer gives me hope.

If you checked the other thread. It seems that trim is actually now running on external SSDs. As long as it's unmap capable and I assume it only works if it connects using UASP which is confirmable using the command above.

 

[CMMChris]

I checked my logs and indeed TRIM is being run on both of my 2.5-inch SSD enclosures (both of them are rather cheap Chinese models). TRIM appears to be triggered after plugging them in as well as every 15 minutes if the disk is in idle. Good to know! The screenshot shows my external 1TB Final Cut SSD (ADATA SU650).

 

[white7561]

I checked my logs and indeed TRIM is being run on both of my 2.5-inch SSD enclosures (both of them are rather cheap Chinese models). TRIM appears to be triggered after plugging them in as well as every 15 minutes if the disk is in idle. Good to know! The screenshot shows my external 1TB Final Cut SSD (ADATA SU650).
View attachment 1919404

On disk utility does it say as Solid State? And what Chip is it using? The enclosure chip.

 

[CMMChris]

Solid State says "No" in Disk Utility, so apparently that doesn't matter.
Chipset appears to be a JMicron JMS578.

 

[white7561]

Solid State says "No" in Disk Utility, so apparently that doesn't matter.
Chipset appears to be a JMicron JMS578.

Interesting. Hmm. Welp as long as it's running i guess

 

[Basic75]

Solid State says "No" in Disk Utility, so apparently that doesn't matter.
Chipset appears to be a JMicron JMS578.

There really should be a support document from Apple on this subject.

 

[white7561]

Interesting. it does trim my TM drives. So i do know my TM backup drives enclosure supports UASP since i can see it's connected using UASP on my Mac. And since my drives (2.5inch Seagate with 2TB of capacity) is an SMR drive which supports trimming. It actually trims it. that's actually pretty cool.. I think that's actually one of the reasons why it takes a long time to format the drive back when i got the new MBP 2021.

2021-11-29 06:15:44.686475+0700 0xb7a35 Default 0x0 0 0 kernel: (apfs) spaceman_scan_free_blocks:3153: disk7 scan took 78.020216 s, trims took 73.999477 s
2021-11-29 06:15:44.686481+0700 0xb7a35 Default 0x0 0 0 kernel: (apfs) spaceman_scan_free_blocks:3155: disk7 395446431 blocks free in 3761 extents
2021-11-29 06:15:44.686485+0700 0xb7a35 Default 0x0 0 0 kernel: (apfs) spaceman_scan_free_blocks:3163: disk7 395446431 blocks trimmed in 3761 extents (19675 us/trim, 50 trims/s)
2021-11-29 06:15:44.686495+0700 0xb7a35 Default 0x0 0 0 kernel: (apfs) spaceman_scan_free_blocks:3166: disk7 trim distribution 1:908 2+:382 4+:840 16+:607 64+:435 256+:589

 

[CMMChris]

It even does run TRIM on my Raid (Raid 0 with 4x 4TB WD Red). They are non SMR hard disks.

 

[white7561]

It even does run TRIM on my Raid (Raid 0 with 4x 4TB WD Red). They are non SMR hard disks.
View attachment 1920065

Now that's weird. They shouldn't be Trim-able right? Unless they are Trim-able

 

[CMMChris]

Yes, really strange. Is TRIM even supported at all with RAIDs?!

 

[white7561]

Yes, really strange. Is TRIM even supported at all with RAIDs?!

Idk ?. That's why it's weird

 

[jnofi]

@white7561 Does this mean I can buy a SanDisk Extreme Portable v2 with an ASM2362 chipset (that, according to your info, supports UASP) and have trim automatically enabled in the current macOS? Or do I need to do anything?

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but I'm not sure I understood correctly. Also, what is the command to check the logs for successful trim?

 

[white7561]

@white7561 Does this mean I can buy a SanDisk Extreme Portable v2 with an ASM2362 chipset (that, according to your info, supports UASP) and have trim automatically enabled in the current macOS? Or do I need to do anything?

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but I'm not sure I understood correctly. Also, what is the command to check the logs for successful trim?

It should in theory. UASP is definitely enabled on mine .u can check using ioreg | grep UAS .when your USB is plugged in (make sure its the only one to make sure that it is the one being detected) although i cant be sure that it will be enabled on yours since even if the chip supports it. firmware versions can vary. i think its gonna be enabled tho.. on the trim logs it does show the successful trim. but well i cant really see if its true or not.

The command to check trim thingy is
log show --predicate "processID == 0" --start "2021-11-29" | grep spaceman
change the date accordingly. and this command only shows trim attempts for APFS partitions i think since spaceman is only for APFS as far as im aware

 

[Basic75]

The command to check trim thingy is
log show --predicate "processID == 0" --start "2021-11-29" | grep spaceman
change the date accordingly. and this command only shows trim attempts for APFS partitions i think since spaceman is only for APFS as far as im aware

You might want to change the starting date in the command.

 

[white7561]

You might want to change the starting date in the command.

yeah. that's why i said to do it on my post above

The command to check trim thingy is
log show --predicate "processID == 0" --start "2021-11-29" | grep spaceman
change the date accordingly. and this command only shows trim attempts for APFS partitions i think since spaceman is only for APFS as far as im aware

 

[Basic75]

yeah. that's why i said to do it on my post above

Sorry, I should have said change it to --start `date "+%Y-%m-%d"`so that it always does "today".

 

[jnofi]

Thanks for the detailed response and for the commands. I'm getting my new Macbook later this week and then I'll check!

 

[yifuhood]

the only trim able USB external drive on Mac is ASM1153e chip, with active trim. others are passive trim passible. if you have ASM1153e here is the firmware and tool. choose 141126_A1_EE_82_UASP_TRIM. (141126_A1_EE_83) not include it is private for Ugreen, maybe dangerous to flash. after you will see from System report, it shows as " Drive type SSD " . done.

forgot , you need parallel to do it. or a windows PC.
works on all Mac ,intel m1 m1 pro ,so on.
otherwise I would recommend a MLC sm2246en or sandforce the old fellows. Reasons to much to write. otherwise don't matter, give you drive some overprovision it will be fine. Especially if you just use it for sequential, no real difference at all

 

[haralds]

Trim eases wear leveling on drives that are filled close to capacity, which is not a good idea for SSDs in any case.
With the current generation of Macs, Thunderbolt is the way to go. They are not that much more expensive and offer better performance.