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upgraded from MBP 2012 to mac mini 2020, but having issues trying to use external SSD


SoSpiro

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I would like to use my 4TB SATA SSD externally to load my VST's and plug-ins in logic. I have a boatload of plug-ins and am not able to put them on the M1 limited 500GB onboard PCIE SSD. I am having MacOS issues with my 4TB SSD and am not able to choose the external SSD as a bootable disk from the mac mini on the internet recovery screen because the HD was greyed out with some error or reason why it couldn't download MacOS monterey on it (i forgot to note the error, but will update this post). Fine.....i give up on making my 4TB SSD the bootable SSD and just try to use is as an external HD, but now i'm not quite sure how to go about doing this and the external and the internal HD's have different OS's which i don't think will work for what i'm trying to do???? i'm seriously about to just go back to my 2012 MBP and call it a day because i'm not sure what to do here....

 

EDIT- my External SSD can only be formatted as APFS. i'm not sure if that's why i cannot update it to MacOS Monterey.

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I would like to use my 4TB SATA SSD externally to load my VST's and plug-ins in logic. I have a boatload of plug-ins and am not able to put them on the M1 limited 500GB onboard PCIE SSD. I am having MacOS issues with my 4TB SSD and am not able to choose the external SSD as a bootable disk from the mac mini on the internet recovery screen because the HD was greyed out with some error or reason why it couldn't download MacOS monterey on it (i forgot to note the error, but will update this post). Fine.....i give up on making my 4TB SSD the bootable SSD and just try to use is as an external HD, but now i'm not quite sure how to go about doing this and the external and the internal HD's have different OS's which i don't think will work for what i'm trying to do???? i'm seriously about to just go back to my 2012 MBP and call it a day because i'm not sure what to do here....

 

EDIT- my External SSD can only be formatted as APFS. i'm not sure if that's why i cannot update it to MacOS Monterey.

You don't need to have macOS installed on an external drive to host sample libraries on it. The plugins themselves will need to be installed on your boot drive, but the sample files can be hosted anywhere. Most plugins will have the option of relocating the sample files.

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I would like to use my 4TB SATA SSD externally to load my VST's and plug-ins in logic. I have a boatload of plug-ins and am not able to put them on the M1 limited 500GB onboard PCIE SSD. I am having MacOS issues with my 4TB SSD and am not able to choose the external SSD as a bootable disk from the mac mini on the internet recovery screen because the HD was greyed out with some error or reason why it couldn't download MacOS monterey on it (i forgot to note the error, but will update this post). Fine.....i give up on making my 4TB SSD the bootable SSD and just try to use is as an external HD, but now i'm not quite sure how to go about doing this and the external and the internal HD's have different OS's which i don't think will work for what i'm trying to do???? i'm seriously about to just go back to my 2012 MBP and call it a day because i'm not sure what to do here....

 

EDIT- my External SSD can only be formatted as APFS. i'm not sure if that's why i cannot update it to MacOS Monterey.

You don't need to have macOS installed on an external drive to host sample libraries on it. The plugins themselves will need to be installed on your boot drive, but the sample files can be hosted anywhere. Most plugins will have the option of relocating the sample files.

i have over 2TB of plug-ins and Vst's. do i absolutely need to buy at least a 2TB+ Pcie SSD and replace it with my onboard SSD just to use all of my plug-ins on this mac mini?

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i have over 2TB of plug-ins and Vst's. do i absolutely need to buy at least a 2TB+ Pcie SSD and replace it with my onboard SSD just to use all of my plug-ins on this mac mini?

You can split the 2TB between your boot drive and an external drive, but it's always good practice to keep samples off the boot drive for optimal performance.

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As has already been said, you dont need to run an OS on that drive. Depending on the age and speed of your SSD you may find the libraries wont run as fast as expected.

 

Im running big libraries on external SSD drives (see my sig) and only have 500GB internal drive. Everything runs OK.

 

Whatever you decide, dont let your SSDs get too full. I personally like at least 30% free on each drive.

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