OWC, a manufacturer of expansion products for Apple devices, has announced the miniStack STX, the world’s first Thunderbolt 4 storage and hub expansion solution. Stackable with the Mac Mini, it can be connected to Thunderbolt or USB-equipped Macs, PCs, iPads, Chromebooks, and Android tablets.
OWC, the premier zero-emissions Mac and PC technology company, and a respected provider of Memory, External Drives, SSDs, Mac & PC Docking Solutions, Network Attached Storage, and Performance Upgrade Kits, announces the OWC miniStack STX, the world’s first Thunderbolt 4 Certified storage and hub expansion solution that seamlessly stacks with the Mac mini. It is also a Plug and Play expansion companion for Thunderbolt or USB-equipped Macs, PCs, iPads, Chromebooks, and Android tablets. Three Thunderbolt 4 (USB-C compatible) ports connect to millions of Thunderbolt, USB-C and future USB4 devices and accessories. A universal HDD/SSD bay and an NVMe M.2 SSD slot provide massive storage capacity expansion and can be combined in a RAID 1 configuration. With up to 770MB/s of storage performance, the OWC miniStack STX is great for bandwidth-intensive video editing, photography, audio, virtual machines, and everyday data backup and access tasks. Its heat-dissipating aircraft-grade aluminum with an internal heat sink and high-efficiency fan provides cool, nearly silent operation.
The miniStack STX can be combined with other drives and configured with an NVMe M.2 SSD and hard drive. Pricing begins at $299 for the DIY enclosure and goes up to $1,249.
The Thunderbolt ports can be used for charging devices and supports up to 60 watts of power delivery. OWC sells MacDrive ($49.99) software for Windows 10 users that allows a PC full access to the Mac drives.
Source: OWC (via PR Newswire)
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I had to look entirely too hard to find that the miniStack STX does indeed support a 3.5″ SATA drive. Still can’t find a measurement for the M.2 slot, but it looks to be 2280.
And this is the kind of thing that would make a future M1 Pro / Max Mini fairly usable. Be nice to see if they carry forward the 10Gbit ethernet port as well, which would make this a pretty potent ‘editing’ node’!
[QUOTE=”LazyGamer, post: 44090, member: 1367″]
I had to look entirely too hard to find that the miniStack STX does indeed support a 3.5″ SATA drive.
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Yeah, that was something I was wondering about too and that detail seemed to have slipped their minds. Glad you were able to find it.
[QUOTE=”LazyGamer, post: 44090, member: 1367″]
Still can’t find a measurement for the M.2 slot, but it looks to be 2280.
[/QUOTE]
Pretty sure it is. I included that pic just for that reason and like the HDD I didn’t see anything mentioning it.
All-in-all a pretty nifty device. A cross between a NAS, hub, and charging station with its own drive options. I can’t say I’ve ever seen anything quite like it before but nor have I had the need to look either.