Hardware Encryption on Crucial X10 Pro

realmitten wrote:

How can I set Hardware Encryption on Crucial X10 Pro? I can't seem to find the Crucial Utility that is supposed to do this on a Mac.

I don't think Crucial has any macOS software to manage the Crucial external SSDs.

You can still use the SSD without using the Crucial SSD's built-in hardware encryption. If you want to encrypt the data on that SSD, then you can erase the whole physical external drive as GUID partition and APFS (encrypted) file system option.

https://support.apple.com/guide/disk-utility/erase-and-reformat-a-storage-device-dskutl14079/mac

If you need to share this SSD with a Windows system by using the exFAT or NTFS file system (exFAT would be preferred since it doesn't require yet another third party driver), then you would need to use the third party open source utility VeraCrypt which is available for macOS, Windows, and Linux.

I would not use the device manufacturer’s encryption option regardless. If you do, you’re at the mercy of the manufacturer to keep the software updated. Several users reported they were unable to access their Seagate/LaCie and Samsung drives after updating to macOS Tahoe, for that reason.

Use Disk Utility as HWTech suggests.

An Overview of Hardware Encryption

What is hardware encryption?

Hardware encryption means the encryption happens within the drive. An SSD that has encryption built into the hardware is more commonly referred to as a Self-Encrypting Drive (SED). The majority of Crucial® SSDs are SEDs.

realmitten wrote:

Thanks! I get the idea of hardware encryption. From searching I understood that I would need a utility to set the password - otherwise the drive would encrypt/decrypt freely. The software that I thought I needed is Crucial Portable SSD Utility Software for Mac. I also read that on a Windows machine the Bitlocker app could (transparently) do this - resulting in hardware encryption speed with Bitlocker familiarity. Links to download the Crucial Portable SSD Utility Software for Mac were dead ends.

All the more reason Not to use Third Party On Device Encryption Software

Firmware software is very tricky even on Apple computers

realmitten wrote:

...hardware encryption speed...

MacOS handles the encryption/decryption fast enough that there is no meaningful impact. Perhaps at Thunderbolt 5 speeds it would matter, but with the 2000 MB/s max speeds of the Crucial drive, it won't. I run apps and stream 4K video from a macOS-encrypted Samsung T9 (same speeds as the Crucial X10 Pro) with no issues.