Nevermind Joe on BH question, just applied Payboo, but 14 days for them to decide, and even then you part 2 with 25 forms, and then wait again, so just ordered Mini from Apple, but want comment on it anyway ok...
I just wanted to point out that the reason B&H does not use third-party replacements or add-ons in Macs with Apple Silicon is they are built into the same
blanket as the CPUs and GPUs and for all intents and purposes impossible to replace. Having everything “on the same blanket” is a major contributor to the performance of M1/M2 Macs because it makes communications between the processor, memory, and storage so much faster by eliminating the necessity of moving data from one to the other.
As to checking CF or SD cards and thumb drives they have no reporting technology analogous to S.M.A.R.T. or NVMe, so there is nothing to analyze. CF and SD cards were initially created for use on cameras and similar devices that lacked the processing power to analyze or do anything about that kind of data, so it was never contemplated in the standard. Similarly, thumb drives were never intended for use apart from transferring data from one device to another, so the added expense was deemed unnecessary. There are a few thumb drive like SSDs on the market and although I no longer have one I could test, I assume those would support NVMe attribute reporting.
