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macOS Tahoe brings a new disk image format
ASIF disk images are new in Tahoe, and promise to be space efficient, as they’re sparse files, and almost as fast as the disk they’re stored on. Ideal for VMs and general use.
In the wrong circumstances, an encrypted sparse image (UDSP) stored on the blazingly fast internal SSD of an Apple silicon Mac may write files no faster than 100 MB/s, typical for a cheap hard drive. This has been detailed as a major improvement in lightweight virtualisation, where it promises to overcome the most significant performance limitation of VMs running on Apple silicon Macs. Unless a sparse bundle is required (for example when it’s hosted on a different file system such as that in a NAS), ASIF should be first choice for general purpose disk images in Tahoe.
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