[GUIDE] Add A Full Size M.2 SSD In An Asus GL551!

[iamdarkyoshi]

Because Asus decided to use a half height mSATA SSD. I don't have any half height mSATA SSDs of a decent capacity that work, but I did have a 256GB M.2 SSD. For this mod, you will need one of these:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/161907748747

 

This thing normally is for installing short m.2 SSDs in a full size mSATA slot, but can be broken down to a half height card.

 

After doing this, we will need to make two more mods. One, the fan.  

 

Notch out a little bit of the fan chassis

 

Then, install the SSD. It will be at an angle, but it works perfectly fine.

 

To hold it in place, get creative

 

Then, you will need to break off this peg in the bottom case, it has simply become a hole now. This peg used to mount just to the left of the SSD.

 

And close it up and test it!

 

Now to reinstall windows 10

 

Again

[Energycore]

Lol that's so ghetto. I love it

[Mira Yurizaki]

Poor drive though, it looks like it'll see many rounds of cooking from the heat pipe.

[vanished]

Two things concern me, in this order:

1. That hole you cut for the fan will in theory reduce its effectiveness since air will now leak out through the hole rather than going out through the heatsink where it is supposed to
2. I hope that wire you're holding the drive in with doesn't touch any of the electrical parts on the drive, or anything else for that matter.

1 minute ago, M.Yurizaki said:

Poor drive though, it looks like it'll see many rounds of cooking from the heat pipe.

This too, good catch

Edited December 21, 2016 by Ryan_Vickers

[iamdarkyoshi]

11 minutes ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

Two things concern me, in this order:

1. That hole you cut for the fan will in theory reduce its effectiveness since air will now leak out through the hole rather than going out through the heatsink where it is supposed to
2. I hope that wire you're holding the drive in with doesn't touch any of the electrical parts on the drive, or anything else for that matter.

This too, good catch

11 minutes ago, M.Yurizaki said:

Poor drive though, it looks like it'll see many rounds of cooking from the heat pipe.

The hole I cut has been effectively sealed by the SSD. I ran AIDA64 on it for an hour, never passed 85 on the CPU + GPU. Identical to its previous performance.

 

The case intakes air where the RAM is, so the SSD is between the ram and fan, and actually gets cooled by it.

 

It was an insulated paperclip

[vanished]

4 minutes ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

The hole I cut has been effectively sealed by the SSD. I ran AIDA64 on it for an hour, never passed 85 on the CPU + GPU. Identical to its previous performance.

 

The case intakes air where the RAM is, so the SSD is between the ram and fan, and actually gets cooled by it.

 

It was an insulated paperclip

Oh good, sounds like it'll be ok then

[manikyath]

i approve of this bodge.

[MarvinL]

Sorry to ressurect this thread, but I have the exact same laptop and I need to replace the SSD. I still can't seem to find any good/branded half-size mSATA SSDs. I wonder how this bodge has been holding up. I'm very skeptical about making these permanent modifications to my laptop, but it might be just better than getting a shady SSD.

[iamdarkyoshi]

3 hours ago, MarvinL said:

Sorry to ressurect this thread, but I have the exact same laptop and I need to replace the SSD. I still can't seem to find any good/branded half-size mSATA SSDs. I wonder how this bodge has been holding up. I'm very skeptical about making these permanent modifications to my laptop, but it might be just better than getting a shady SSD.

Absolutely perfectly. I sold the machine not too long ago to a friend and it's still working flawlessly.

 

Get like a samsung 860 evo m.2 SSD for it

[MarvinL]

6 hours ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

Absolutely perfectly. I sold the machine not too long ago to a friend and it's still working flawlessly.

 

Get like a samsung 860 evo m.2 SSD for it

Great! How's the performance though? No performance degradation with using that adapter? And I was also wondering why you didnt use a smaller m.2 SSD so that you didnt have to make a hole on the fan chassis

[iamdarkyoshi]

10 hours ago, MarvinL said:

Great! How's the performance though? No performance degradation with using that adapter? And I was also wondering why you didnt use a smaller m.2 SSD so that you didnt have to make a hole on the fan chassis

Performance is identical. All the adapter is doing is adapting one physical standard to another, the electrical standard, sata, is still the same.

 

As for height, this was the most common sized SSD, so I just rolled with it

 

I already had the SSD on hand, anyway

[MarvinL]

12 hours ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

Performance is identical. All the adapter is doing is adapting one physical standard to another, the electrical standard, sata, is still the same.

 

As for height, this was the most common sized SSD, so I just rolled with it

 

I already had the SSD on hand, anyway

Thanks for the reply! I'll probably have to go this route, but I'll use a smaller SSD so I dont have to make that hole. Thanks again!

[MarvinL]

Oh one more thing, do you think a full-size mSATA would work? Just a little at an angle? Or is the angle really too high that it wont get detected?

[iamdarkyoshi]

4 hours ago, MarvinL said:

Oh one more thing, do you think a full-size mSATA would work? Just a little at an angle? Or is the angle really too high that it wont get detected?

It might work, but the angle may be too steep for the case to close