nvme to PCIe adapter - any downside to super cheap ones?

[German_John]

Hey all,

so I bought a new nvme SSD and my motherboard only has one slot. I do have a PCIe x1 slot left over that I could put an adapter into (yes, I know, won't give me full bandwidth, but eh, better than no storage I guess, and probably still as fast as a SATA SSD)

I can find some for fairly cheap (15€) on Amazon and some for WICKED cheap (2 to 5€) on eBay. Is there any reason not to use the super cheap ones? From my understanding, nvme is basically PCIe anyway, so are those just physical adapter to make the pins line up? If so, there shouldn't be much harm in getting the cheapo ones, right?

 

Best wishes,

John

[NewMaxx]

Yes, the "dumb" adapters are cheap and don't use any sort of controller, they pass the lanes. So they work just fine.

[Senzelian]

1 hour ago, German_John said:

nvme is basically PCIe anyway

First of all, the cheap adapters should be just fine, but I wanted to touch on this sentence I quoted.
 

HDDs and SSDs (or SSMs (Solid State Modules) are being specified by the following technologies:

• Protocoll (ATA, NVMe, ...)
• Interface (PCI-e, SATA, ATAPI, AHCI, SAS ...)
• Connector (PCI-e x4, PCI-e x16, M.2, U.2, SATA, SFF-8643, ...)
• Formfactor (2.5", 3.5", M.2 2280, ...)

You can almost always mix these with each other however you want and get a functional drive.

 

What you consider to be a NVMe SSD uses the NVMe protcoll, on a PCI-e interface, with probably a M.2 connector in a M.2 2280 formfactor.

 

So back to your quote:
NVMe is not PCIe, but both technologies are often combined.

[German_John]

Spoiler

 

Thanks everyone! I'll be ordering and waiting for China Post to deliver it. So I guess I'll have it in, like, June.