M.2 NVMe 2280 to 2230 (x2) card/ribbon

[ClutchClutch]

Hey all. This is my first post on the forums. I read the rules and think I found the right place. Apologies for any faux pas I commit.

 

I really love small form factor tech, and I was wondering if it would be possible to make a M.2 ribbon cable or 2280 length card that allows multiple smaller 2230 cards to sit in the space of a 2280 slot. Kind of like a miniaturized PCIe to multi M.2 adapter card.

The purpose of this would be dual-booting something like windows and linux/SteamOS. Most BIOS don't allow you to boot off a partition, so a multiple drive adapter would theoretically be an easy solution, that doesn't include something like a dongle or external drive/dock.

 

Would something like this work? Would it need some sort of control hardward so multiple SSDs could communicate through the one M.2 slot?

 

I've seen a few LTT videos that mention people running whole set-ups on Steam Decks or ROG Allys. I was thinking about it for the Legion Go. It has a full size 2280 slot that fits double sided SSDs. You could have the common-use utility of windows, and the gaming efficiency of Proton and the like for better 1600p performance on that big screen, with no dongles or external drives or docks.

[Electronics Wizardy]

I don't see the point of this for dual booting.  Setting up a dual boot isn't that hard and supported by most oses these days. You can pretty easily setup 2 windows installs, 2 linux installs or a mix of windows + linux.

 

With EFI booting you don't boot from a drive, you boot from a EFI file on a partition.

 

A problem with this solution is thickness. You would need some complex design to make this without making it much thicker.

[RONOTHAN##]

3 minutes ago, ClutchClutch said:

Most BIOS don't allow you to boot off a partition, so a multiple drive adapter would theoretically be an easy solution, that doesn't include something like a dongle or external drive/dock.

I question the validity of this claim. Every board I've used that was made in the past 10 years has had support for this. There are still reasons to have multiple drives for doing a dual boot, mostly because Windows doesn't like it when it can't control the EFI partition, but that isn't to say you can't make it work. 

 

Also most motherboards, even ITX boards, will have at least 2 M.2 slots, so I don't really see the need for something like this. 

 

If you really do want something like this, I don't see why it wouldn't be possible to create a riser card that converts an M.2 slot to x2/x2 for two 2230 SSDs (there is compatibility concerns with how thick it is, though there's not many situations where I see this being that big a problem), though I'm not sure any exist since as said above, there's not much reason for one of these to exist. For something like a Legion Go I can kinda see it, but at the same time it's a niche within a niche within a niche product, especially since just getting a large M.2 drive and dealing with the possible EFI issues is a very valid option. 

[ClutchClutch]

1 minute ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

I don't see the point of this for dual booting.  Setting up a dual boot isn't that hard and supported by most oses these days. You can pretty easily setup 2 windows installs, 2 linux installs or a mix of windows + linux.

 

With EFI booting you don't boot from a drive, you boot from a EFI file on a partition.

 

A problem with this solution is thickness. You would need some complex design to make this without making it much thicker.

I admit I'm not familiar with UEFI vs BIOS, but that's certainly something I can research on my own.

The thickness is why I was thinking about a ribbon cable, like a splitter with one lead longer that then other, that you could easily fit in a double-side 80mm slot. But I don't know about controlling hardware for something like that.
 

[ClutchClutch]

3 minutes ago, RONOTHAN## said:

especially since just getting a large M.2 drive and dealing with the possible EFI issues is a very valid option. 

Agreed, I think my own ignorance of UEFI vs BIOS and EFI played a role in my question. It's been a hot minute since I dual booted a machine, when I did in the past it was custom linux distros for specific machine interfaces, and those ran off USB drives we had to boot out of the BIOS to use. But that was years ago.

 

I do still see a utility as machines get smaller, but I was mostly curious about any hardware controller requirements. I'm a novice with hot-table soldering, but have access to the equipment. I was curious about fabbing something up for a project, either a m.2 board or just a ribbon cable.

[Blue4130]

23 hours ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

 

A problem with this solution is thickness. You would need some complex design to make this without making it much thicker.

Another problem is bifurcation. I doubt any boards allow bifurcation of the m.2 slot.

[Electronics Wizardy]

12 minutes ago, Blue4130 said:

Another problem is bifurcation. I doubt any boards allow bifurcation of the m.2 slot.

I think OP was thinking about having a PCIe switch to switch between drives, and only have one usable at a time. I'm guessing this is possible, but liekly a produce that has a pretty small userbase.

 

One fun fact is some of the optane + qlc drives intel sold needed PCIe bifurcation support on the board. These are dead now, but a lot of oem systems probably support bifurcation on the m.2 slot because of this.