m.2 vs sata ssd

[megatronends]

is it worth spending a bit extra for m.2 ssd over normal sata ssd ?

mobo: asus pro gamer z97

[deVIZtation]

M.2 uses available PCI express lanes so yeah, it is worth it if you are into speed. Normal SATA you can really only get up to around 560 max read/write, where as M.2 can surpass that.

[FuzzyYellow]

M.2 uses available PCI express lanes so yeah, it is worth it if you are into speed. Normal SATA you can really only get up to around 560 max read/write, where as M.2 can surpass that.

some M.2 slots/ssd are sata. not all are PCIE

[Mighty_Miro_WD]

Hi there @megatronends!

 

Basically the mSATA is just a size reduction primarily designed for laptops or other portable devices, and mSATA will work just a little bit faster, and a M.2 can be either native PCIe or SATA. However, keep in mind that PCIe SSDs are quite power hungry, which means form factor, heat dissipation and airflow become important. 

 

The main benefit of a SSD is low latency. When doing sequential operations on SATA, the transfer rate will be capped at around 550 MB/s range, and the advantage of the newer PCIe based devices is the possibility of upping the sequential transfer rates from 550 to perhaps 1000 or more theoretically. 

 

Hope this helps.

 

Cheers!

[DarkSmith2]

[chaddesch]

Hey, thanks for posting this. I have an Asus z97m, and I just put in an 128GB Samsung SM951. It's great and I'm only using about 50GB of it without having loaded any games yet. My plan was to run it as my boot drive, which I'm now doing, and get a WD black 1TB as my secondary drive. I'm using an old, noisy Toshiba as my current secondary drive. When I first started looking at 1TB drives I saw that I could just get a 512gb SSD pretty easily for $150, and I'm leaning in that direction now. Now I'm wondering if the $110 I paid for the SM951 is really worth it if I'm just going to pair it up with another SSD. Yeah, the SM951 is more than twice as fast, but I wonder if I'd really notice the difference or care when I get 4 times the storage for only $40 more. Thoughts?

[Mighty_Miro_WD]

Hi there @chaddesch!

 

IMHO it depends on what are you need more - speed or capacity. If you're going for the speed performance then the SSD will suit better, and if the storage space is more needed, then a HDD will suit better. 

 

For games in particular, the only real benefit will be the reduced loading times (for instance in open world games and such that have to load often and load in objects, etc.) because the data transfer speed of a SSD is higher than that of a HDD.

 

Cheers!

[chaddesch]

is it worth spending a bit extra for m.2 ssd over normal sata ssd ?

mobo: asus pro gamer z97

 

Hi @megatronends I noticed yesterday that the z97 series mobos only offer two lanes for the m.2 card so make sure you don't spring for the xp941 or sm951 like I did. Like @FuzzyYellow said, some m.2 are sata and some are pcie. If you go for the m.2 pcie card, expect to get capped around 780 read and 650 write or so with most mobos that support m.2 cards since the four lane variety isn't really mainstream yet. I've read that those mobos that do offer four lanes like asrock's don't natively support using the m.2 as your boot drive and require some pain-in-the-butt tinkering. That being said, the speed is still better than sata, but imo the premium for the m.2 isn't quite worth it right now. The sata m.2 cards are still more expensive than their 2.5mm counterparts; so those clearly aren't worth it. That being said, if you can find an m.2 sata card that's selling for around the same price as it's 2.5mm, I'd go for it just to save the space and for no cable management.

 

Alternatively, you can spring for a pcie adapter to get the m.2 card running on one of your pcie slots, but that option seemed silly to me, so I'm just going to return my SM951. You could also spring for an Intel 750 if you want that kind of speed. Those things are BA.

 

 

Also like @Mighty_Miro_WD said, heat dissipation can be an issue with the SM951s. They have no way of dealing with it, so they can end up throttling. I found this review helpful: http://techreport.com/review/28446/samsung-sm951-pcie-ssd-reviewed

 

Cheers,

Chad

[megatronends]

thanks for the info. i currently went with samsung sata ssd. but in future can add intel 750 nvme ssd to my system. its crazy insane. only if my mobo supports it