M.2 vs current gen hardware

[Flowey]

Yeah I builded my PC about 3 weeks ago and I'm now trying to future prrof mah knowledge. Right now I'm studying M.2 cable format and I'm kind of wondering if it's going to replace SATA 6gb/s cables, which are so common these days. At least that's what I'm running with.

 

Otherwise, anyone has a good secure site for the latest tech news? I want to know when tech which is possibly going to replace the current standard comes out, you know?

[Goodman2265]

M.2 will never replace SATA. Its fact

[xiej]

M.2 isn't a cable.

[Flowey]

1 minute ago, xiej said:

M.2 isn't a cable.

Hehehe my bad wth was I thinking, I still need to know if it's going to be commonplace anytime soon. Like, PCIe's been there for a long ass time, at least from my understanding. So is it going to be replaced soon? If so, by what?

[mikat]

do you mean U.2?

 

because:

 

U.2:

ssd with m.2 connector:

Sata:

 

 

[Flowey]

Just now, mikat said:

do you mean U.2?

 

because:

 

U.2:

ssd with m.2 connector:

Sata:

 

 

Yeah I think I was braindead when I wrote this, I meant replace PCIe, not SATA

[LogicalDrm]

M.2 is connector rather than cable. It might replace or rather make useless SATA cable connectors, but thats really hard to say at this point. It might take 10 years for that to happen. IDE hasn't been dead that long either. And your just built PC will need new mobo, CPU and RAM faster than what PCIe and SATA standards change.

 

As for good news sites. Pretty much all that are used base for forums Tech News section. You probably aren't looking cutting edge/early adopter tech in any case. Consumer worthy stuff needs 2-5 years to become worth of money.

[Moonzy]

13 minutes ago, Flowey said:

Yeah I builded my PC about 3 weeks ago and I'm now trying to future prrof mah knowledge. Right now I'm studying M.2 cable format and I'm kind of wondering if it's going to replace SATA 6gb/s cables, which are so common these days. At least that's what I'm running with.

 

Otherwise, anyone has a good secure site for the latest tech news? I want to know when tech which is possibly going to replace the current standard comes out, you know?

m.2 is for fast SSD drives

abd sata ia for slower ssd/HDD, unless HDD needs the speed m.2 provides, i doubt sata ports will be gone

but there might a possibility that large storage of ssd is cheaper than hdd, and cheaper... but that wont be coming anytime in the near future

 

[mikat]

Just now, Flowey said:

Yeah I think I was braindead when I wrote this, I meant replace PCIe, not SATA

you do also know that PCIe is not a cable (unless you count risers)?

[xiej]

Just now, Flowey said:

Hehehe my bad wth was I thinking, I still need to know if it's going to be commonplace anytime soon. Like, PCIe's been there for a long ass time, at least from my understanding. So is it going to be replaced soon? If so, by what?

 

SATA will stick around for Hard Drives, M.2 for mostly laptops/M-ITX, and U.2 for fast 2.5 inch SSDs

[Moonzy]

1 minute ago, Flowey said:

Yeah I think I was braindead when I wrote this, I meant replace PCIe, not SATA

well... for storage it pretty much will replace pcie, but i dont see it replacing for gpu anytime soon

[Flowey]

Just now, mikat said:

you do also know that PCIe is not a cable (unless you count risers)?

HAHAHA yeah I sure do. I told y'all I had a braindead moment.

[Flowey]

2 minutes ago, Moonzy said:

m.2 is for fast SSD drives

abd sata ia for slower ssd/HDD, unless HDD needs the speed m.2 provides, i doubt sata ports will be gone

but there might a possibility that large storage of ssd is cheaper than hdd, and cheaper... but that wont be coming anytime in the near future

 

Well not consumer side that's for sure.

[Glenwing]

54 minutes ago, Flowey said:

Yeah I think I was braindead when I wrote this, I meant replace PCIe, not SATA

M.2 isn't any kind of communication protocol, so it won't be replacing anything like PCIe or SATA.

 

M.2 is a type of physical connector shape. The M.2 connector can be used for any number of different protocols, including SATA, PCIe, or USB, but it doesn't have its own special "M.2" protocol, it just carries other protocols that already exist. "M.2 SSD" is just a form factor, just like "3.5 hard drive". A 3.5" hard drive could use IDE, it could use SATA, it could use SAS. Of course, these do have different connectors so that you can't plug SATA hard drives into IDE motherboard connectors, and so forth. After all, using the exact same connector for a bunch of different things that are not compatible with each other would be a really dumb idea, now wouldn't it...?

 

Many early M.2 SSDs used the SATA 6Gb/s protocol, and were no different than 2.5" SATA drives. Higher-end M.2 SSDs today use the PCI Express protocol. There are different configurations of PCIe that M.2 can be equipped with as well, PCIe 2.0 ×2, PCIe 2.0 ×4, PCIe 3.0 ×2, PCIe 3.0 ×4.

 

Just like different 3.5" hard drives have different connectors for each protocol they might use, M.2 cards have many different connectors, so M.2 SSDs that use PCI Express cannot be used with motherboard M.2 slots that only support SATA, and M.2 SSDs using the SATA protocol cannot be used with motherboards that only support PCI Express M.2, and 4-lane M.2 PCIe SSDs cannot be used in motherboards that support only 2-lane PCIe SSDs, and the list goes on and on... of course everyone has done a really terrible job of making clear exactly what configuration their SSDs and motherboard support (motherboards can be configured in ways that support both SATA and 2-lane PCIe, or SATA and 2 and 4-lane PCIe, again it goes on and on...), everything just says "M.2" with no indication of what keying it uses, for checking compatibility. Really M.2 is a very poorly designed and poorly executed "standard" IMO.

 

M.2, as a card slot like mSATA, also doesn't really lend itself to having cables attached to it, so some motherboard manufacturers have started putting SAS connectors on their motherboards, but wiring the pins to PCIe instead of SAS controllers, and have renamed them to "U.2" because it's easier than calling them by their actual names (SFF-8643 and SFF-8639). Because again obviously reusing a connector that is already in use for something else which is completely incompatible, is an extremely good idea that definitely won't cause any confusion whatsoever.

[Flowey]

1 hour ago, Moonzy said:

 

 

53 minutes ago, Glenwing said:

M.2 isn't any kind of communication protocol, so it won't be replacing anything like PCIe or SATA.

 

M.2 is a type of physical connector shape. The M.2 connector can be used for any number of different protocols, including SATA, PCIe, or USB, but it doesn't have its own special "M.2" protocol, it just carries other protocols that already exist. "M.2 SSD" is just a form factor, just like "3.5 hard drive". A 3.5" hard drive could use IDE, it could use SATA, it could use SAS. Of course, these do have different connectors so that you can't plug SATA hard drives into IDE motherboard connectors, and so forth. After all, using the exact same connector for a bunch of different things that are not compatible with each other would be a really dumb idea, now wouldn't it...?

 

Many early M.2 SSDs used the SATA 6Gb/s protocol, and were no different than 2.5" SATA drives. Higher-end M.2 SSDs today use the PCI Express protocol. There are different configurations of PCIe that M.2 can be equipped with as well, PCIe 2.0 ×2, PCIe 2.0 ×4, PCIe 3.0 ×2, PCIe 3.0 ×4.

 

Just like different 3.5" hard drives have different connectors for each protocol they might use, M.2 cards have many different connectors, so M.2 SSDs that use PCI Express cannot be used with motherboard M.2 slots that only support SATA, and M.2 SSDs using the SATA protocol cannot be used with motherboards that only support PCI Express M.2, and 4-lane M.2 PCIe SSDs cannot be used in motherboards that support only 2-lane PCIe SSDs, and the list goes on and on... of course everyone has done a really terrible job of making clear exactly what configuration their SSDs and motherboard support (motherboards can be configured in ways that support both SATA and 2-lane PCIe, or SATA and 2 and 4-lane PCIe, again it goes on and on...), everything just says "M.2" with no indication of what keying it uses, for checking compatibility. Really M.2 is a very poorly designed and poorly executed "standard" IMO.

 

M.2, as a card slot like mSATA, also doesn't really lend itself to having cables attached to it, so some motherboard manufacturers have started putting SAS connectors on their motherboards, but wiring the pins to PCIe instead of SAS controllers, and have renamed them to "U.2" because it's easier than calling them by their actual names (SFF-8643 and SFF-8639). Because again obviously reusing a connector that is already in use for something else which is completely incompatible, is an extremely good idea that definitely won't cause any confusion whatsoever.

Now that's what I call an informative answer, thx a lot man!

[Flowey]

Just now, Flowey said:

 

Now that's what I call an informative answer, thx a lot man!

Also, I just realized that's what I had meant, the physical slot for an expansion card, not PCIe. So I guess when I want to talk about the PCIe slot I need to put PCIex16 or whatever? Am I stoopid?I'm also tiping this while answering an old lady at the job, and mulitasking's not a thing I excel at, so forgive me for any retaraded statement.

[Glenwing]

24 minutes ago, Flowey said:

Also, I just realized that's what I had meant, the physical slot for an expansion card, not PCIe. So I guess when I want to talk about the PCIe slot I need to put PCIex16 or whatever? Am I stoopid?I'm also tiping this while answering an old lady at the job, and mulitasking's not a thing I excel at, so forgive me for any retaraded statement.

Well PCIe can refer to both the PCIe protocol and the physical slots.