Old SSD in enclosure not shown

stevenwright637 · 21 Feb 2025 at 13:59

I'm racking my brains and I can not figure this out
I have an old SSD (Samsung SM951 MZ-HPV5120 512gb) I want to retrieve some data from, nothing too important just some game saves.
I have brought a ugreen m.2 NVMe/SATA SSD enclosure from the rainforest.
I have plugged it into my laptop and can not access it
In disk management it is there but if I try to initialise it.
I get the incorrect function error with both MBR & GPT.
Is disk part I can select the disk but it comes up as the chip (RTL9210B-CG) with no volumes.
Googling has mostly just led to guides from data recovery companies that ultimately just want me to buy a licence.
I have updated the firmware on the enclosure and still nothing.
Is there any way with disk part/ CMD I can get it detected
Best I can tell is that the SSD isn't compatible but looking at specs I can't work out why it wouldn't be unless I'm missing something. If that is the case does anyone have any recommendations on an enclosure that could be? They helpfully refunded the entire order when my laptop stand was missing so have some credit to my account to buy one that works.
Thank you for any help

stevenwright637 · 21 Feb 2025 at 15:53

Think I have finally found an answer.
Seems Samsung made 2 versions
NVMe version
AHCI version
It seems I have the AHCI version which isn't compatible with the SATA or NVMe protocols. Looking around it seems external enclosures don't exist for the very short lived AHCI standard.
Could I plug it in to an internal motherboard m.2 motherboard?
Any other suggestions on how to access the data?

Fluffybob · 21 Feb 2025 at 16:54

Try plugging it back into the Pc and see if it shows up that way.

stevenwright637 · 21 Feb 2025 at 18:05

Fluffybob said:
Try plugging it back into the Pc and see if it shows up that way.

Unfortunately, the pc it's from the water-cooling pump broke so I dismantled it and sold it all to help fund my new PC which is currently all on back order.
Only pc I have access to at the moment is a old sandy bridge pc that doesn't have an m.2 slot
Can't even find any documentation to say of B850 even supports this standard.

Tetras · 21 Feb 2025 at 19:03

stevenwright637 said:
Could I plug it in to an internal motherboard m.2 motherboard?
Any other suggestions on how to access the data?

I didn't know PCI-Express drives that use AHCI existed, weird, in the anandtech article they mention some boards that it worked with, but I'd be worried that more modern motherboards would have dumped support for these drives.

Since you don't want to boot from it, theoretically you could try an adapter that lets you plug the M.2 drive into it and then into a PCI-Express slot on the motherboard, but you might have the same issue as the enclosure.

stevenwright637 · 21 Feb 2025 at 19:33

Tetras said:
I didn't know PCI-Express drives that use AHCI existed, weird, in the anandtech article they mention some boards that it worked with, but I'd be worried that more modern motherboards would have dumped support for these drives.

Since you don't want to boot from it, theoretically you could try an adapter that lets you plug the M.2 drive into it and then into a PCI-Express slot on the motherboard, but you might have the same issue as the enclosure.

I remember when I brought it around 10 years ago, it one of the faster drives around at the time.
Seems to be a small number of mostly OEM Samsung drives from what I'm seeing. I would doubt if when it arrives my B850 board will support it.
I have just found for £2.99 at the rain forest place with no reviews, an adapter for PCI-E that claims to support it. Will give it ago.

Snapshot · 22 Feb 2025 at 08:53

I note in your OP that you were trying to initialise the drive. If you do that you will lose all your data.

stevenwright637 · 22 Feb 2025 at 10:51

Snapshot said:
I note in your OP that you were trying to initialise the drive. If you do that you will lose all your data.

Good job it didn't work then :cry:

Makes sense though, it was a data recovery site that said it wouldn't clear the data

Mcnumpty2323 · 22 Feb 2025 at 13:50

stevenwright637 said:
Think I have finally found an answer.
Seems Samsung made 2 versions
NVMe version
AHCI version
It seems I have the AHCI version which isn't compatible with the SATA or NVMe protocols. Looking around it seems external enclosures don't exist for the very short lived AHCI standard.
Could I plug it in to an internal motherboard m.2 motherboard?
Any other suggestions on how to access the data?

You're spot on the mark
There was absolutely an ahci version of this drive
Shortly followed by a nvme version
The nvme was one of the first nvme m2 drives consumers
Could get their hands on
Though technically it was classed as a business/enterprise/oem drive
Samsung never offered firmware updates to
The public for it
My nvme version is still working great 10 years later

Nvme version model number starts with MZ-VPV
ahci starts with MZ-HPV

stevenwright637 · 22 Feb 2025 at 14:10

Mcnumpty2323 said:
You're spot on the mark
There was absolutely an ahci version of this drive
Shortly followed by a nvme version
The nvme was one of the first nvme m2 drives consumers
Could get their hands on
Though technically it was classed as a business/enterprise/oem drive
Samsung never offered firmware updates to
The public for it
My nvme version is still working great 10 years later

Nvme version model number starts with MZ-VPV
ahci starts with MZ-HPV

I might have known 10 years ago when I brought it, that it was a different version but forgot about it all these years later.
I think a part of me knew it was different as that's why I chose a enclosure that does both sata and NVMe.
Was confusing when googling just the sm951 part as that was just coming up with the NVMe version. which is what left me confused for so long as well.
Needed the full model name in the search to find the AHCI one.
If it wasn't for the fact that 512gb is too small for me now. I would have considered putting it into my new system as upto November it has been completely faultless. Probably would have kept it as an external drive if it worked in the enclosure.
No idea what I'm going to do with it now though.

Mcnumpty2323 · 22 Feb 2025 at 14:32

stevenwright637 said:
I might have known 10 years ago when I brought it, that it was a different version but forgot about it all these years later.
I think a part of me knew it was different as that's why I chose a enclosure that does both sata and NVMe.
Was confusing when googling just the sm951 part as that was just coming up with the NVMe version. which is what left me confused for so long as well.
Needed the full model name in the search to find the AHCI one.
If it wasn't for the fact that 512gb is too small for me now. I would have considered putting it into my new system as upto November it has been completely faultless. Probably would have kept it as an external drive if it worked in the enclosure.
No idea what I'm going to do with it now though.

At the time 10 years ago
It was very confusing to be honest
M2 was a new technology
You had m2 drives that were pcie x2,pcie x4,sata,ahci
Long time ago but actually remember buying my sm951
From ocuk
And yes naming both versions sm951
And only a single letter difference in the model number
Did very little to sort out any confusion

512gb is a bit small nowadays
I just added mine to windows storage spaces
Alongside all the 2.5 sata ssds I upgraded to m2

stevenwright637 · 24 Feb 2025 at 14:55

The PCI-E adapter arrived today and I'm currently copying the whole 200Gb+ at 100MBps on one of my hard drives.
Nice surprise is that it has a really bright green activity light. That's having a rave at the moment.
Also it has holes for a stand off but no way to fit the included stand off so it's currently hanging off the connector
Still can't moan for £2.99