Addlink S70 1TB SSD NVMe PCIe Gen3x4 M.2 2280 Solid State Drive

CrisisWolf

CrisisWolf

CrisisWolf

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I've been looking at an SSD upgrade. I currently have a small SSD with Windows etc (7 years old) plus a 1TB and 2TB HDD with games and media on. SSD tested at 120mb/sec, HDDs at 80mb/sec so 'slow' by todays standards.

I've read good things about the Addlink S70 but it (and that generation of SSDs) all connect via M2/NVMe PCIe. Tempting to install games on for faster boot times and/or put the OS etc on it too. Getting a bit confused on if I need/should buy an adapter but will that limit speeds or will it fit direct on my motherboards PCIe

My Motherboard is a GA-Z87-HD3 (https://www.gigabyte.com/uk/Motherboard/GA-Z87-HD3-rev-1x/sp#sp) which has various PCIe ports. Some are in use and I've not yet checked which I'm using for GFX etc. Will the SSD work and would it only work (or work best) in a particular one of the below? Or due to my motherboard will it be capped/limited and I'm best buying another 2.5" SSD

  • 1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x16 (PCIEX16)
    (The PCIEX16 slot conforms to PCI Express 3.0 standard.)
    * For optimum performance, if only one PCI Express graphics card is to be installed, be sure to install it in the PCIEX16 slot.

  • 1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x4 (PCIEX4)
    * The PCIEX4 slot shares bandwidth with all PCI Express x1 slots. All PCI Express x1 slots will become unavailable when a PCIe x4 expansion card is installed.
    * When installing a x8 or above card in the PCIEX4 slot, make sure to set PCIE Slot Configuration in BIOS Setup to x4.

  • 2 x PCI Express x1 slots
    (The PCIEX4 and PCI Express x1 slots conform to PCI Express 2.0 standard.)

  • 2 x PCI slots
 
So my 1 x PCI Express x16 slot, running at x4 is free. You can buy the adapters for the M2 cards (now looking at WD Black) but I've read support issues in older generation motherboards like mine (Z87). The PCIe I'm assuming is Gen 3 given the motherboards age and when Gen 3 came out.

Not planning to use as a boot drive (stick to Sata SSD for now but may change in future)

Any preference on NVME adapters? Going to buy the SSD with heatshield included. A few ***elsewhere*** in the £10-15 category.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Grab another sata3 ssd and save all the hassle you won't notice any diffrence getting an m2 drive maybe 1 second max in loading times.
 
I did find a YouTube video, may have been on a similar thread on here, which had SSD vs M2 game load times, I think one game had a 2 or 3 seconds in it. About to check 7200 RPM HDD versus Sata SDD videos now to sell it to myself.

Will put NVMe on the future list for when I do a motherboard/CPU update and use it as the boot drive. It isn't an option on my motherboard as a booting option it seems.
 
CrisisWolf said:
The PCIe I'm assuming is Gen 3 given the motherboards age and when Gen 3 came out.
Click to expand...
According to your quote above "(The PCIEX4 and PCI Express x1 slots conform to PCI Express 2.0 standard.)" then no that slot would only run at PCI-E 2.0 4x, so you would be significantly limiting the performance of any PCI-E 3.0 or PCI-E 4.0 NVMe (it would still be faster than a SATA SSD, but no where near it's potential)

CrisisWolf said:
Not planning to use as a boot drive (stick to Sata SSD for now but may change in future)
Click to expand...

You can't easily boot from an NVMe on a Z87 motherboard anyway so I wouldn't worry.

As above better to pick up a recent SATA SSD, it will likely still be better performing than your old SSD, and you can always carry a SATA SSD forward as storage for a new PC at a later date.

You can use Macrium Reflect or similar to clone your existing OS SSD across to the new one, so will get the benefit of faster boot up etc without needing to reinstall

Something like the below should be ideal:
My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £92.69 (includes shipping: £8.70)​
​
 
I'll check my tiny 7 year old 128GB SDD spec and performance as hadn't thought about the cloning option! I see Macrium is free for home use and inc cloning so recommendation taken.

£92 seems good, had a Samsung one on my list for £105 ish. Going to 'go shopping now.
 
CrisisWolf said:
I'll check my tiny 7 year old 128GB SDD spec and performance as hadn't thought about the cloning option!
Click to expand...

Drives from that era and of that capacity normally have lower Write Speed and Random Write IOPs due to having less NAND packages e.g. the 128GB versions could have less than half the IOPS (e.g. 35K) and say ~410MB/s Sequential Write speed

e.g. 7 Year old Samsung 840 EVO
https://www.anandtech.com/show/7173...iew-120gb-250gb-500gb-750gb-1tb-models-tested

Not huge differences by any means, but still a difference.

120MB/s from your current SSD sounds low though, so I imagine would be noticable
 
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