Msi b450 carbon pro ac motherboard ssd question/help?

Paul51 · 14 Sep 2021 at 15:07

Hi.

I have a msi b450 carbon pro ac motherboard and an m2 ssd device in the m2 slot.
After reading here on the description of the motherboard is says if you scroll down slightly number 10, 2x m2?
I am gathering that means i can attack another m2 ssd drive for storage?
But upon looking at my motherboard there doesn't seem to be a place where i can attach the/a new m2 ssd drive?
As i am looking at expanding on my current ssd, m2 ssd and 2 other hdd storage drives.
Am i being thick or how do i go about adding storage to my pc?
If someone could link me too a top end budget m2 or normal ssd gaming storage drive that would be great.
Looking at 1tb min.
Thanks

keenan · 14 Sep 2021 at 15:10

Which slot are you currently using?

First one is under the shield above the top pci-e 16x slot and the second one is right below the bottom pci-e 1x slot..

Paul51 · 14 Sep 2021 at 15:34

keenan said:
Which slot are you currently using?

First one is under the shield above the top pci-e 16x slot and the second one is right below the bottom pci-e 1x slot..

Argghhh brilliant thanks for that i am currently using the one where it says msi in the middle of the motherboard.
So i can get another m2 ssd storage drive is the other slot version 3 or 4 is it worth the extra money getting the m2 version 4.0 staorage drive?
It will mainly be for gaming hopefully 3.0 will be enough.
Can you recomend any off overclockers m2 drives 1tb bargains for gaming?

VaderDSL · 14 Sep 2021 at 15:42

It’ll be gen 3, be aware when/if you install the second SSD, it disables all but the top PCIe slot.

for gaming, maybe look at the crucial p2, western digital sn550, should be fine for game drive.

Paul51 · 14 Sep 2021 at 16:02

VaderDSL said:
It’ll be gen 3, be aware when/if you install the second SSD, it disables all but the top PCIe slot.

for gaming, maybe look at the crucial p2, western digital sn550, should be fine for game drive.

Thanks for helping i have ordered the Western digital sn550.

Joxeon · 14 Sep 2021 at 16:38

Bear in mind an nvme will also only run at PCIe gen 2.0 speeds when used in the second M.2 slot so your read/write will cap out around 1800 but you probably won't notice a difference vs it running full gen 3.0 anyway.

VaderDSL · 14 Sep 2021 at 16:43

Joxeon said:
Bear in mind an nvme will also only run at PCIe gen 2.0 speeds when used in the second M.2 slot so your read/write will cap out around 1800 but you probably won't notice a difference vs it running full gen 3.0 anyway.

Good spot, but as you say probably won't see any difference.

rumple9 · 21 Sep 2021 at 02:06

I have the same board and been thinking about getting an NVME ready for windows 11 direct storage but don't know what to do.
Also I presume direct storage will work better with pcie4x4 which would require a new mobo, if anyone knows?
Then again its pointless spending money on a new mobo now when socket AM5 is a few months away

Joxeon · 21 Sep 2021 at 07:56

rumple9 said:
I have the same board and been thinking about getting an NVME ready for windows 11 direct storage but don't know what to do.
Also I presume direct storage will work better with pcie4x4 which would require a new mobo, if anyone knows?
Then again its pointless spending money on a new mobo now when socket AM5 is a few months away

The new Xbox uses direct storage yet only has a PCIe gen 3.0 nvme with a speed of around 2500Mb/s so I don't think going with gen 4.0 will give much more loading speed as devs will optimise for the Xbox and the 95% of users with gen 3.0 devices over the 5% running gen 4.0

rumple9 · 11 Oct 2021 at 04:24

xbox is nvme 4 @ 2.4gb/s