NEW Samsung 950 Pro M.2 NVMe (think SM951 with VNAND & Black PCB) yum!

delpy8 said:
Updated driver out :)
http://ssd.samsungsemi.com/ecomobile...iver_rev11.zip

Changes in v1.1
Code:

Driver version update for USB compatibility
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Cenedd said:
Is the NVMe driver applicable if I'm running a hardware RAID using Intel RST?
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crinkleshoes said:
I can't answer your last question - try installing it and find out? It will only install if it detects the drives present in your system.
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Just thought I'd report back that trying to install the Samsung NVME driver when the drives are in an Intel RST array in RAID mode doesn't work. It just says the Samsung NVME device is not installed.

This is on a Gigabyte Z170X Gaming 7 motherboard. In the bios it doesn't show up under NVMe devices - which bothered me at first - but it is in a RAID0 set and does boot and does have good performance :shrug:
Intel RST shows the disks, the serial and that they are NVMe interface at x4 (4000 MB/s) but doesn't show me the drive temperature....which is what I want. Also tried Intel SSD Toolbox, Aida64, HWInfo, HD Sentinel - all of which supposedly show SMART info for disks behind Intel RST and/or support Samsung 950 Pro. If anyone knows how to get a temp reading from the chip while it's part of an Intel RST array, I'd appreciate it. I have a temp sensor taped to the controller but I want to put a heatsink on and couldn't then have the sensor on the controller. Thanks all.
 
Be interested to see if anyone has run PCmark08 against the 750 & 950. This uses real world tasks to benchmark your PC (rather than the usual old synthetic tests that tools like AS SSD etc. run). And the storage test/s alone (even on a fast system) can take over an hour to run.

Currently my 951 is sitting third in the PCmark08 hall of fame for a Skylake based system. Runs much better using the Samsung Nvme driver (& regardless of what Samsung would have you believe, it runs just fine with the 951's).
 
Very much considering getting one of these as a boot drive but reading through some of the pages I see recommendations for an intel 750 as well. Are there any other recommendations for boot M2 SSDs?
 
I'm running a pair of 950's as my only drive. They're tidy (no bays used and no cables), look good and they're fast. Someone has said that the Intel drive feels faster and I I've read that people were having issues with 950's on Asus motherboards. If you aren't using an Asus board (or you check that it won't cause you problems) then the 950's are good.
 
Afternoon all. Just thought I'd report back on the effects of adding a heatsink to a 950.
With thanks to Fluke and OJ46 for the idea

I started with a SK454-100SA heatsink which is 100x21.45x19mm (LxWxH). I aligned it with the shoulder of the M.2 board (near the edge connector) then I marked where the screw hole was and the end of the board - just traced the edge with a CD marker. Drilled a 5mm hole for the screw and hacksawed the end off roughly level with the end of the board - there's a PCI-E slot next to one of my M.2's so it cannot overhang.
I removed the label from the top of the drive - funnily enough only the bottom label (which I didn't remove) says that removing it invalidates the warranty but I took a picture for the serial number etc first.
Unhelpfully there is a height difference between the controller chips and the NAND chips and it was more than the Akasa thermal tape could compensate for so, lacking the milling machine that some of you lucky people have, I used a whetstone to lap some height off one end.

I'm measuring the temperatures from the back of the PCB underneath the controller chip as that's supposed to be the hottest part. Why not the top? Because once the heatsink is on the temperature probe cannot be there.

Temperature difference between the 950 with a heatsink and the one without is about 7°C at idle and up to 18°C when benchmarking so it does seem to work well.

Not sure why the picture won't embed but you can view it here

I should point out that unless you have a milling machine or can be bothered to lap the better part of half a mil off the bottom, you'd probably be better using the separate VGA style heatsinks that OJ used since they can be applied separately to each chip.
 
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Dunno if anyone can help me, but I'm getting really slow boot times using this with an asus x99 deluxe (over 45 seconds boot time) does anyone know why? or does it just suck on my platform
 
So I've had the 950 since launch, and It doesn't seem to make much difference in gaming loads compared to my old 830.

Does anyone else feel the 950 offers little real world benefits for the average user?
 
For the average user I would say that it would / will make no real noticeable difference in real world day to day use compared to a decent sata3 ssd. Not saying there is no difference, as there obviously is. Anyone considering one of these drives really needs to appreciate that there isn't going to be a life changing experience here! Though quite obviously depends on quite what your useage is going to be.

In my opinion and that's all it is... Buy one if you fancy having the latest tech and can justify the costs. Just don't expect a WOW moment like you would coming from a mechanical hard drive to your first ssd.

I've had one of the earlier sm951's and quite happy with it as my boot drive. Zero issues with it. But only bought one because it was a new build and I had spare cash in the pot. Run a more real word orientated test suite like PCmark (paid version to get the storage tests) and it looks seriously quicker than my Samsung 840 (runs best with the Samsung Nvme driver regardless of what Samsung say) but day to day.... If being totally honest, can't tell any difference. Though my system was pretty nippy before this anyway.

A lot of folks go on endlessly about boot times. But does anyone really care if your PC boots in 10 seconds rather than 20. I know I don't. There are far more important factors effecting boot times than the speed of your OS drive. Like... Which version of windows are you running. If windows 10, are you using hybrid shutdown / start up. Are you using fast boot. Is this a new install etc. Etc.

As to game loading times. Depends on whether (to a great extent) whether the loader is designed to take advantage of a very fast drive. Doubtful if many currently are. Pretty much backed up by comparison tests I've seen run in review articles.

Sorry to ramble. But you did ask ☺
 
a66as said:
Dunno if anyone can help me, but I'm getting really slow boot times using this with an asus x99 deluxe (over 45 seconds boot time) does anyone know why? or does it just suck on my platform
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My PC takes about that to boot, I’m using an Intel 750 as the boot and the PCI-E drive seem to get initialized last and the Asus X99 Deluxe has a lot of hardware so the POST take longer than other boards.
 
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