Old computer storage options ?

slowpoke · 27 Nov 2019 at 22:49

Hello folks.
My trusty old i7-2600k is holding up quite well so far (for what i need it for), however one of the non-boot storage drives started to make some uneasy sounds, needs replaced.

Checked current trends and it looks i might want in on some nvme action, however no ports to plug it in.
Motherboard is MSI Z68A-GD55-G3.

Is there any way to get a fat quick 1tb nvme into it ? I'm still booting off a 120gb Corsair Force3.
Am i destined to keep with sata drives ? PCI NVMe adapter cards ? so i can reuse new drive later in upcoming upgrades?

No point in major upgrades at this point as i will be replacing whole machine some time in 2020 to some of dat rgb gaming goodness, but that's a question for another day.

Educate me, please.

slowpoke · 27 Nov 2019 at 23:19

At this point i'm thinking speeds dont much matter, i'm looking ahead and will be reusing it in new build, but now i'm cramped a bit, might as well get adapter and proper nvme. Just exploring how viable are them adapters ? It is going to be faster than near 10year old mechanical drive, but how much of a brake old mobo puts on modern nvme via adapter ?

slowpoke · 28 Nov 2019 at 10:14

So, say if i get one of these:
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/wd-b...-solid-state-drive-wds100t3x0c-hd-55v-wd.html

...what adapter do i get ? I see there's some differences in M/B keys on them drives ? What would be compatible to run this in 4x or 16x PCI slot ?

slowpoke · 6 Dec 2019 at 02:57

Happy to report that WD Black SN750 works as storage on Z68A-GD55(G3) motherboard. Bought el-cheapo pcie adapter off ebay.
Read/write is about 1500mb/s according to crystal. On second gen pcie. Not too shabby.

BIOS doenst see it as bootable, but thatd fine, its an old mobo afterall.

#Edit# Hm. Crystaldiskinfo reports current transfer mode as gen2.0 x4 pcie, but "supported gen 3.0". not sure what that means...