SSD up grade advice

[arthurwellsley]

I have an Asus Z170 pro gaming motherboard.
Samsung SSD 850 Evo at 250gb in it with Windows (10 pro) on it and Office.
An HDD at 1TB. With a few other bits and pieces on it. (ST2000DM001-1ER164)
Intel Core i7-6700k CPU @ 4.00GHz.
16gb RAM

I either want to replace the Samsung (which means I need to transfer windows across to the new disc and so need decent software to do it), or just add in another SSD.

If I want either a 500gb or 1TB replacement for the Samsung what is your recommendation?

If I can add another drive instead of just replacing the Samsung (again either 500gb or 1TB) what is your recommendation?

I do not understand the difference between PCIe (or the different generations) and M.2 and which I should be looking for, so any explanation of why you have chosen your recommendation might help there as well.

Many thanks in advance

 

[arthurwellsley]

Sensible size depends on what you do with your PC.
If you're doing anything more space demanding than word processing, there's zero sense to buy smaller than 1TB SSD at current prices.
For example for standard gaming wouldn't even think about smaller ones.


M.2 is physical form factor/connector standard and similar mess to USB-C...
In that it can support many different data buses, but without strict requirement for needing to support all those automatically.
Even support for both SATA and PCIe isn't guaranteed.
Though that board supports both:
https://dlcdnets.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/LGA1151/Z170-PRO-GAMING/E10719_Z170_PRO_GAMING_UM_V2_WEB.pdf

Hence considering prices NVMe/PCIe) drive is the most sensible having more future use value over PC upgrades.
(also DirectStorage will only support NVMe SSDs)

WD Blue SN550 would be good standard level drive.
WD Blue SN550 1TB SSD NVME M.2 2280 PCIe Gen3 Solid State Drive (WDS100T2B0C)= £89.99
And Crucial P5 is higher up drive...
Crucial P5 1TB M.2 2280 PCI-e 3.0 x4 NVMe Solid State Drive= £99.95
Unlike DRAMless QLC Flash bait and switch P2:

Crucial has swapped out the P2's TLC flash for QLC flash in newer revisions of this product, but they carry the same name and model number. These new versions result in much lower performance in several key metrics. We recommend you look elsewhere for your next SSD.
https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/crucial-p2-m-2-nvme-ssd​

Thanks for all the replies. In the end I purchased the Crucial P5 recommended in the above post.