Upgrading Motherboard to a PCIE one, any issues using current PCIE 3 and pcie4 SSD’s

Phillip Gwynne · 25 Jan 2024 at 22:21

I plan to update my pc soon changing motherboard cpu and gpu soon. Currently have Samsung 970 and 980 pro SSD’s. Will there be any issues using a PCIE 5 board. And can you basically take them out of old motherboard and put in new and just carry on like old set up? Also debating whether to hold out for 15th gen boards and cpu or 14th be good and same with GPU, if uk shops sell RTX 4080 not too much higher than mrsp then tempted to get this first and maybe get newer boards and cpu later.

Tetras · 25 Jan 2024 at 22:26

Phillip Gwynne said:
Will there be any issues using a PCIE 5 board.

PCI-E 5.0 slots can work at slower speeds, but it doesn't matter anyway, because boards with PCI-E 5.0 M.2 slots always have at least one that is 4.0 or 3.0 and you could just use that instead.

Phillip Gwynne said:
can you basically take them out of old motherboard and put in new and just carry on like old set up?

Possibly.

Potential problems: file system (GPT/MBR), encryption (+ bitlocker & secure boot) and OS/software activation.

The OS can usually detect the new system automatically and download the drivers needed, but making backups of important files is always a good idea.

Phillip Gwynne · 25 Jan 2024 at 23:05

Oh, that’s worrying me a little. If I can safely stores, games, music and other personal files and than transfer them later I’ll do that. Was just hoping that most of it would just be carrying on but maybe faster. In past windows starts downloading drivers almost straight away, but sometimes this can cause problems if it’s a windows generic driver. You’ve also just reminded me about going back from windows 11 insider Preview to Windows 11 as seems to cause problems with GTA V so need to figure out for sure if I can go to Windows 11 and not lose all my personal files. As my home broadband is about 12mbps so use Vodafone 5G which on a good day can be 260mbps but often it loses connection or goes to 3G/4G so don’t want to spend weeks downloading again. Thanks for replying so quickly

Tetras · 25 Jan 2024 at 23:08

Phillip Gwynne said:
If I can safely stores, games, music and other personal files and than transfer them later I’ll do that.

Having a decent external drive as a backup is always a good thing to have anyway, in my opinion. You might find that everything works fine after the upgrade, but it is hard to predict these things as there is always something you forget about it that doesn't work properly.

Phillip Gwynne · 25 Jan 2024 at 23:36

Would I be right in thinking that any half decent external drive would be ok? Thinking like an external western digital or whatever the other big companies are six to eight TB.

Tetras · 25 Jan 2024 at 23:45

Phillip Gwynne said:
Would I be right in thinking that any half decent external drive would be ok? Thinking like an external western digital or whatever the other big companies are six to eight TB.

Ah. That would be expensive, you're looking @ NAS level storage there! I don't know enough about them to recommend anything of that price/capacity.

I only pay about £50, since I mainly keep personal files on mine and e.g. I only store game save files, not the games themselves.

Craig_d1 · 26 Jan 2024 at 17:55

is there not enough space to put your music/photo etc on the 970 drive, and then wipe the 980 drive...then when you put the new mobo in, do a clean install in the 980 drive, and just then just add the 970 drive after