What M.2 Drive ?

dtrance · 8 Dec 2015 at 14:44

I've ordered the following Motherboard;

Asrock Z170 Gaming K6 Intel Z170 (Socket 1151) DDR4 ATX Motherboard
MB-145-AK

What is the best drive that I can fit into the M.2 slot on this motherboard, I was looking at getting 128gb for OS only.

Or should I just get a bigger SSD drive and forget about the slot?

Thanks for any help.

snips86x · 8 Dec 2015 at 14:46

I've read these will reduce the speed of your PCIe lanes which means your GPU is no longer running at x16 but x8. I was looking at getting one too and this put me off a little...maybe not enough to not get one though

skaif · 8 Dec 2015 at 15:00

Depends on what you do to be honest. I bought the 256gb M.2 nvme because...just.
I haven't noticed THAT much of a dramatic speed increase in my day to day application.

I am one of those individuals who leaves his computer on most of the time so the boot up times aren't a priority. It performs slightly faster (real world man science guestimation) than my old MX100 ssd boot drive.

If you are going to be copying large amounts of data around then sure, it will blitz along!

dtrance · 8 Dec 2015 at 15:08

It won't be for dragging data around, its for booting and perhaps running Photoshop (I have a SSD for the PS scratch disk already). I'm completely new to M.2 technology, there appears to be cards with 1 and 2 notches in them, how can I tell what is compatible with the motherboard I've ordered?

snips86x · 8 Dec 2015 at 15:08

dtrance said:
It won't be for dragging data around, its for booting and perhaps running Photoshop (I have a SSD for the PS scratch disk already). I'm completely new to M.2 technology, there appears to be cards with 1 and 2 notches in them, how can I tell what is compatible with the motherboard I've ordered?

The board spec will tell you

dtrance · 8 Dec 2015 at 15:37

The Motherboard has the following slot,

- 1x Ultra M.2 Socket, supports M.2 SATA3 6.0 Gb/s module and M.2 PCI Express module up to Gen3 x4 (32 Gb/s)***

does it support this drive?
SM951 128GB M.2 PCI-e 3.0 x 4 NVMe Solid State Drive (MZVPV128HDGM-00000)

It appears so but I'm can't see anything explaining why some boards have 2 notches in them and others only have 1. It doesn't appear to be a capacity thing, perhaps a newer generation of boards?

skaif · 8 Dec 2015 at 15:54

As far as I am aware it is to do with sizes. Usually 60mm and 80mm. The sm951 is 80mm as far as I know!

E:
Scratch that I see what you mean, I don't think it makes a difference to be honest, it would be down to how many connectors are in the actual slot. It should still fit regardless.

Wiki has some great info along with a pic which may help!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.2

and here
http://rog.asus.com/313352014/labels/guides/buying-an-m-2-ssd-how-to-tell-which-is-which/

Wow its actually quite interesting, wish I did this much ~~procrastination~~ research when I was buying one!

dtrance · 8 Dec 2015 at 16:35

haha, thanks very much for your help. That 2nd link has explained a good bit. Cheers!