So where are all the NVMe SSDs?

[Octopuss]

If we disregard those enterprise level costy products, months after Samsung's 950 was released, there's still nothing on the market.
What's going on?

 

[RejZoR]

I grabbed Samsung SM951 for my SSD caching needs. It's an AHCI version, but I know NVMe was also available. What I need are bigger capacities. 2TB SM951 would be nice. But I guess I'll have to settle for 2TB Samsung 850 Evo sometime soon as M.2's are nowhere to be found in such capacities that don't cost 4 digit prices.

 

[cdawall]

I'm curious why they are so expensive and so few out there.

 

[Octopuss]

I grabbed Samsung SM951 for my SSD caching needs. It's an AHCI version, but I know NVMe was also available. What I need are bigger capacities. 2TB SM951 would be nice. But I guess I'll have to settle for 2TB Samsung 850 Evo sometime soon as M.2's are nowhere to be found in such capacities that don't cost 4 digit prices.

That's not what this thread is about... Don't derail it please.

 

[Slizzo]

Besides Intel's and Samsungs NVMe, yeah, there really isn't anything else out there. Other manufacturers may be waiting on other suppliers? That's the only thing I can think of.

 

[GreiverBlade]

i am curious ... are they really useful or even cost efficient ... they might just be a brainfart from their original designer ... which would explain why there are fewer than expected ...

aside from that i don't like at all the M.2 interface wiring ... choosing between 2 slot on the mobo and sacrificing some PCIeX slot or even standard SATA 3 plug is not really balanced by the usefulness of those M.2 drive (AHCI or NVMe) plus they tend to heat more than SSD's or other (luckily they don't throttle ... do they? )

That's not what this thread is about... Don't derail it please.

that was in the axis of the thread ..... AHCI NVMe ... M.2 SSD on PCI express interface
ok there is some difference between AHCI and NVMe obviously ... but even the AHCI is ridiculously fast (and likely bottlenecked by the CPU, or not ... i don't remember where i did read that ...)

 

[RCoon]

I'm curious why they are so expensive and so few out there.

Who wants/needs one? I certainly don't. My guess is there's not enough money to be made off of them yet (how many users actually have NVMe M.2 slots available? I bet its less than 1% of the PC market).

They don't increase SSD capacities, they take up PCI-E lanes, they don't make Windows load significantly faster to want one, and games don't see an appreciable gain in load times to warrant one.

Aside from jerking off to big benchmark numbers, there's almost no reason to buy an NVMe SSD over a standard SATA one. I'd rather spend the money on a SATA SSD that's twice the size.

 

[Aquinus]

Who wants/needs one? I certainly don't. My guess is there's not enough money to be made off of them yet (how many users actually have NVMe M.2 slots available? I bet its less than 1% of the PC market).

They don't increase SSD capacities, they take up PCI-E lanes, they don't make Windows load significantly faster to want one, and games don't see an appreciable gain in load times to warrant one.

Aside from jerking off to big benchmark numbers, there's almost no reason to buy an NVMe SSD over a standard SATA one. I'd rather spend the money on a SATA SSD that's twice the size.

This. Adoption numbers has got to be dead low in comparison to the size of the SATA market. I'm not planning on upgrading my platform any time soon but, I do want a 512GB SSD. For reasons like that, M.2 in general isn't taking off. Plus, the only time I could see myself wanting a small SSD like that would be for a laptop or a low profile mini-ITX build. Beyond that, other than benchmarks, there isn't a whole lot of justification for it in my opinion.

 

[alucasa]

Who wants/needs one?

Pretty much this. I don't want one. I don't need one.

Okay, maybe I want one but don't really "need" one.

 

[cdawall]

Who wants/needs one? I certainly don't. My guess is there's not enough money to be made off of them yet (how many users actually have NVMe M.2 slots available? I bet its less than 1% of the PC market).

They don't increase SSD capacities, they take up PCI-E lanes, they don't make Windows load significantly faster to want one, and games don't see an appreciable gain in load times to warrant one.

Aside from jerking off to big benchmark numbers, there's almost no reason to buy an NVMe SSD over a standard SATA one. I'd rather spend the money on a SATA SSD that's twice the size.

No one needs a $2000 computer, plenty want a faster unit. PCI-e based SSD's are faster than Sata, other issue is manufacturers are forcing adoption the new Asus ROG laptops have one 2.5" and 2 NVMe slots. That's it for hard drive expansion. It is not like the older units with dual 2.5's. They will become more popular because they are getting put in a multitude of laptops and desktop boards even have them now. Even the new Dell XPS's have NVMe, laptop and desktop variants.

 

[Octopuss]

I don't need one. I do want one It's not like I need higher speeds (there are some situations where I'd benefit from those though, or better performance when dealing with lots of small files)
@RCoon is probably right though.

 

[Ferrum Master]

I have the 950pro 256GB.... I will never look back to SATA3 drives As for primary OS drive.

 

[EarthDog]

Needs? Very few.

Wants? COMPLETELY different story....

The whole point of these is to get around the SATA bandwidth limitations. It is, or trying to be, the next standard. From my discussions with some vendors at CES, they are putting some final touches on controllers etc. Remember the Samsung, while first to the market (consumer) the thing throttles because of heat. I have a feeling others took notice and are looking to do something about that as well.

 

[Ferrum Master]

Remember the Samsung, while first to the market (consumer) the thing throttles because of heat. I have a feeling others took notice and are looking to do something about that as well.

I just use a PCIe adapter and heatsink... Mimicking the Intel 740 Looks... Heat solved.

But the installations and programs that recheck crc for flash files + drm, the heck even stupid razer synapse moves its arse faster. Those little moments sum up.

My X79 bridge is old unsupported crap as such already, I got a nice boost bypassing it. I got one more free connector that I lack really.

 

[GC_PaNzerFIN]

I can't explain why and it doesn't make any sense at all but after using 1.2TB Intel one for few days I just knew I would like to... want to.... HAVE TO buy one.

(400GB only)

 

[RejZoR]

That's not what this thread is about... Don't derail it please.

Derailing is when you start talking about oranges and apples in a thread about cars. Talking about SM951 in a thread where opp talks about 950 drives, it kind of fits, doesn't it?

 

[Octopuss]

Derailing is when you start talking about oranges and apples in a thread about cars. Talking about SM951 in a thread where opp talks about 950 drives, it kind of fits, doesn't it?

Which part of "NVMe" didn't you understand?

 

[EarthDog]

They are both NVMe based drives... The SM951 is the OEM of the 950, IIRC, with the 950 having a couple of different tweaks. The SM951 had two versions, AHCI and NVMe.

Move on or take it to PM...

 

[Ferrum Master]

They are both NVMe based drives... The SM951 is the OEM of the 950, IIRC, with the 950 having a couple of different tweaks. The SM951 had two versions, AHCI and NVMe.

Move on or take it to PM...

The main thing is different... nand type.

 

[EarthDog]

The main thing is different... nand type.

oh..sorry, the op wanted to focus on nvme. Anyway, carrying on - myself included, isn't helping.

This. Adoption numbers has got to be dead low in comparison to the size of the SATA market. I'm not planning on upgrading my platform any time soon but, I do want a 512GB SSD. For reasons like that, M.2 in general isn't taking off. Plus, the only time I could see myself wanting a small SSD like that would be for a laptop or a low profile mini-ITX build. Beyond that, other than benchmarks, there isn't a whole lot of justification for it in my opinion.

These are new, super fast, and expensive...remind you of SSDs when they were first released? It took more than a few months for ssds to catch on too...now look.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

I think the reason for limited selection right now is because it's hit or miss with motherboard support. Enterprise buyers know to verify motherboard support with NVMe and they're also aware of the benefits. The technology is just too new to have mass market proliferation yet. LCD screens and SSDs had the same enterprise -> consumer trickledown. In time, NVMe will become the norm because SATA just doesn't have the bandwidth for the fastest SSDs out there.

It's kind of like the 32-bit wall come to think of it. When developers limited themselves to 32-bit, they knew that virtually all computers would support their software and they also know what memory constraints they have to program for. Going from SATA to NVMe (PCI Express based) the wall comes crashing down but you limit the number of buyers. Over time, the wall matters less and less. We're in that transition period now.

I think SATA 3.2 (16 Gb/s) will catch on before NVMe does in the consumer space. I think NVMe will remain in the enterprise segment for quite a while yet because of the lack of backwards compatibility and the cost of stupidly fast NVMe chips.


I think the NVMe card I recommended to a client recently was 1400 MB/s and 1.2 TB of storage. Only NVMe can do that.

 

[Octopuss]

I hope the situation will change once Intel releases new microarchitecture. Wasn't it only with Skylake that chipsets got NVMe support?

 

[Shou Miko]

If Sata3 SSD's was a bottleneck for 9 out of 10 pc users there would be more of the M.2. NVMe SSD's around.

Personal it would be nice with the speed, but i rather have the around 500/500mbps and the storage space than the speed.

 

[GreiverBlade]

Wasn't it only with Skylake that chipsets got NVMe support?

i don't think so since i saw some X79 build use them .... and Skylake is not X79 (nor even X99 )

at last having 2 M.2 on my motherboard are less useless than the 3 SATA express (which are luckily converted into 6 SATA 3 if not using them ... well how would i use them... SATA Express drive are non existent, even less represented than M.2 NVMe)
M.2 is flawed tho, how come the overheat solution is : "put them on PCIeX adapter and slap a heatsink" NGFF(Next Gen Form Factor) my @ss ... why even do a new interface if the solution is putting them in the same form factor of a PCIeX SSD ... U.2 is what to come next ...

i suspect Samsung and intel are refraining to launch any more NVMe on the M.2 interface for that reason ... M.2 is already dead

If Sata3 SSD's was a bottleneck for 9 out of 10 pc users there would be more of the M.2. NVMe SSD's around.

Personal it would be nice with the speed, but i rather have the around 500/500mbps and the storage space than the speed.

true that ... 170chf is more "well spent" on a 520/500mb/s 850 Evo 500gb than 198chf on a 2150/1260mb/s 256gb NVMe drive that can potentially overheat, specially when nothing show a bottleneck on a SATA 3 SSD depending the usage you have.

 

[Hood]

This. Adoption numbers has got to be dead low in comparison to the size of the SATA market. I'm not planning on upgrading my platform any time soon but, I do want a 512GB SSD. For reasons like that, M.2 in general isn't taking off. Plus, the only time I could see myself wanting a small SSD like that would be for a laptop or a low profile mini-ITX build. Beyond that, other than benchmarks, there isn't a whole lot of justification for it in my opinion.

My justification was; Newegg had the Intel 750 400GB on sale for $300 (.75/GB), I paid $.70/GB a year ago for my 850 Pro 256GB (now $.47/GB), and storage speed was the only real bottleneck my system had. I too had deep reservations about whether it would be a complete waste of money, but besides an expensive upgrade to Haswell-E ($1000+), which I can't really afford and don't even like, this was my only upgrade option for this system.
So I took the plunge, and was pleasantly surprised to discover that the 750 is fast enough to actually feel the difference (after using the fastest SATA drive for the past year). The difference is subtle but definitely there. Programs, games (and levels), Windows utilities, Windows Update,etc all loaded a little faster. A few things run a lot faster, like WinRAR, virus scanners, Windows drive cleanup, defragmenters, photo and video editors. I'm definitely glad i bought it.
Anyone who has a Z97, X99, or Z170 board can boot an NVMe drive on Windows 7 SP1 or later, using a PCIe 3.0 x 4, 8, or 16 slot and the latest BIOS (an adapter for M.2-to-PCIe 3.0 x 4 is <$30). Running on my Z97 system with a 780 Ti in the top slot and the Intel 750 in the 2nd slot, the board has to split the lanes into x8 x8, so the graphics card now runs on 8 lanes (but suffers no measurable performance loss thereby, no card can saturate even 8 lanes of PCIe 3.0).
The number of systems that could benefit from this upgrade is increasing every day, and we should see a lot more options in 2016, and lower prices.