M.2 SSD on old X58 system with M.2 PCI adaptor. Can it work?

[Tomgang]

I might have gotten a great idea, but im not sure if it will work out.

The idea is to get a SAMSUNG 960 EVO M.2 250GB SSD and a Aqua Computer kryo PCIe 3.0 x4 adapter for M.2 NGFF PCIe SSD.

But here comes the questions.

1. This pci adaptor is a stated for PCI express 3 X4 , but i only have PCI express 2. Does any one know if it can work in PCI express 2 (i am off cause aware that if it work, it will run at reduced speed cause of lower speed on PCI 2 contra PCI 3, but PCI 2 at X4 still has a speed of up to 2000 MB/s transfer rate and that is still far better than the onboard sata 2 or sata 3 with the crappy marvel controller that not can give true sata 3 speed. onboard sata 3 maxes out at 400 Mb/s read and 250 MB/s ride, so here will 2000 MB/s be far better).

PCI adaptor:

https://shop.aquacomputer.de/product_info.php?products_id=3400

2. Is M.2 so fast that it can give a performence over normal sata SSD but at reduced speed cause of crappy sata 3 controller. Se screenshot under here. The screenshot test is with my Crucial MX300 275 GB SSD.

3. spending this amount of money on M.2 is that even a good idea contra performance gain. The M.2 SSD is ment to be used as OS drive and for the most used games i have?

 

[jboydgolfer]

I remember many issues with PCI E based SSDs in combination with OS installations for Z68, dunno if it was 58 too, but there may likely be complications . Is 2.5 out of the question?

I've looked into the benefits of them over traditional Sata, and every time I do I see a lot of posts or reviews using words like "theoretical" and "possible" in regards to the performance gains and a large absence of the term realworld. Personally I haven't ran one in my own system but I would bet that the day-to-day change would be very minimal over traditional Sata... what I tried to do is read as many reviews as I could and weed out the comments from people who already bought them for their own systems and Were trying to convince themselves that it was worth the money by posting just that online from the genuine feedback ...personally I came to the conclusion that it wasn't worth my money at least not now. But if I were you my first step would be looking into the compatibility on the X58 platform

 

[Tomgang]

I remember many issues with PCI E based SSDs in combination with OS installations for Z68, dunno if it was 58 too, but there may likely be complications . Is 2.5 out of the question?

Sorry but what do you mean by 2.5?

 

[jboydgolfer]

Sorry but what do you mean by 2.5?

Sata 2.5" ssd

Also if it helps what I've read is that X58 will not support boot from and NVME

 

[dorsetknob]

Almost certain it wont boot to O/S unless you can Bootstrap Drivers in conjunction with a Sata SSD Raid Combo and i suspect that may not work/be possable

 

[jboydgolfer]

http://www.overclock.net/t/1599519/boot-from-pci-e-ssd-on-sabertooth-x5

I can't speak for all nvme ssd's, but it appears that Samsung models do indeed support older bios'.


Seems like the 950 pros work 100% on older systems, so I stand corrected . As a disclaimer I want to add that this is not based on personal experience but rather information gathered from the link I posted above to overclock.net

 

[eidairaman1]

From what I've seen board makers launched bios updates with nvme support, as of last year mine received it and it is AM3+. LGA 1366 may never get that functionality, let alone not guaranteed to work. You can always refer to the board manufacturer since they code the bios and make the boards to see if it is supported, if it is not and they never plan to support nvme, just buy a 850/860? Pro, or Toshiba, Crucial SSD and call it a day.

 

[Tomgang]

Sata 2.5" ssd

Also if it helps what I've read is that X58 will not support boot from and NVME

Sure 2,5 SSD are fine, but im a bit of a speed junkie to when it comes to boot and game load.

 

[eidairaman1]

Sure 2,5 SSD are fine, but im a bit of a speed junkie to when it comes to boot and game load.

See my previous post, also You can always run ssds in RAID for data stripping.

 

[jboydgolfer]

Sure 2,5 SSD are fine, but im a bit of a speed junkie to when it comes to boot and game load.

If you read above I edited one of my older posts. It seems that the Samsung 950 pros do indeed support X58

Read the thread in the link I posted to overclock.net

 

[Tomgang]

I have been looking in that about NVME and it maybe looks like it can work if the the SSD has a Legacy driver support build in.

I found this that i will take a closer look at. Since my mobo is also a Asus X58 motherboard, i might cut get it to work and my mobo is a second gen board aswell that also might increase the chance.

https://audiocricket.com/2016/12/31/booting-samsung-sm961-on-asus-p6t-se-mainboard/

 

[jboydgolfer]

I have been looking in that about NVME and it maybe looks like it can work

yup, from what i read, Samsung for certain DID indeed built in support for older boards. I personally ONLY run Samsung drives in my personal systems, due to good user experience, and i feel it to be a likely fact that they would include legacy support

 

[Tomgang]

See my previous post, also You can always run ssds in RAID for data stripping.

I know, bit only sata 2 on my mobo supports raid, sata 3 port dosent as said before that marvel controller for sata 3 sucks ass and raid 0 with two SSD wil only give the speed of one true sata 3 SSD + the risk with raid 0 if one drive dies, all data is lost and that is not optimal for OS drive with importent files on.

http://www.overclock.net/t/1599519/boot-from-pci-e-ssd-on-sabertooth-x5

I can't speak for all nvme ssd's, but it appears that Samsung models do indeed support older bios'.


Seems like the 950 pros work 100% on older systems, so I stand corrected . As a disclaimer I want to add that this is not based on personal experience but rather information gathered from the link I posted above to overclock.net

Yes that is also what i came to after looking around the web.

yup, from what i read, Samsung for certain DID indeed built in support for older boards. I personally ONLY run Samsung drives in my personal systems, due to good user experience, and i feel it to be a likely fact that they would include legacy support

Yeah i looks like if i stick to samsung m.2 it shut work just fine.

Edit: You asked about if 2.5 is fine. I already have 3 sata SSD. Samsung EVO 850 250 GB, Crucial MX300 275 GB and a old Crucial M4 64 GB (my old OS drive).

 

[eidairaman1]

I know, bit only sata 2 on my mobo supports raid, sata 3 port dosent as said before that marvel controller for sata 3 sucks ass and raid 0 with two SSD wil only give the speed of one true sata 3 SSD + the risk with raid 0 if one drive dies, all data is lost and that is not optimal for OS drive with importent files on.



Yes that is also what i came to after looking around the web.



Yeah i looks like if i stick to samsung m.2 it shut work just fine.

Edit: You asked about if 2.5 is fine. I already have 3 sata SSD. Samsung EVO 850 250 GB, Crucial MX300 275 GB and a old Crucial M4 64 GB (my old OS drive).

In the event M2 doesnt work or wont be supported get a better SATA 3 Raid card, disable Raid on the motherboard itself and use it through the card. Also You did say you were a speed junkie hence why I said Data stripping, so alternatively run data stripping and mirroring at the same time.

 

[Ferrum Master]

No. Only few native drives like kingston... maybe Liteon did... and... mother Intel.

It will not work for a generic nvme device. Well... it will not boot... it will work in windows or Linux.

 

[jboydgolfer]

Yes that is also what i came to after looking around the web.

good luck with your Revamp....I hope all goes well.

 

[eidairaman1]

No. Only few native drives like kingston... maybe Liteon did... and... mother Intel.



It will not work fot a generic nvme device. Well... it will not boot... it will work in windows or Linux.

I suppose a interpreter chip would be needed on the adapter to trick the system into thinking it is SATA first then once windows load screen appears it hands off the operation.

 

[Tomgang]

In the event M2 doesnt work or wont be supported get a better SATA 3 Raid card, disable Raid on the motherboard itself and use it through the card. Also You did say you were a speed junkie hence why I said Data stripping, so alternatively run data stripping and mirroring at the same time.

Yeah that might be the solution if my M.2 project turns out to not work. But hope M.2 can do the trick. The safes and fastes solution.

good luck with your Revamp....I hope all goes well.

Thanks pal

 

[cat1092]

No. Only few native drives like kingston... maybe Liteon did... and... mother Intel.

It will not work for a generic nvme device. Well... it will not boot... it will work in windows or Linux.

NVMe SSD's had Linux support long before Windows, these were used back in 2012 on Ubuntu 12.04/Linux Mint 13 LTS, both of which are EOL sometime in April 2017.

I recall this when looking for Samsung 950 PRO support for my 512GB version, wondered if there was Linux support, was amazed to say the least, personally I didn't know that NVMe SSD's existed at the time. It was likely more for corporate/enterprise use at that time.

Note that the source link below which I relied upon last year has been revised a bit.

https://delightlylinux.wordpress.com/2016/04/20/the-samsung-950-pro-256g-and-linux-does-it-work/

The drive with Linux not only didn't need a NVMe driver, also booted from a Z87 MB set to legacy BIOS. Only with Windows are these restrictions in place, I suppose similar to one can install & run Linux OS's fine on a Kaby Lake CPU, although nothing with Windows earlier than somewhere around the Anniversary Edition of Windows 10, if not a bit later, is supported by the CPU.

However, one notable issue, boot speeds are about the same, as these were on my PC, I can accept this, it's once on the desktop when most everything is instant that counts the most.

While Linux doesn't have the market share of Windows, yet due to the Linux powering the financial capital of the World, in New York City, as well as many government agencies all over the World, also handles most all payment processing when we perform transactions, it's no wonder why Linux is the first with their foot in the door. Many folks has the wrong picture of the typical Linux user in mind, only a small fraction of it's users are those who lost their Windows install media & no resources to obtain another or a recovery disc set, LInux is actually an OS of the 1%'ers of this World (or the elite). Wealth isn't typically managed on insecure OS's that often waits weeks for patches for issues, when one is discovered, all of the major Linux forks places their differences to the side long enough to get issues resolved, and patches shipped in 24-72 hours.

Thank goodness that there's life outside of Windows, and OS's where these type of drives & other hardware can run w/out restriction.

Cat

 

[Aenra]

Yes.

Mine run* at about 1.4k/sec at PcIe 2.0 x4, though it is the 960Pro; don't think it matters here, as the difference (being upwards) would only show on a gen3, so this 1.4ish should be what you're looking at too. Still pretty good, not like anything out there utilizing such speeds anyway

*The above (running it at that lane, in this rig, is what happen when you buy Asus. If you're wondering at the past tense, it's because i no longer have an Asus board)

 

[Tomgang]

Yes.

Mine run* at about 1.4k/sec at PcIe 2.0 x4, though it is the 960Pro; don't think it matters here, as the difference (being upwards) would only show on a gen3, so this 1.4ish should be what you're looking at too. Still pretty good, not like anything out there utilizing such speeds anyway

*The above (running it at that lane, in this rig, is what happen when you buy Asus. If you're wondering at the past tense, it's because i no longer have an Asus board)

Thanks. Very usable answer. About 1400 MB/s vs. 400 MB/s read and 250 MB/s whrite is deffently a big step up in performence. Well had hoped for around 1600-1800 MB/s but 1400 MB/s is still way better than the alternative.

I have just putted a strategy together on how i will tackle this. I know by know to get it to work that the SSD needs to have legacy mode Option ROM built into its firmware and that the Samsung 950 Pro M.2 NVMe has, but they are no longer on sale. So i will give samsung a call on monday and ask if the 960 EVO has the legacy mode Option ROM and if not, try to find a used 950 PRO cause then i know it shut work. That is the plan for now.

 

[cat1092]

Tomgang, please don't give up on the (new) 950 PRO yet, there may be some overstock somewhere, a bit of searching can go a long way.

Newegg & Amazon both were carrying the version before the 950 PRO on their sites for sometime after that release, although just because it's a model behind doesn't necessarily equate a lower price, in fact the opposite happens often. Like when I wanted to get another MSI GTX 960 (2GB) reference card design, the price had tripled over the $200 I paid for mine, no way. Not when I could get a GTX 1080 for the same price that would smash it's fist through both cards.

Not that I needed it anyway, have a system with a GTX 1070 & another with a 1060, just wanted to make the most I could out of a secondary PC, after being bounced around through 4 different computers, the GTX 960 now has a permanent home. Although I do have another idea for that system for a boot drive, since it doesn't pertain to NVMe, will create my own Topic.

Cat

 

[Ferrum Master]

It will work, but not boot. That's the problem mates.

 

[Tomgang]

alright, just returning with an update, but not the final update. I chose to play safe and get a M.2 SSD with Legacy mode support and by that i chose Samsung 950 PRO 256 GB to be the drive to get. And i just got it today and mounted it in my X58 mobo. First steps looks promising for use as a boot drive. bios ses it (but only in AHCI mode) and i can set it as a main boot drive. Next step is to backup my old install and then go nuts on install windows 10 on the m.2 SSD.

I hope that can happen to morrow. so stay tuned. Mean while you can take a look under here of the image of the SSD and PCIe adaptor + bios image.

 

[eidairaman1]

Go

alright, just returning with an update, but not the final update. I chose to play safe and get a M.2 SSD with Legacy mode support and by that i chose Samsung 950 PRO 256 GB to be the drive to get. And i just got it today and mounted it in my X58 mobo. First steps looks promising for use as a boot drive. bios ses it (but only in AHCI mode) and i can set it as a main boot drive. Next step is to backup my old install and then go nuts on install windows 10 on the m.2 SSD.

I hope that can happen to morrow. so stay tuned. Mean while you can take a look under here of the image of the SSD and PCIe adaptor + bios image.

Good that it is detected, how were the ratings on the adapter you got?