SSDs. SATA or M.2?

[Jon.M]

Hi Chaps,

I'm planning on building a new PC. I've never built one from scratch before but I have swapped, replaced or upgraded RAM, PSU, graphics cards, optical and hard drives and fans in the past. The only part of the construction I haven't tackled before will be adding the processor and it's cooling fan to the mother board.

I've spent some time studying and deciding on parts but have a question. I wanted to use an SSD of 250Gb and a 1 Tb hard disk as an acceptable compromise on capacity verses speed verses cost. I've discovered that SSDs can be connected either using the SATA interface like hard disks or there is a newer option to use an M.2 connector. The plus side is that the M.2 is much faster, up to 2Gb/sec instead of the 600Mb/sec limit on the SATA drives. The downside is of course cost. €126 for M.2 as opposed to €88 for SATA.

The motherboard I'm thinking of (ASUS PRIME H270-PLUS) has 2 M.2 NVMe connectors. The processor is an 17-7700 with 16 Gb DDR4 RAM. I decided against an overclocking processor so I don't have to do anything special about cooling.

On the face of it it looks like spending the extra for the M.2 SSD is worth it, but has anyone here used SSDs with this interface or have an opinion on whether they're worth the extra expense?

Jon

[TSR2]

Hi John,

The M.2 SSD is basically the same as the traditional 2.5" variety without the SATA interface connector and the enclosure. It's obviously more fiddley to change them, my M.2 connector is on the underside of the board, but being much smaller will give you the option of a smaller case perhaps. I've used a number of different manufactures over the years; Samsung, Kingston and SanDisk, but the Samsung units have always had the edge.

[blanston12]

I think the M.2 SSD's are worth it also. Since they plug directly into the motherboard they have the potential to be much faster, plus they don't use a drive bay in the case, so you can have more disks in the future.

[Jon.M]

Thanks chaps.

I thought the M.2 SSD looked like it was worth the extra expense for the potential increased read write speed. On the Mother board I'm looking at it would go on the front making it accessible, and neater with one less bay filled and one less cable.

Jon

[TSR2]

I've not noticed any perceivable difference in speed Jon, but its simply a lot neater, and if you don't intend in handling it often (I know folk who swap drives like sharing sweets) then its fine and dandy.

[Buggyman]

I recently had a new PC built and have an all SSD set up. With a 500GB C drive for all the MS stuff and the a 1TB for admin stuff, photos, videos etc and a 1 TB for my Steam stuff; FS2, CoD, FSW and Rail Works. My final drive is a 2TB SSD and has All my P3D stull and Orbx add-ons.

Not being a techie - I can barely turn on a light on my own -I find this all works fine. It is quiet and very fast and I am therefore a happy bunny.

ATB

Allan

[511Flyer]

Eye wateringly expensive. My wallet cringes in fear.

[DaveB]

Indeed Dennis. Around £270 for a 1TB SSD and over £500 for a 2TB (just got these prices from Crucial) They are bloody quick though. Wish I could afford one big enough to put FSX on plus another to take a lot of my scenery which currently lives on another drive. MY OS is on an SSD and I have FS9 on another. Quick as you like and no mistakin

ATB
DaveB

[GHD]

My only SSD is 500Gb on which I have photo scenery.

[Buggyman]

Yes, very expensive, but it was my compensation for being too I'll to go on a long planned visit of a lifetime Which was a 3 week tour of family in the USA

I decided that my lovely, kind wife and tireless carer should go and my reward/compensation was a pc that would see me out - which, as you may ha've seen from my post earlier this week could be sooner than we think. But, positive thoughts prevail.

ATB

Allan

By the way, I already had some SSDs fron my old .pc