question about SSD's, HDD and MB controllers

[devnulllore]

Ok, I will look into it further

[DevTech]

5 minutes ago, devnulllore said:

Ahh so I have 3 slots for one of those cards. I can't get to the one between or below the video cards so I will have to use the top on. Those are compatible?

OK, here is what you have:

 

QTY 3 - PCIe x 16 physical slots

 

QTY 3 - PCIe x 1 physical slots

 

I am using the word "Physical" here because the mobo BIOS will control the actual PCIe lane assignment as follows:

 

1. Your TWO GPU cards are in TWO PCIe x 16 slots running at PCIe x 8

 

2. The rest of your slots are unused.

 

3. You can add a SINGLE M.2 NVMe drive to the third PCIe x 16 physical slot which will steal PCIe lanes from ALL of the PCIe x 1 slots to give you PCIe x 4 which will drive a single NVMe so it ALL WORKS as long as you never need to plug in a PCIe x 1 card down the road, which is a fair deal to get NVMe

 

HERE IS WHAT YOU NEED TO RESEARCH:

 

1. check for an updated BIOS

 

2. see if anyone else on the internet BOOTED Windows from the NVMe drive. I think the mobo is new enough that it will work, but confirmation would be nice. I will search this one out as well, time permitting.

 

3. If you can't boot from the NVMe, you can still integrate it into the OS drive via Windows NTFS Junction Points which gives most of the advantage.

 

4. The fastest drive is a Samsung 970 EVO PLUS, which can also handle WRITE LOADS (in the PLUS version) almost as well as a Samsung Pro

 

Alternate drives that are almost as good are AData XPG SX8200 Pro and WD BLack SN750

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[DevTech]

So it can get confusing on Amazon and Newegg etc so here is some additional tips to avoid ordering the wrong versions:

 

1. Samsung 970 EVO PLUS --- For some reason Amazon in particular likes to shove the older non-PLUS version in you face. There is a significant improvement to the newer version and it is generally less expensive then the older model

 

Samsung 970 EVO PLUS   <--- the PLUS is important

 

2. there is a speed difference between the different sizes - they get faster as the size goes up and then flattens at the 1 TB point and up.

 

3. AData XPG SX8200 Pro - sometimes this drive is listed without the AData, i.e. just XPG SX8200 Pro - there is an older slower model of this drive as well so ensure SX8200 and Pro

 

4. Western Digital - WD Black SN750 - the "SN750" is critical to designate the newer model which fixes a bunch of stuff and makes it competitive. The SX8200 Pro and the SN750 use the same Controller Chip and general design.

 

5. Samsung 970 Pro - the anticipation is that a new "Samsung 970 Pro PLUS" model will be coming but the existing model is still blazing fast, just not quite as fast as the EVO PLUS and it costs a lot more...

 

 

[devnulllore]

Sorry if they seemed to be multiple threads about the same thing but they were actually two different topics they just ended up being on the same topic. No matter close them both at this point.

 

[Mindovermaster Global Moderator]

24 minutes ago, devnulllore said:

Sorry if they seemed to be multiple threads about the same thing but they were actually two different topics they just ended up being on the same topic. No matter close them both at this point.

 

Don't sweat it, man.

[DevTech]

2 hours ago, devnulllore said:

Sorry if they seemed to be multiple threads about the same thing but they were actually two different topics they just ended up being on the same topic. No matter close them both at this point.

 

Yeah don't worry about that. It was not a complaint. Just somebody doing some "cherry picking" and spaming everything with a button that slaps themselves in the face with a wet fish or something. Internet silliness.

 

100% nothing wrong with what you did.

 

The existence of multiple threads when you click on "Hardware Hangout" happens quite a lot in complex problems and I always check for that in case more information is available so there is no chance I would miss anything.

 

@Mindovermasteronce had like a million threads going on at the same time and I don't recall anyone complaining

 

Just keep asking away and figuring out your hardware stuff!

[farmeunit]

Comparison video for speed difference:

 

Very little difference in NVMe and SSD.  

[Mindovermaster Global Moderator]

1 minute ago, farmeunit said:

Comparison video for speed difference:

 

Very little difference in NVMe and SSD.  

In the real world, SSD and NVMe is negligible. Sure, NVMe has faster writes, BUT unless you are using that 24/7, it doesn't matter ALL that much.

[xrobwx71]

On 6/24/2019 at 6:47 AM, devnulllore said:

So on a side note I want to get an NVMe drive for my OS can you recommend one and some information on what I need to install? I have dual EVGA video cards and cannot tell without removing them what I have for slots. Someone else here has the same board maybe they can give me some info for the future.

https://dlcdnets.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/LGA1155/SABERTOOTH_Z77/E7246_Sabertooth_Z77.zip

 

Above is the entire manual for your board.

[devnulllore]

1 hour ago, xrobwx said:

https://dlcdnets.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/LGA1155/SABERTOOTH_Z77/E7246_Sabertooth_Z77.zip

 

Above is the entire manual for your board.

Thanks. I just have to make sure I get the right drive for my slots.

 

I think I am about all upgraded until I build a new rig. This MOBO has done me proud for 5 years.

[DevTech]

1 hour ago, devnulllore said:

Thanks. I just have to make sure I get the right drive for my slots.

 

I think I am about all upgraded until I build a new rig. This MOBO has done me proud for 5 years.

I have mobos over 5 years old that I will be upgrading with a plug-in NVMe drive. Spending real money on a older SATA SSD in 2019 makes no sense for me.  I have described exactly how to do the upgrade to something like a Samsung 970 and if in the end some bottleneck prevents the best results from happening, it is still the better way to future-proof a purchase.

 

Any M.2 drives can be unplugged from an expansion slot and plugged into a new mobo, so it is a wise future-proof purchase.

 

There is a portion of people that have some weird attitudes about these drives, perhaps because they invested too much in the older technologies.

 

I have added a drive to my computer in the same manner and from my personal experience the difference is very noticeable. The first generation NVMe drives were not much faster than SSD, but the current state of the art drives (like the 970) are blazingly fast by a factor of 5 TIMES or more. This is something you notice! (unless you configure it to RAID-5 to slow it down or have a really screwed up Windows config)

 

 

ANECDOTAL EXPERIENCE:

 

Certainly different people have different experience and then they project that experience on other people! If somebody added a drive and did not notice anything, then it has no value. If somebody did the same upgrade and went "WOW" what a difference, then they think everyone will have that experience. This type of BIAS is known as Anecdotal Experience and people tell stories and base their suggestions upon it. For the most part it is NEVER very predictive for another person with another computer.

 

 

FUTURE PROOF:

 

In 2019, I will NOT spend another penny on a SATA SSD drive! Every SSD I buy will be NVMe and that way I can upgrade motherboards on any of my computers with the full confidence that I can move my drives over.

 

 

[devnulllore]

Thank you sir. This was very helpful!

[goretsky Supervisor]

Hello,

I did a bit of searching, and it seems the Z97 chipset was the first Intel chipset in the Z-series to support booting from NVMe SSDs.

 

There were a couple of message threads I cam across where people talked about modifying the BIOS for Z77 motherboards to add NVMe support, with varying results:

• https://www.bios-mods.com/forum/Thread-NVMe-for-ASUS-SABERTOOTH-Z77
• https://www.pcgameshardware.de/SSD-Hardware-255552/Tipps/Booten-von-einer-NVMe-SSD-mit-Sandy-Ivy-Bridge-Hardware-Anleitung-User-Artikel-von-Mephisto-xD-1206051/ [in German]
• https://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?48001-R4E-BIOS-4804-MODDED-EFI-Intel-13-1-0-2126-Download

Personally, I would be very hesitant to do this to any computer other than a spare, since a failure could leave one with a non-working motherboard.  That said, I myself did make use of a modified BIOS (or UEFI as they are now called) firmware from the last message thread where support for booting from an NVMe SSD drive was added to my X79-based motherboard.  It is certainly possible the owner of the thread could modify a copy of the ASUS Sabertooth Z77 motherboard firmware for you, but you would likely need to do some testing, and there is always the possibility of ending up with a non-working motherboard.

 

Regards,

 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

[devnulllore]

Yes I am going to shy away from this for now. I am saving for a big upgrade this summer. I will then be looking for recommendations on MB's etc...

[devnulllore]

ok, well a little off topic but I figured I'd ask this here while we're on the subject of SSD's.

 

I am using the 2 extra SSD's I have as storage via USB 3.1. Is it still suggested I over-provision them?

[goretsky Supervisor]

Hello,

 

You can over-provision the SSDs regardless of what kind of interface they are on (USB, SATA, NVMe, etc.).  The type of connection used doesn't change the physics of how the RAM in the drive works.

 

Regards,

 

Aryeh Goretsky

 

[farmeunit]

On 6/28/2019 at 12:01 PM, devnulllore said:

ok, well a little off topic but I figured I'd ask this here while we're on the subject of SSD's.

 

I am using the 2 extra SSD's I have as storage via USB 3.1. Is it still suggested I over-provision them?

Over provisioning increases performance of drive.

https://www.seagate.com/tech-insights/ssd-over-provisioning-benefits-master-ti/

 

I always over-provision, but if you need the space vs performance, that's up to you.  If you don't need the space, necessarily, just over-provision.  You can always remove it later if you want or need to.