Question Best way to add a third M.2 SSD for best performance ?

[Star2222]

Hi,
I have a MSI MAG B550 TOMAHAWK Motherboard ATX. I already filled the two M.2 bays. I want to add storage but have the same speed.

What is the best way?
SATA I assume is not an option (much slower). Perhaps some PCI adaptor?

Also, for that motherboard specifically, what is the fastest M.2 SSD I can buy?

Thank you

 

[USAFRet]

What is this system used for?

What are all the rest of the parts?

Be careful about trying to chase that absolute best speed thing. SATA III SSDs are still perfectly fine.

 

[logainofhades]

In a B550 board, your top slot is normally gen 4 speed, and the second slot is gen 3, so you already are not at the same speed, unless both your drives are gen 3. Either buy a larger NVME drive, to replace your second drive, or get a 2.5" sata. As already mentioned a 2.5" SATA is still plenty fine.

 

[Star2222]

Thank you @USAFRet and @logainofhades

I use it for heavy engineering work (simulations and 3D CAD) and also large high-res video editing).

The rest of the system is:
- Ryzen 9 3900 12-core @ 3800MHz
- 64Gb RAM - Patriot Viper 4 Blackout Series DDR4 (4 x 16GB) 3200MHz
- 2 x WD_BLACK SN750 1TB High-Performance NVMe M.2NVMe

What do you mean SATA III is still ok? According to Kingstone website (link below) it is 6 times slower (600MB/s vs 3,500MB/s). Am I missing something?

2 Types of M.2 SSDs: SATA and NVMe - Kingston Technology

There are two types of M.2 SSDs: SATA and NVMe. SATA uses an older interface designed around hard drives while NVMe is designed for flash memory.

www.kingston.com

Thank you

 

[USAFRet]

What do you mean SATA III is still ok? According to Kingstone website (link below) it is 6 times slower (600MB/s vs 3,500MB/s). Am I missing something?

Yes, NVMe are faster. But that is mainly seen when doing large data transfers between two like devices.
An SSDs main benefit is the near zero access time. This is true across all types of solid state drives.

Not every drive in a system has to be blindingly fast. I have 6x in mine, and usually it is pretty hard to tell which one I'm working with.
2x NVMe, 4x SATA III.

I also do a lot of CAD and video.
Rendering a short video, out to 3 different drives....virtually the same time.

The drive speed difference is irrelevant, the rest of the system (CPU/RAM) is what takes the time. The drives are just loafing along, waiting on data from the rest of the system.

 

[Star2222]

Thank you all,
because I have some M.2 drives I was thinking about a PCI expansion card.

I came across these two from the same manufacturer/seller. But the smaller one (2 slots) is actually more expensive than the 4 slots one. Why is that?

And which one is best for my motherboard assuming I just want to use it to add more M.2 drives in normal configuration (not RAID)?

Or perhaps you have a better suggestion than those two?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/4-Port-Con...1b0-bc71-34ae524355de&pd_rd_i=B09CTZ8QJM&th=1


And


https://www.amazon.co.uk/4-Port-Con...1b0-bc71-34ae524355de&pd_rd_i=B09CTZ8QJM&th=1

Thank you 😊

 

[CountMike]

The first one is quite enough for 2 NVMe SSDs, if it's plugged in at least PCIe x8 slot but fit in x16 too. NVMe is just adaptation of PCIe lines. In case of your MB, other PCIe x15 slot supports only x4 lines so 2 NVMe drives would have to share it, each one running at only x2 lines so that would cut SSD's speed in almost half but still pretty faster than SATA SSDs.

 

[Star2222]

The first one is quite enough for 2 NVMe SSDs, if it's plugged in at least PCIe x8 slot but fit in x16 too. NVMe is just adaptation of PCIe lines. In case of your MB, other PCIe x15 slot supports only x4 lines so 2 NVMe drives would have to share it, each one running at only x2 lines so that would cut SSD's speed in almost half but still pretty faster than SATA SSDs.

Thank you @CountMike

 

[Star2222]

Thank you all.

I bought this:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/4-Port-Con...1b0-bc71-34ae524355de&pd_rd_i=B09CTZ8QJM&th=1

But when I installed it, not only the new M.2 drive (on the expansion card) did not appear, but the previous D drive (installed on the motherboard's second M.2 slot) disappeared from Windows Explorer too... so only the C drive was still appearing.

Do I need to configure the card I bought (see link below) to see both M.2 I am planning to install (perhaps in the BIOS or Windows) or does it automatically recognise I installed two M.2 on the same card?

Someone mentioned PCIe lane sharing and that sometimes it needs configuration. If I need to, how do I configure it?

Thank you as always!

 

[logainofhades]

Check Disk Management. You might need to configure drive letters there.

 

[SkyNetRising]

I bought this:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/4-Port-Con...1b0-bc71-34ae524355de&pd_rd_i=B09CTZ8QJM&th=1

But when I installed it, not only the new M.2 drive (on the expansion card) did not appear, but the previous D drive (installed on the motherboard's second M.2 slot) disappeared from Windows Explorer too... so only the C drive was still appearing.

Do I need to configure the card I bought (see link below) to see both M.2 I am planning to install (perhaps in the BIOS or Windows) or does it automatically recognise I installed two M.2 on the same card?

You can use that adapter card in upper PCIE x16 slot only (where you probably have your graphics card).
There is no other way for installing more than 2 NVME drives on this board.
Note - using second PCIE x16 slot will disable second onboard M.2 slot (M2_2).

Please read user manual of your motherboard.
https://download.msi.com/archive/mnu_exe/mb/MAGB550TOMAHAWK.pdf