[SOLVED] NVMe M.2 SSD on an Asrock AB350 Fatal1ty Gaming K4?

[thomasst]

Hello,

I'm currently using a small SATA SSD as a boot drive, and two HDDs for most of my storage needs. However, this setup is becoming too slow for me (not to mention noisy), so I'm looking for an upgrade.

A retailer in my country offers a good deal on a Samsung 970 Evo Plus 2TB. However, I have little experience with this technology, so I wonder if it will be compatible with my ASRock Fatal1ty AB350 Gaming K4 motherboard. As far as I understand, the disk should be plugged into one of the M.2 ports on my motherboard, and that's it (cloning drives aside). Am I missing something here?

Other than that, I'm using a Ryzen 1400 CPU, a Radeon RX 570 graphics card, and 16GB RAM in 4 modules, 4GB each.

Thanks in advance!

 

[MatthewSterling]

Hello.

It seems that the motherboard has an M.2 socket, PCIe Gen3.

The drive you have linked also is PCIe Gen3. Samsung makes great drives and if you got a deal for it, that's great. It is a lot faster than an SSD, and exponentially faster than an HDD.

So yes, you should be able to just plug your new drive in the top M.2 slot and it'll work.

I strongly suggesting also moving Windows to the new drive if you plan on also keeping the old ones (they can still be used to store photos, documents, etc.).


Only personal opinion from this point onwards:
Unless your HDD is 2TB or larger, I'd consider just removing it. The 2TB from the new drive plus your current SSD should be plenty, and if the HDD is the loudest component in your PC (not under load), then it can greatly improve the quitness.

Anyway, you should wait for a few other people to respond, because I may have gotten wrong, but either way I hope I have helped you and if it turns out everything's compatible, you should definitely go for the drive, especially if you got it on a deal. It'll truly be a lot faster.

Have a nice day

 

[USAFRet]

Hello,

I'm currently using a small SATA SSD as a boot drive, and two HDDs for most of my storage needs. However, this setup is becoming too slow for me (not to mention noisy), so I'm looking for an upgrade.

A retailer in my country offers a good deal on a Samsung 970 Evo Plus 2TB. However, I have little experience with this technology, so I wonder if it will be compatible with my ASRock Fatal1ty AB350 Gaming K4 motherboard. As far as I understand, the disk should be plugged into one of the M.2 ports on my motherboard, and that's it (cloning drives aside). Am I missing something here?

Other than that, I'm using a Ryzen 1400 CPU, a Radeon RX 570 graphics card, and 16GB RAM in 4 modules, 4GB each.

Thanks in advance!

That drive on that motherboard should be no problem.

It must go in the M.2_1 port.

 

[thomasst]

That drive on that motherboard should be no problem.

It must go in the M.2_1 port.

Thanks for your responses! Still, I'll try to double-check the compatibility issue with the vendor if possible.
But before that, I'm trying to sort out another issue with my motherboard, namely regarding BIOS - I would appreciate if you took a look at it - thread here.

Unless your HDD is 2TB or larger, I'd consider just removing it. The 2TB from the new drive plus your current SSD should be plenty, and if the HDD is the loudest component in your PC (not under load), then it can greatly improve the quitness.

Indeed, this is what I've been planning - to get rid of HDDs altogether - it should make everything faster and quieter. 👍