OS Boot on M.2 x4 Gen-3 SSDs with 32Gb/s

[DarvinKManwah]

Hey guys, I'm putting a new system together and was wondering about the new M.2 x4 Gen-3 SSDs with 32Gb/s. I don't see much talk about it recently. Should one consider getting one?Would you recommend booting my OS off of it? Would I really see a performance difference?

This is the Mobo I'm getting: http://www.msi.com/product/mb/X99S-GAMING-9-ACK.html#hero-overview

Thanks.

 

[i7Baby]

You can see - http://ark.intel.com/products/77948/Intel-SSD-530-Series-80GB-M_2-80mm-SATA-6Gbs-25nm-MLC - they don't go any faster than a run of the mill sata3 ssd.

 

[DarvinKManwah]

So why does the MSI X99S GAMING 9 ACK Mobo says this: "Turbo M.2 : Delivering next generation M.2 Gen3 x4 performance with transfer speeds up to 32 Gb/s"

Does it mean at present there is no technology that can be used with speeds of 32gb/s?

 

[i7Baby]

The interface can deliver that if you can find the SSD that will do it.

So far I haven't seen any M2 SSD that do more than 550mB/s. Right now, if I could afford it, I'd get a pcie SSD eg http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820228112&cm_re=pcie_ssd-_-20-228-112-_-Product - ~ 900 mB/s

 

[DarvinKManwah]

That looks good as well. I've been keeping my eyes on the Samsung SM951 M.2 PCIe SSD which is looking very very promising. The reviews I've seen looks solid as well. Here are some that I've read:

http://lab501.net/samsung-sm951-m-2-pcie-ssd-released/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonevangelho/2015/01/13/diy-pc-samsungs-scorching-ssd-asus-motherboard-mania-pc-shipments-bounce-back/
http://www.anandtech.com/show/8865/samsung-launches-sm951-m2-pcie-30-x4-ssd-for-oemssis.

Maybe I can run my OS on my SSD and run my programs and projects on the M.2. Maybe I might be able to see a difference in performance but for now I won't rely on it heavily. Also I haven't read of anyone successfully being able to load their OS and boot from it.

 

[i7Baby]

Newegg has the 941 version - $500! http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820147349 but 1000mB/s

 

[DarvinKManwah]

I saw a few people on youtube actually booting off of it, interesting.

Also I was adding the Samsung XP941 M.2 PCIe SSD on to my list over at PCPartPicker and it says it's not compatible with my MSI X99S GAMING 9 ACK MoBo but it is compatible with the MSI X99S GAMING 9 AC. Is there a major difference on the board regarding M.2 support? Or is that just an error on PCPartPicker.

Here is my list with the error at the bottom of the page: http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/HJxtRB

And here are compatible Mobos for the M.2: http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/parts/motherboard/?compatible_with=samsung-internal-hard-drive-mzhpu512hcgl00000#m=27

I'm going to say it's an error on the website, what do you guys think?

 

[i7Baby]

I think it depends on how they pick up the bandwidth. See http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/samsung-xp941-z97-pci-express,3826-2.html