M2 Storage unit for OS boot disk purpose

[DottorSerpente]

Hi everyone,
I'm thinking to puirchase a new M2 PCI-Express storage unit with the mean to speed up the boot process of my windows gaming PC.
I read some articles about it and everyone thinks it's a good and affordable option.
The only question leaving me behind is: Will it work as a boot disk on my Asus P8P67 EVO MoBo?
It's kinda an old one and I read that it's needed to know where the BUS is and if it's boot capable.
Everyone could help me out in findings theese infos about my MoBo model?
Thanks everyone in advance
Bye

[WarmedxMints]

It doesn't look like it has the required port on board. Just get a 2.5" sata ssd. They are the same speed iirc.

[DottorSerpente]

thanks Dude,
Really helpful.
I already own a SSD via SATA III and it works really fine but I read that the boot up speed will increase a lot by using the PII-E 2.0 connection, do u agree with that?
So u're sure about the bootabilty of this setting?
Just one thing, can u advice me on a specific product or a brand?
I'll like to stay around EUR 150
I really appreciate your help

[Ellie]

Originally posted by Dott. Serpente:

thanks Dude,
Really helpful.
I already own a SSD via SATA III and it works really fine but I read that the boot up speed will increase a lot by using the PII-E 2.0 connection, do u agree with that?
So u're sure about the bootabilty of this setting?
Just one thing, can u advice me on a specific product or a brand?
I'll like to stay around EUR 150
I really appreciate your help

My pc boots in 12 seconds with a 850 evo 1 TB, It doesnt need to get faster than that...

[DottorSerpente]

@Wahrmed "It doesn't look like it has the required port on board. Just get a 2.5" sata ssd. They are the same speed iirc."

what port are u referring to?
I checked that the MoBo has PCI-E 2.0

[WarmedxMints]

M2 Sata SSD's use the same NAND and controllers as their 2.5" counterparts. If you want a drive which reads/writes faster you would want an NVME ssd.

Originally posted by Dott. Serpente:

@Wahrmed "It doesn't look like it has the required port on board. Just get a 2.5" sata ssd. They are the same speed iirc."

what port are u referring to?
I checked that the MoBo has PCI-E 2.0

Modern boards have a port you can connect m2/nvme drives directly to without the need for a pci card.

[tacoshy]

Originally posted by Dott. Serpente:

@Wahrmed "It doesn't look like it has the required port on board. Just get a 2.5" sata ssd. They are the same speed iirc."

what port are u referring to?
I checked that the MoBo has PCI-E 2.0

SATA III and NVMe are not even clsoe to be the same speed even no under normal performance. 12 sec boot time is average with SATA III SSD while NVMe gets me down to 3.6sec boot time. The games on it load also much faster tho some games faster means then instead of 3 sec loading time you go down to 2sec loading down which is also 33% faster.

If that is such a huge advantage everybody has to know for himself.

PS: Also NVMe is PCIe 3.0 x4... PCIe 2.0 wont cut it.

[DottorSerpente]

Originally posted by WarmedxMints:

M2 Sata SSD's use the same NAND and controllers as their 2.5" counterparts. If you want a drive which reads/writes faster you would want an NVME ssd.

thanks for the explanation, it really helped me out, the only issue is, as suggested by TheDude, the retrocompatibilty with PCI-E 2.0, I assume is possible but to be verified per product model.
If anyone has known of a model with theese features to sdvice me on, i'll be glad ;-)

I'm sorry but is possible that I misunderstood the whole thing.. ;-)
I assumed that theese NVme are fisically connected directly to the MoBo via a PCI-E port.
Am I wrong?

[tacoshy]

Originally posted by Dott. Serpente:

I'm sorry but is possible that I misunderstood the whole thing.. ;-)
I assumed that theese NVme are fisically connected directly to the MoBo via a PCI-E port.
Am I wrong?

well you can physically connect them to a M.2 Port but also via a cable to an U.2 Port. what you might misunderstood is, that M.2 doesnt mean NVMe. M.2 is a port like a formfactor. NVMe SSD's are always M.2 but there are also SATA III M.2 SSD's.

[DottorSerpente]

Originally posted by tacoshy:

Originally posted by Dott. Serpente:

I'm sorry but is possible that I misunderstood the whole thing.. ;-)
I assumed that theese NVme are fisically connected directly to the MoBo via a PCI-E port.
Am I wrong?

well you can physically connect them to a M.2 Port but also via a cable to an U.2 Port. what you might misunderstood is, that M.2 doesnt mean NVMe. M.2 is a port like a formfactor. NVMe SSD's are always M.2 but there are also SATA III M.2 SSD's.

Ok, but just to make sure that I understood..
I catch an NVMe model, making sure is retrocompatible with PCI-E 2.0, then where do exactly i plug it in?
I saw some images on amazon and I didn't figure out how to plug it on the MoBo, it goes in a PCI-E slot?
the plugs are very different..
sorry for the 'stupid' question

[tacoshy]

Originally posted by Dott. Serpente:

Originally posted by tacoshy:

well you can physically connect them to a M.2 Port but also via a cable to an U.2 Port. what you might misunderstood is, that M.2 doesnt mean NVMe. M.2 is a port like a formfactor. NVMe SSD's are always M.2 but there are also SATA III M.2 SSD's.

Ok, but just to make sure that I understood..
I catch an NVMe model, making sure is retrocompatible with PCI-E 2.0, then where do exactly i plug it in?
I saw some images on amazon and I didn't figure out how to plug it on the MoBo, it goes in a PCI-E slot?
the plugs are very different..
sorry for the 'stupid' question

no NVMe always require PCI-e 3.0 x4
And those NVMe SSD's are plugged into a M.2 Port or connected with a cable with a female M.2 and male U.2 Port. To use NVMe your Motherboard has to support it. It has nothing to do with PCI-e ports where you put in graphics card or stuff liek sound cards and WiFi cards.

[TehSpoopyKitteh]

Originally posted by TheDude:

Are you planning to buy a PCIe M2 adapter? If so, make sure to get one that works with PCIe 2.0 as that is what your motherboard has. Most PCIe adapters are backward compatible, but you'll want to make sure you get one that works for your motherboard.

Or get a SATA SSD. That motherboard has two SATA III ports.

M.2 is not an adapter...It's a specific form factor.

M.2, formerly known as the Next Generation Form Factor (NGFF), is a specification for internally mounted computer expansion cards and associated connectors. It replaces the mSATA standard, which uses the PCI Express Mini Card physical card layout and connectors.

M.2's more flexible physical specification allows different module widths and lengths, and, paired with the availability of more advanced interfacing features, makes the M.2 more suitable than mSATA for solid-state storage applications in general and particularly for the use in small devices such as ultrabooks or tablets.

Computer bus interfaces provided through the M.2 connector are PCI Express 3.0 (up to four lanes), Serial ATA 3.0, and USB 3.0 (a single logical port for each of the latter two). It is up to the manufacturer of the M.2 host or device to select which interfaces are to be supported, depending on the desired level of host support and device type. The M.2 connector has different keying notches that denote various purposes and capabilities of M.2 hosts and modules, preventing plugging of M.2 modules into feature-incompatible host connectors.

In addition to supporting legacy Advanced Host Controller Interface (AHCI) at the logical interface level, M.2 specification also supports NVM Express (NVMe) as the logical device interface for M.2 PCI Express SSDs. While the support for AHCI ensures software-level backward compatibility with legacy SATA devices and legacy operating systems, NVM Express is designed to fully utilize the capability of high-speed PCI Express storage devices to perform many I/O operations in parallel.

Buses exposed through the M.2 connector are PCI Express 3.0, Serial ATA (SATA) 3.0 and USB 3.0, which is backward compatible with USB 2.0. As a result, M.2 modules can integrate multiple functions, including the following device classes: Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, satellite navigation, near field communication (NFC), digital radio, Wireless Gigabit Alliance (WiGig), wireless WAN (WWAN), and solid-state drives (SSDs). The SATA revision 3.2 specification, in its gold revision as of August 2013, standardizes the M.2 as a new format for storage devices and specifies its hardware layout.

The M.2 specification provides up to four PCI Express lanes and one logical SATA 3.0 (6 Gbit/s) port, and exposes them through the same connector so both PCI Express and SATA storage devices may exist in the form of M.2 modules. Exposed PCI Express lanes provide a pure PCI Express connection between the host and storage device, with no additional layers of bus abstraction. PCI-SIG M.2 specification, in its revision 1.0 as of December 2013, provides detailed M.2 specifications.

Legacy SATA
Used for SATA SSDs, and interfaced through the AHCI driver and legacy SATA 3.0 (6 Gbit/s) port exposed through the M.2 connector.
PCI Express using AHCI
Used for PCI Express SSDs and interfaced through the AHCI driver and provided PCI Express lanes, providing backward compatibility with widespread SATA support in operating systems at the cost of not delivering optimal performance by using AHCI for accessing PCI Express SSDs. AHCI was developed when the purpose of a host bus adapter (HBA) in a system was to connect the CPU/memory subsystem with a much slower storage subsystem based on rotating magnetic media; as a result, AHCI has some inherent inefficiencies when applied to SSD devices, which behave much more like DRAM than like spinning media.
PCI Express using NVMe
Used for PCI Express SSDs and interfaced through the NVMe driver and provided PCI Express lanes, as a high-performance and scalable host controller interface designed and optimized especially for interfacing with PCI Express SSDs. NVMe has been designed from the ground up, capitalizing on the low latency and parallelism of PCI Express SSDs, and complementing the parallelism of contemporary CPUs, platforms and applications. At a high level, primary advantages of NVMe over AHCI relate to NVMe's ability to exploit parallelism in host hardware and software, based on its design advantages that include data transfers with fewer stages, greater depth of command queues, and more efficient interrupt processing.

So yes M.2 SSD's are sort of worth it.....

[tacoshy]

Edmund please google what M.2 actually is. Not all M.2 Support storage devices at all. Also M.2 doesnt automatically support NVMe. Many M.2 Ports only support SATA III. It was never a replacement for mSATA. Also M.2 SATA III is exact the same performance then 2.5" SATA III as the connection is the same (SATA III).


@ OP that might give you a slight idea what I was talking off.

Different PCI-e Ports on a Motherboard 

Community Created Artwork for Steam Artwork

By: tacoshy

Educational Picture of different Ports on a Motherboard.

[Hare+Guu!]

Afaik, only z97 and up support m2 boot. Anything older requires a bios hack.

[TehSpoopyKitteh]

Originally posted by tacoshy:

Edmund please google what M.2 actually is. Not all M.2 Support storage devices at all. Also M.2 doesnt automatically support NVMe. Many M.2 Ports only support SATA III. It was never a replacement for mSATA. Also M.2 SATA III is exact the same performance then 2.5" SATA III as the connection is the same (SATA III).


@ OP that might give you a slight idea what I was talking off.

Different PCI-e Ports on a Motherboard 

Community Created Artwork for Steam Artwork

By: tacoshy

Educational Picture of different Ports on a Motherboard.

I gave you a long explanation about that already.

Originally posted by Hare+Guu!:

Afaik, only z97 and up support m2 boot. Anything older requires a bios hack.

OP's motherboard is a P67 chipset...so no chance of M.2 working...even with the adapter TheDude suggested....And it seems I was correct...

[tacoshy]

You still not correct. Can't boot over it doesn't mean you can't use it. But I'm pretty sure I saw such adapter even working on older PC's as the adapter with a M.2 SSD does act anymore as M.2 SSD but as a normal PCI-e SSD like many of the Intel ones