Specifically, Intel users will need a 12th or 13th Generation Core CPU with a motherboard based on Intel's Z690 or Z790 chipset. AMD fans must have a Ryzen 7000 series processor and an AM5 motherboard with an X670, X670E, or B650E chipset. Important: You'll also have to be sure the motherboard actually has a PCI Express 5.0 M.2 slot implemented. The chipset is not a guarantee of that, just an indication that the motherboard maker could include one. (Some of these boards will have only PCI Express 5.0 x16 expansion card slots, and not 5.0-compliant M.2 SSD slots.) The earliest versions of M.2 PCI Express SSDs made use of the PCI Express Gen 2.0 x2 interface, which defines a throughput ceiling that's higher than SATA 3.0's, but not enormously so. That evolved into PCI Express Gen 3.0 x2 and x4, paired with a technology called Non-Volatile Memory Express (NVMe) to propel performance even further, especially with heavy, deeply queued workloads. Now let's reiterate an important point: You may know an M.2 solid-state drive's length and capacity, but that doesn't tell you about thebusor interface it makes use of. That detail is vital to know—just as important as making sure the drive physically fits in the space you have. Also, make sure that if your system supports and you're shopping for an NVMe drive, any PCI Express drive you're considering is specifically an NVMe model. Merely using the PCI Express bus is not necessarily a guarantee of that; PCIe M.2 SSDs existed before NVMe, and though all current models support NVMe, some oldies are still on the market. Today's mainstream solid-state drives are PCI Express 3.0 and 4.0 x4 NVMe M.2 devices, and they leave the fastest SATA-based drives in the dust.

The main way it achieves this is by being a DRAM-less SSD drive. This saves a big chunk of the manufacturer's bill of materials, and thanks to advances in the latest controllers, it can be surprising how little impact this has on performance. Such drives are slower, don't get me wrong, but this new SN770 still quotes read and writes of 5,150MB/s and 4,900MB/s, respectively. Not bad. The ADATA XPG Spectrix S40 is an unapologetically bright RGB-lit PCIe 3.0 NVMe M.2 SSD that blings up your PC. Its 4K read and write speeds should keep most gamers happy, too. The ADATA XPG Spectrix S40G carries some respectable wins out of its duel with other competing drives we've tested, and it looked great doing it. g2nlvmqcchiscx5bva5a-pwotro-14b66ca5a-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net, g2nlvmqccuqvax5bs7hq-p4vzcl-ad59a5fd9-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net, g2nlvmqccuqxax5bsz6q-pm3a6a-3feb7d021-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net, g2nlvmqxzp4swx5bs5uq-pd12b9-62c8cb38d-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net, g2nlvmqxzp4swx5bt3va-p7puv0-d4fafcfea-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net, g2nlvmsy3wdkax5bs5zq-p675cj-d0b1fd299-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net, g33b4vqccuqvax5btwhq-pfp8ei-5c0ea4329-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net,Some PCI Express M.2 SSDs can run hot under sustained use, so having the M.2 module mounted on a vertical card can also mean better ventilation, and in theory less throttling due to heat. That said, these drives are so fast that under most normal use they finish data transfers before heat can become a major issue. Nowadays, though, many lean, premium laptops can make use of PCI Express-bus M.2 SSDs. (Just about all new desktop motherboards with M.2 slots also support PCI Express M.2 SSDs, too.) With these, you may see a substantive increase in performance in benchmark testing, but in most real-world usage, they'll just feel like a fast, premium SATA SSD. (Credit: Molly Flores) We actually like these because often, you often get a robust heat sink on the M.2 drive. Some PCI Express-bus M.2 SSDs can run hot under sustained read/write tasks and throttle their speed. That said, unless you're running a server or something similar, where a drive is constantly getting hammered with reads and writes, that's usually not something you have to worry about. That's because many of these drives are so fast, they get their transfer duties done before they have a chance to get all that hot. WATCH THAT BOOT. If your desktop is getting a PCI Express/NVMe drive for the first time, verify with the motherboard or PC maker that the drive will be bootable. It's unlikely, but a BIOS upgrade may be required to get you there. (This is an issue with older motherboards, not current ones.) clienttons-s.akamaihd.net, 176-34-86-175_s-23-203-249-81_ts-1604432488-clienttons-s.akamaihd.net, 176-34-86-175_s-23-203-249-90_ts-1604428164-clienttons-s.akamaihd.net, 176-34-86-175_s-95-101-143-18_ts-1604428258-clienttons-s.akamaihd.net, 176-34-86-175_s-95-101-143-24_ts-1604428321-clienttons-s.akamaihd.net, 34-242-207-243_s-23-203-249-81_ts-1604425495-clienttons-s.akamaihd.net,

clienttons-s.akamaihd.net, 364bf52c.akstat.io, 364bf5fa.akstat.io, 364bf6cc.akstat.io, 36c3fef2.akstat.io, 54-154-186-178_s-23-203-249-81_ts-1604425586-clienttons-s.akamaihd.net, 54-154-186-178_s-23-203-249-81_ts-1604429882-clienttons-s.akamaihd.net, 54-154-186-178_s-23-203-249-90_ts-1604425341-clienttons-s.akamaihd.net, 54-154-186-178_s-23-203-249-90_ts-1604425577-clienttons-s.akamaihd.net, Of course, SK Hynix isn't new to this space, but the new P41 is arguably the brand's first tilt at a truly high-end M.2 drive. The old SK Hynix Gold P31 was a bit of a clunky old thing, limited as it was to the PCIe 3.0 interface and a controller chip with a mere four memory channels. The new Platinum P41? It's got it all. As a replacement for the SATA bus, it was decided to leverage a much higher-bandwidth bus technology that was also already in place—PCI Express, or PCIe. PCIe is the underlying data transport layer for graphics and other add-in cards.. As of generation 3.x, it offers multiple lanes (up to 16 for use with any one device in most PCs) that handle darn near 1GBps each (985MBps). Bottom line: An NVMe-PCIe SSD is a nice-to-have if you can afford it. What about eMMC storage (aka eMMC memory)?It improves game loading times courtesy of a so-called "read look-ahead" algorithm, which predictively caches game data. gzfstpqxzp4swx5bsvra-ps8whv-800c4ca06-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net, gzfstpqxzp4swx5bt2ka-p3owfu-9bef421db-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net, gzfstpqxzp4swx5btynq-p80cg4-5fbda6ae3-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net, gzfstpsy3wdkax5btvta-pc4hb3-c24fbde0b-clientnsv4-s.akamaihd.net, i03f9f400-ds-aksb-a.akamaihd.net, i03fa4400-ds-aksb-a.akamaihd.net, i03faac00-ds-aksb-a.akamaihd.net, i03fae300-ds-aksb-a.akamaihd.net, i03fb4f00-ds-aksb-a.akamaihd.net, i22f29600-ds-aksb-a.akamaihd.net, Bottom Line: Doing your own upgrades can save money but be aware of the risks. If you're not sure how to upgrade your laptop's hard drive to an SSD all on your own, you might want to leave it to the professionals. Final thoughts Bottom line: eMMC memory is slow and lives in cheap laptops only. It's not an SSD. What is an M.2 SSD and do I need one? What about a 2.5-inch SSD?