M.2 vs Full Sized Sata III

[nbrikha89]

I just don't know what the deal with M.2 is and I want more information. Best as I can tell, M.2 SSDs are just SSDs that use up PCIe lanes instead of being plugged into the Sata connectors. I'm having issues figuring out why someone would want this on a full sized mobo over just a 2.5" form factor. Can someone explain it?

 

[BikerEcho]

one very simple reason. Speed
PCI-E 3.0 is much faster than Sata3.

 

[nbrikha89]

So if I'm just running a single GTX 780, I'd probably better off using an M.2 SSD? Are we taking about higher transfer rates? Lower latency? And am I going to notice this speed over a SATA 3 SSD (840 EVO)?

 

[BikerEcho]

Most non budget motherboards has 2 or more PCI-E slots. so you could use your 780 aswell as a PCI-E SSD.

PCI-E SSD's are way faster. take a look at this article:
OCZ RevoDrive 3 X2 review - Introduction

 

[nbrikha89]

My understanding one the RevoDrives were that they were that quick because they were technically set up in RAID 0. Am I wrong? I can get near those speeds putting to 840 EVOs in Raid too.

 

[BikerEcho]

It's not raid configured. that would require 2x RevoDrives. You might see in the specs it says something about 2x, but that's to tell that it uses 2 pci-e lanes.

I wound't get a PCI SSD because of the price. It's too early for that. The price is gonna drop as they become more common.
Just like SSD's. They are actually affordable now

I rather get 2 Evo 840 in raid0. For more than half the price you get a little more than double capacity. Sure it's still not as fast, but it's close enough.

 

[Mossiac]

Well the reason I wouldn't buy one yet is that it's still very young and I don't want my data sat on it as I wouldn't trust it. Although I'm just about to have a mortgage to worry about so price is also a very big factor.

Mossiac