mSATA and the M14XR2

Has anyone had luck finding one for sale and installing it with good result? Will the machine recognize a SATA III disk and take full advantage of SATA III speeds?

Lastly, if a SATA III mSATA drive is used, will the speeds be exactly as if you had a 2.5" SSD installed?

Why the heck are there so few, and even fewer decent looking mSATA drives on the market?

 

msata is still fairly new to the main stream computing especially with DDR3. I was doing some research on this last week and many model are only be supplied to the OEM as well so us consumers can't buy them new.

 

You can find mSATA drives all over the net. Newegg & Amazon specifically have them in stock. Newegg even carries a 256GB mSATA, though it'll cost ya $399. I plan to get either a 128GB or 256GB mSATA when my M14x R2 arrives.

 

Ah, but keep in mind, I said decent looking ones

Most of those are SATA II, and nasty brands. Then there's the outrageously priced ones. What I really want is a 64GB SATA III, reliable branded mSATA drive for $90 or less.

 

what does the m14x come with when going for the 64msata option? i think mushkin is the only brand that has a sata 3 at a value of 400$ which is quite ridic.

 

Hey, I found a decently reviewed Adata 60GB mSATA drive. It's on this website for $76! The site seems a bit shady, and it is currently broken, but I do wonder if we might be able to get Amazon to pricematch it.

Here's the site:
ADATA XM13 AXM13S2-60GM-C mSATA MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

And here's the Amazon link:
Amazon.com: A-Data 60GB XM13 mSATA SSD SATA II 3Gb/s Sandforce Driven Internal Solid State Drive: Computers & Accessories

Click on "tell us about a lower price".

If we get a couple people to submit the pricematch, we could get it for a somewhat respectable price!

 

Got a 60GB Adata mSATA drive installed - only took 5 minutes. WEI score is now 7.8. Not bad for SATA II!

 

hi .. the m14x r2 Msata port support sata 2 only right?

 

No, I don't think that's true. I'm not sure, but I assume it can handle SATA3

 

I believe if its similar to the m17x r4, that its only SATA II. I could be wrong about that, but that's what I was told in another thread. Guess the only way to know for sure would be to buy one and test it out.

 

hmm... i did some benchmark.. seq. read around 450-460mb and seq. write around 170mb ish.. and i did some system check using speccy, it shows sata type as SATA 2 and transfer mode as SATA 3..

 

i dont think the m14x r2 is sata 3 as my ssd will get 245mb/s on crystalmark but on m14x only 200mb/s.

 

Some data about the Intel 310 80GB mSata.

 

I think aw is using samsung pm830 sssds.!
Thats what i found out.!
Samsung PM830 SATA 3 256GB mSATA SSD Review - Ultrabooks To Gain Capacity and SATA 3 Speed - The SSD Review
If that is true it must be supporting sata 3.
I'll get mine on 4 june with 32gb msata cache. Lets see which one it is

 

We can actually confirm this. We have had a couple of Alienware laptops pass through our shop for upgrades where we found that the Samsung PM830 mSATA had been installed, customer ordered. they were the 64GB ones, and they do put out fairly impressive numbers.