SSD feature dependencies

Hi
If I were to purchase the fastest SSD today, I would want an SSD based on MLC NAND technology on a PCIe bus of version 3.x and with y channels using a nvme controller.

i believe, but do not know x = 3.0 and the max current y=4

My question is what must the actual mobile workstation or laptop have in order to install the above ficticious SSd

Obviously the MLC features is inherent with the SSd so there is no laptop dependency.

Is the nvme controller on the drive or in the laptop?

if the PCIe bus physically is an x16 (connector has all 16 channels), then will it utilize an SSD with x=4 (current) or maybe in a year or so x=6 channels? or is there a PCIe controller which might limit the number of channels regardless of the number available in the physical connector

how important is it that the PCIe bus is version 3.0 or 3.1 (whatever the latest version is). How many versions back can I go before the version slows the transfers down.

I want to use the above information to determine if i can purchase a lower cost
laptop and install an SSD of my own chosing with known capability instead of
purchasing some unknown SSd from some well known laptop vendors.

If that quest rings warning bells for anyone, please share your concerns.

Thank you

 

Warning bells: Don't buy based on theoretical 'superiority'. Why? Because theoretical and real world usually have no correlation.

While I could agree on your logic above, the real world proves otherwise.

Instead of attacking the problem of a new platform from the lowest performance denominator (storage...) - why don't you tell us what you will use your system for 'specifically'.

In 99% of the cases? An 2.5" SSD that is current, larger than 1TB and is also OP'd by 33% over and above whatever 'technical' OP it may be shipped with for warranty purchases (i.e. allowed to make it just past warranty...) is ime superior to any NVMe SSD I've had the displeasure to use (sustained, over time). Why? Because of throttling (thermal) either in just the SSD itself or that and in combination with other components like the GPU and the CPU.

A lot depends on the chassis and cooling design of the notebook in question - in addition to the aforementioned workload/workflow expected out of the platform.

With any 'lower cost laptop' and with many higher cost ones too (the fruity companies offerings, Dell, etc.) the design of the notebook is strictly for looks - not for high (sustained) performance of not only the (i)GPU/CPU/RAM trifecta... but also the hot running SSD's that we have access to today (yeah; far from the promise of 2009 where an SSD meant; less heat/noise/power than a HDD...).

2.5" SSD's don't necessarily run cooler... but what makes them superior is that they actual physical size and required bay makes them dissipate the same or more heat much, much better than any M.2 NVMe drive that is slapped against a M/B can ever hope for (in a mobile platform).

I didn't count how many bells there are above; but any one of those would be enough for me to be turned off of any current M.2 NVMe SSD you can currently buy for your mobile workstation.

 

Good Morning !

Thank you for responding.

First, I want to make sure I understood you.

I thought I heard that thermal issues dominate the success of using SSD M.2 NVMe over traditional SSD.

I thought I heard that you came to that conclusion from experience and from common sense (you believed the design of the traditional SSD was superior as compared to the M.2 NVMe

Did I hear you correctly?


Secondly.....you asked for my laptop use.
I am an inventor and poet/philosopher/photographer.

So for "work" I sketch new designs on scraps of paper. I quantitatively analyze the designs using matlab and excel. I use autocad as I converge on a design that works.

For "fun" i write using scrivener and word. I use photoshop to meld my photography into my poems.

for school, I am taking geomatic courses which involved running applications like ARCmap and autocad.

I am tired of having stacks and stacks of paper sketches all over my house.

I used to build my own workstations purchasing motherboards and other components to suit my desires. I loved doing that and know I would still love doing that.

But I am 72 which means I enjoy sitting in a comfortable chair to work until my cats converge on me to the point i move to a simple straight back chair and work from a table top. I also help others less fortunate than I and hence sometimes find myself at their houses just to reassure that noone has forgot about them. I bring my laptop and work.

So I was originally attracted to Microsoft's SurfaceBook with performance base. I knew its display was inadequate for autocad work, but I thought I could purchase a second monitor for that application.

But I was worried about MS's failure to provide a reliable device, although I am hearing better reviews of the performance base device. And they seem to be overpriced for what you get.

But it does have a pressure senstive screen so that i can sketch (not as a detached unit but folded over). that screen did receive rave reviews.

Alternative mobile workstations had significantly better components but failed to offer sketching capability or if they had a touch(vs pressure sensitive) screen I was led to believe that such screens do not have palm rejection and tend to have an unacceptable delay(1.5 sec) between touching and not touching operation.

I don't care about weight. Just as you, I would prefer a bulkier heavier mobile workstation that actually consistently performs to spec, not a pretty little thing that degrades in performance as heat builds up. Noise is a non-issue.

The reason I have not (so far) sought two devices (one for computing and one for sketching) is that I never know when I will have a fresh idea. I spend most of my time computing as there is so much work transforming an idea into reality, but when an idea magically surfaces, I was hoping to capture it on the device i was working on.

I welcome your viewpoints. You seem to be far more grounded than I. I appreciate who you are. Please offer me any suggestions you might have (including your explanations which I appreciated).

have an incredible day....shake up the world....while valuing diversity of thought

for those of you who face others who do not value multiple points of view....I do not know what to offer for advice in successfully preventing them from steam rolling over you.

 

@whburling why don't you just purchase a device similar to surface book, but business-class - with better build quality and easy upgradeability? There are many.

Regarding SSDs - if you're into capacity, there ain't much choice, you just get what is available. 2.5" slots are only available in bigger machines; there are some exceptions, but they all come with noticeable trade-offs. 2.5" currently top out at 4TB, while m.2 - at 2TB. Good TLC is OK - and drives of highest capacity are all TLC anyway. Comparing NVME and SATA m.2 drives, they differ in price much more noticeably than in (real world) performance.

 

A smaller Wacom tablet might pair nicely with a workstation that otherwise meets your needs but doesn't offer the sketching capability. The smaller ones look like they retail for ~$70, so you could conceivably leave one at home and have one for traveling (or left at a location you frequently visit).

 

@alexhawker drawing on Wacom tablet without display is nowhere near pleasant as on a tablet with display, or paper. It's simply unnatural unless you're used to it.

 

Agreed 100% (I never got used to it, or tried enough to, but I'm happy with no touchscreen and no sketching).

There's also something like a Cintiq (never tried one but assume it's more natural to be "drawing" directly on top of what you're working on).

FWIW I'm a CAD monkey/product designer/3D modeler, but I pretty much just use mouse/kb when working digitally. And with pen and paper, while I can visually communicate an idea with a sketch, but it's a crude drawing not a piece of art - I'm creative in my work but NOT artistically inclined/talented.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

@alexhawker OP can just get a convertible ultrabook / detachable tablet with pen & touch input, like Surface Book he already mentioned, instead of multiple devices, if ulv dual-core is enough for his tasks.

 

You're quite welcome!

First:
Yes; in most chassis and notebook designs, an M.2 format SSD is inferior to a 2.5" SSD when the system is used as a workstation (i.e. for hours at a time) because of heat/throttling issues to itself from other components (GPU/CPU) or both to itself and to other components. Do note that storage 'performance' for 99% of the use cases is not that important - there is a reason why the 64+ year old tech called HDD is still around and still viable.

Should we ignore an option with SSD's over HDD's? Of course not. But it is important to note that not all SSD's are created equal. Nor is a theoretically superior option (NVMe) better in real world use when the rest of the platform isn't up to the task of properly powering and cooling it.

A key point to note is that your actual workflow and workloads will determine if SATAIII or NVMe is superior for you - in the notebook/platform you choose. Ignore what everyone says - even me - until you actually test it as you want to use it. Ignore graphs, benchmarks, numbers and otherwise irrelevant 'scores' from websites and manufacturers with their own agenda. What information you get (whether good or bad) in your actual use during your 'test period' is worth more than all the reviews in the world.

Yeah; I did come to the above conclusions from experience and a common sense approach. Note that the design of 2.5" SATAIII SSD's isn't superior on it's own. It's when it's shoved into a constricted area like a compact notebook that 2.5" SSD's perform at their potential while most M.2 SSD's in most notebooks perform not only at a fraction of theirs; but at times slower than a HDD too.


Second:
With your usage spelled out (thank you!), it is easy to see you need at least two platforms from where I sit.

The biggest question now is what kind of budget do you have?

(For the rest of my post; the budget is 'unlimited' - you can pick and choose where you would like to make tradeoffs to fit your real world budget as you see fit).

Forget the scrap papers... a Surface Pro is desperately calling your name - along with Windows 10 Pro 'creators edition'.

The Surface Pro can do (at some pace...) all of the work you want/need. But I would recommend either a desktop or a very capable notebook if you want to keep all your 'work tools' portable. Which one would I recommend? The Surface Pro 5, of course (but since they're not available yet...) the SP4 with an i7, 16GB RAM and 1TB SSD storage. Price? ~$2,600

While pricey, the above recommendation will give you a digital sketchbook that will have you drop and forget your paper and pen/pencil 'now'.

The 'feel' of the SP4 with the newest Stylus Pens is very satisfying to use. The overall eco-system is impossible (yeah; opinion) to beat today.


If you want to stay portable for your 'main' platform, the Lenovo ThinkPAD line is where I would be looking at. Especially check out the Lenovo ThinkPAD P40 Yoga with it's Wacom Pen with 2048 levels of sensitivity. If you don't need a touch/sketch screen on your beefier setup? The Lenovo ThinkPad P70 is where I would be spending some $$$$.

I would be configuring the P70 with as much RAM as it can hold along with the fastest processors available at the time you buy - with of course the biggest SSD's (yeah; multiples) possible.

See:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/10444/the-lenovo-thinkpad-p70-review-mobile-xeon-workstation/8

If you don't want to stay portable? I would be considering the MS Surface Studio - especially if being able to 'sketch' is important to you.

See:
https://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/Surface-Studio/productID.5074015900

With 32GB of RAM, a 128GB SSD + 2TB of storage and with a 4GB GPU - the Surface studio is made for someone with the name 'inventor' in their title. At $4,200 this isn't for the faint of heart. But at 72 years old, I think that you, just like I, appreciate that time is greater than $$$$$$$$.

Should it be even better (cheaper, with more RAM and bigger SSD's)? Yeah. But the sum is much more than the parts. Make sure you at least get a hands on demo of this 'next gen' tech... Everything about it inspires 'create'.



Last:
In an ideal world, you would have all three of the above suggestions. With the Surface Pro 4 never leaving your side.

Combine this with a yearly subscription to Office - and you'll get 1 TB of synced and effortless sharing of your most important work in progress between the devices above...

I would seriously start out with the SP4 and add more platform(s) as needed, with the Office subscription becoming important when you actually decide to use and keep two or more devices (and you're almost always connected via high speed internet).

Back to reality though...

What is your budget?

Would any one of the systems above (possibly the Yoga P40) be a reasonable compromise?

Would a bargain basement 'SP4' wannabe be enough for your sketching?

See:
http://www.pcmag.com/review/349819/asus-transformer-mini-t102ha-d4-gr


For ~$400, the above offers a touch screen and Stylus (and you can use SP4 Pens with it too) and a long enough battery life so that you aren't tethered to AC everywhere you go. It pales in comparison to the SP4, of course - but for a quarter of the $$$$ or less, it is something to think about.


With an unlimited budget, it may seem that $$$ can buy you happiness. Not true. All the above suggestions are just tools to get a job done.

What more $$$$ will do is give you back your time to create and produce; rather than be bogged down by the steep slope of mediocrity as tech is made to fit into smaller and smaller budgets/price points.


whburling, I hope some of my ramblings above help you a little.



In a nutshell: buy as much tech as you can afford 'now'. By buying the biggest/baddest CPU you can, then marrying it to the most RAM you can physically fit into a system. If a GPU is needed for your workflow; here is where you should spend 'more'. Lastly, the storage capacity should be as big as possible (whether HDD or SSD) - because you'll want to use less than the maximum you bought to have the most responsive and consistently fast system possible.

With an HDD - you would 'short stroke' the C:\ volume for maximum responsiveness - with an SSD - you OP it. Either way; 'free space' isn't the same thing as 'unallocated' space.


Looking forward to your response to my questions above. Take care.

 

Just was wondering if my last post above (post#9) was any help in helping you decide what you need?

Curious...