What's a good M.2 form factor SSD for a Lenovo T540P?

I'm planning on buying two SSD's. One is a SATA 3 2.5 inch for the main drive slot. I'm thinking the 1TB Samsung 850 Pro[1] - unless someone has a better suggestion.

I believe there's a M.2 slot in this system as well, but I don't know much about that form factor or really what that means. I saw there's a Samsung 950 Pro that's M2 but... I don't know if that'll fit? It looks large.

Also note that I dual boot Linux and Windows (Linux primarily, by far), though I don't think that'll matter.

[1] http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820147362

 

I would strongly recommend the 950 Pro as a M.2 drive, its essentially the fastest M.2 drive out there. It however, does have some heat issues as discussed in this anandtech review: http://www.anandtech.com/show/9702/samsung-950-pro-ssd-review-256gb-512gb. Nevertheless, its still a great drive and that issue only comes up when really hammering the drive for an extended amount of time. Its also a 22 by 80 drive, which is by far the most common form factor for M.2 drives, so it will most likely fit, just check your laptop's service manual to verify, or open it up to check for yourself.

 

Cool. I'm not sure how to find out what size the M.2 slot is. I asked here years ago and it ended up being a discussion about mSATA. Is there somewhere I can find this out without taking my laptop apart? I'd rather not take it apart just to put it back together and then take it apart all over again a week later.

 

If you have the choice of both 2.5" SATA III and M.2 form factors... keep ignoring the available M.2 drives for the next little while (still).

http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...ing-as-advertised.783057/page-2#post-10122189

Keep reading the above thread for more...

The heat/throttling issue is real and it will quickly bring the 'fastest M.2' drive to below awesome levels and... it may also affect your other components and make them throttle sooner too giving you less overall performance, real world use.

Read that thread from the beginning; M.2 is a far cry from the best storage subsystem you can get today, regardless of what the online rags might say.

And the 950 Pro? An even worse implementation, imo.

Hopefully X-Point/Optane in the next few weeks/months will show the world what NVMe performance is really supposed to be about.

 

The M.2 slot in the T540p is only 42mm long, which means you're limited to 128GB or 256GB capacities. And make sure you pay close attention to the length of the m.2 drive you purchase, since even some smaller-capacity drives are physically too big for your system.

 

256GB max capacity? Another reason to totally ignore this 'tech' at this time.

 

It's an issue with the laptop, not M.2 technology.

 

No, the technology is still to blame... a 2.5" SSD/HDD can have multiple capacities (even up to 16TB...).

 

The problem is indeed the laptop in this case, however; there's no limitation on M.2 as noted; - it's merely the length of the drive that fits. The smaller lengths have less capacity. Inevitably, the capacities will go up over time.

2.5" isn't without limitations either. Some laptops only take 7mm height versions, others 9.5mm, &c.

Charles

 

Great, thanks for all of the information. If I can't fit the m.2 drive into the slot, no point buying it. Ordering the 850 now.

 

Did you ever find out what size m.2 would fit in your T540p? I just opened mine up and boy, that would have to be a tiny card. I'm new to the m.2 form, so I have no idea what a normal size card would be.

 

See:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...n-m2-or-msata-slot.755244/page-2#post-9698974