Which Thinkpads still support mSATA?

I want to buy a Thinkpad, but my main concern is getting the most internal storage as possible, so I was thinking about a Samsung Evo 840 1TB mSATA SDD and a Samsung M9T 2TB 9.5mm HDD (expensive I know), but it seems that all the latest Thinkpads use M.2 instead of regular mSATA, which limits the potential storage space.

Are there any Haswell-based Thinkpads with an mSATA port?

 

No, all Haswell ThinkPads feature M.2 / NGFF, not mPCIe.

 

Alas, Lenovo decided to cripple all its latest Thinkpads with a semi-useless 42mm M.2 slot instead of an 80mm M.2 or mSATA slot.

 

How about the X230s and T431s? My guess is probably not and I'll have to go back to using an X230 or perhaps a T430u

 

X230s and T431s also use the M.2 format.

No, thats to simple. Lenovo didn´´t cripple anything at all, it is all about the size of the WWAN cards, because 42mm M.2 cards are smaller than mPCIe cards. These are used by Lenovo for the WWAN modems and cache SSDs, not bigger storage SSDs. an 80mm slot would take too much room and there are also no 80mm WWAN modems available. It really wouldn´t make sense for Lenovo at all to use an 80 mm slot.

The only machine with an 80 mm slot is the New X1 Carbon. However, this slot is only used for SSDs on the X1 Carbon, there is still one additonal 42mm slot in the machine for WWAN modems (and Cache SSDs). But these slots are just not meant to be used with big storage SSDs. All other models than the X1 Carbon still make use of the normal 2.5" SATA format.

 

I know my W530 has an mSATA slot since I put an mSATA drive in it and I'm using it right now.

The W530 is way more impressive than most of the Haswell based ThinkPads anyway.

 

I'm sticking with my "crippled" analogy I still maintain it was a dumb move for Lenovo to stick with 42mm M.2 slots for cache drives and I don't buy the argument that space was an issue since there are other 4th-gen Lenovo laptops that offer mSATA slots (which are barely any larger than M.2) and finding an additional few cm in the the chassis of even a 15" Thinkpad cannot be that hard for Lenovo's exulted engineers. After all, a T540p has the same guts as a T440p, yet is in a bigger chassis. Also, plenty of other manufacturers have managed to include mSATA slots in their machines in addition to M.2 slots for WWAN/WLAN cards (such as Dell in its skinny M3800 that I almost bought for that reason). Lenovo apparently just chose not to allow such flexibility.

 

Lenovo used the 42 mm M.2 for most of the Haswell ThinkPad, because these drives were only for cache purpose, and not used for storage (at least Lenovo didn't have high priority for the storage).

 

Lenovo previously used mSATA for cache drives (T430, for example) and they still use mSATA for cache drives in some of the Ideapads so why they decided to change to M.2 for cache drives in the 4th gen Thinkpads I've no idea, but it's annoying and limits system flexibility. Lenovo must have known how common it was for customers to use the mSATA slot for a second system drive instead of for caching.

 

But the first gen mSATA only had one physical dimension in terms of length. The M2 comes in many flavour. Personally i would also like M.2. to be larger, which would give me more storage space.

 

That's my biggest gripe. I've nothing against the M.2 format, but the fact the Lenovo only offers 42mm slots really limits flexibility far more than if they'd kept the mSATA option. I can't help but think that pinching pennies and forcing customers to buy OEM cache drives were clearly more important priorities to Lenovo than offering customers flexibility. Moreover, mSATA might only have one size, but you can still fit a 500GB SSD on one!

If Lenovo sticks with the 42mm format then I might have just bought my last Thinkpad because having two drives is important to me and I'd rather not have to deal with the added bulk of a machine with two 2.5" drive bays.

 

Why should they use the 80mm format for a slot with the primary use "WWAN / LTE modems"?

Of course they will stick with the 42mm format, since there are no real reasons to change it to a different format. mSATA is old, and the 80mm format is primary for storage SSDs.

However, I think there will be more storage SSDs in the future for the 42mm form factor. For example, Intel has already announced a 42mm M.2 SSD (the Intel 1500 Pro with 120 GB). I am also sure they will available with bigger capacity in the future. Lets not forget: At the start, mSATA also was only available with 80 GB.

 

That's exactly my point though -- Lenovo apparently didn't bother to consider those who might want to use the M.2 or mSATA slots for OS or storage SSDs, which I think is an oversight and detracts from the flexibility of their Thinkpads, especially more powerful machines like the W540. And, yes, mSATA is a relatively old format but it can still match the SATA3 speeds of Lenovo's M.2 implementation so is plenty fast enough for a while yet. After all, Samsung released its 840 Evo line of SSDs in mSATA format this year, so it must think there's life left in mSATA.

As for seeing 42mm M.2 drives in larger capacities, I remain skeptical that much will be available this year. That Intel 42mm drive was announced about six months ago and so far the only Intel M.2 drives widely available are 80mm versions of the 530 series. When and if we ever see the mythical 42mm Pro 1500 remains to be seen (and if it does arrive it might only be for OEM customers). Meanwhile, every other manufacturer that has announced M.2 drives in the last six months (none of which are actually available yet, either) have focused on 80mm and larger cards.