Hey there Eggheads, Juan Carlos Bagnell here, continuing our look at lightweight tech throughout the month of July. We’ve covered small form-factor PC cases,
we’ve covered the best wireless mice on Newegg, now it’s time to turn our attention
to one of the lightest, smallest components of a full PC build: an M.2 SSD. Seriously, look at how tiny that is! And to think that you can now fit terabytes
of storage on something this small, for really not much more money than a traditional hard
drive or larger Solid State Drive! Now if you’ve been PC building for a while, you’ll remember what a big deal it was when Solid State Drives started replacing traditional hard drives in build list recommendations. The improved performance of SSDs became impossible
to ignore once the price started to come down. Well, we’re basically getting there with
M.2 drives now. If you’re starting a build from scratch
in 2020, there’s a very good chance that something like this could be the only storage
you need, period. Now, one thing we see a lot of online is confusion
over terms like M.2 and NVMe, and how they relate to form factor and performance - so
let’s try to clear that up a little. First, to be very clear, M.2 and NVMe are not interchangeable terms, but they are closely linked. M.2 is a form factor, which refers to the
size and shape of the drive. Technically a lot of different devices could use the M.2 expansion slot, but SSDs are by far the most common right now. Unlike standard hard drives and Solid State Drives, M.2 drives aren’t connected to a motherboard via a cable. Instead they’re plugged directly into the
motherboard using a dedicated M.2 connector slot. Depending on its type and functionality, an
M.2 drive can make use of either the standard SATA interface or the faster PCIe interface
to transfer data, but in both cases it plugs directly into the motherboard. Since they fold down and lie flush with the
motherboard once they’re connected, rather than jutting out like a graphics card or RAM
module, M.2 drives allow for a cleaner, less cluttered PC interior with fewer cables to
manage and better airflow. It’s important to note that M.2 SSDs which
use the older SATA interface aren’t really faster than standard 2.5” SSDs, they just
take up less space and look cleaner. If you want faster speeds, you’ll have to
make sure your M.2 drive is utilizing PCIe - and the NVMe interface protocol. NVMe stands for Non-Volatile Memory Express,
and it refers to the way in which data is moved, rather than the shape of the drive
itself. The main way in which it differs from the
existing SATA standard is that it draws on your motherboard’s PCIe interface to obtain
notably faster data transfer speeds than what you can get from SATA. Depending on your NVMe drive’s manufacturer,
you can see speeds as much as five or six times faster than a SATA-based equivalent
- and if you want the very fastest options available, you’ll want a drive and a system
that can take advantage of the latest PCIe standard, PCIe 4.0. If you’re planning on going with an M.2
drive while building or upgrading your gaming PC, it’s important to note whether you’re
getting a SATA-based drive or an PCIe, NVMe-based drive. Your motherboard might not have the appropriate
M.2 slots for both types, because SATA and NVMe M.2 drives are often keyed slightly differently,
and even if it does, you don’t want to waste money on a pricier NVMe drive if the motherboard
you’ve chosen can only access data using the SATA protocol (as not every motherboard
allows for PCIe data transfers). As always, read your specs closely before
you make your purchase. So, one more time, to recap: M.2 is a form
factor for SSDs. NVMe refers to the way data is moved to and
from the SSD. NOT all M.2 drives use NVMe, but the fastest
ones do. By contrast, most drives that use NVMe are
in the M.2 form factor, with few rare exceptions. At this point it’s pretty much inevitable
that M.2, NVMe drives are going to continue to grow in popularity and replace traditional
hard drives and larger solid state drives. If you'd like more info you can hit the links in the description below this video to check out M.2 SSDs on Newegg. PC storage has come a long way over the past decade - in the comments below this video, share some thoughts. What are your predictions for what PC storage will look like by the year 2030 - and beyond. It's gotta be crystals right? Like, some kind of magic crystal? As always, thanks so much for watching, sharing and subscribing. For Newegg Studios I'm Juan Carlos Bagnell, and I'll catch you all on the next video. And now I'm going to put this back in my NUC
so I'm not sitting here waving around and gesturing with an M.2 SSD.
