Gen 4? Gen 3?

Cavallino · 28 Nov 2020 at 20:42

Folks Im putting together a build and the MSI Ace Z490 mobo I will be using has 3 M.2 slots.
Presumably these support Gen 4?

But I guess these are out of stock with OCUK for anything above 1TB?

My idea was to populated 1 X 250GB or 500GB (for OS) and 2 X 2TB for games.

(I still have my main HDD which I would like to still keep for general storage of photos and documents - I guess its best to keep it on HDD then move to an SSD due to lifetime of the SSD?)

Thanks folks.

bremen1874 · 28 Nov 2020 at 20:55

Cavallino said:
Presumably these support Gen 4?

Gen3 only. It's all in the specs on their product website.

Does Intel have anything that supports Gen4 yet?

Cavallino · 28 Nov 2020 at 21:01

Stupid thing not to have checked. I assumed PCIe 4.0 = Gen4.
My bad. Apologies.
Looks like Gen 3 for me.

bremen1874 · 28 Nov 2020 at 21:03

PCIe 4.0 is Gen4.

It hasn't got that either.

Cavallino · 28 Nov 2020 at 21:06

Again further further confusion on the epic scale.

PCIe 3.0 x4.
(Saw the 4 and thought gen 4).

Thanks.

Any recommendations of what to get in gen 3 flavour?

COYS · 28 Nov 2020 at 21:34

For a 2TB the SX8200 Pro is a good trade between price and speed, at around £190.

https://www.xpg.com/en/feature/583/

Cavallino · 28 Nov 2020 at 22:46

Why is this: https://www.overclockers.co.uk/wd-b...-solid-state-drive-wds200t2b0b-hd-54p-wd.html

Much more expensive than these:

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/sams...-3.0-x4-nvme-solid-state-drive-hd-23z-sa.html
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/wd-b...-solid-state-drive-wds200t3x0c-hd-55z-wd.html

COYS · 29 Nov 2020 at 00:02

You mean cheaper.

The WD Blue is SATA whilst the other 2 more expensive are NVMe.

Compare the speeds. That WD is way slower.

Cavallino · 29 Nov 2020 at 00:04

Makes sense, thanks COY5 (yes you are right I meant cheaper not expensive).

Think Im going to opt for the SN750 WD 2TB... £289 is around the rate these are going for at this spec?

COYS · 29 Nov 2020 at 00:12

£289 is a lot for Gen 3.

That SX8200 one I linked to is way better value at £190. I have it as my games drive.

Also cheaper that the WD is the Sabrent Rocket Gen3 2TB at around £240.

Cavallino · 29 Nov 2020 at 00:16

Ok cheers COYS. I did see the XPG at the Yorkshire based site, but honestly speaking I would not touch them with a barge pole due to a very sour experience with them on a return in the past, promised never again.
I can see its £230 on rainforest.... Ill consider it....
Incidentally, is it really true that PCIe 4.0 is going to be the way to go really and that games will take full advantage of it and people with PCIe are going to be left in lumber?

Alex h · 29 Nov 2020 at 19:04

Cavallino said:
Ok cheers COYS. I did see the XPG at the Yorkshire based site, but honestly speaking I would not touch them with a barge pole due to a very sour experience with them on a return in the past, promised never again.
I can see its £230 on rainforest.... Ill consider it....
Incidentally, is it really true that PCIe 4.0 is going to be the way to go really and that games will take full advantage of it and people with PCIe are going to be left in lumber?

I keep looking at that one myself the 2tb wd

Joxeon · 29 Nov 2020 at 19:10

Cavallino said:
Stupid thing not to have checked. I assumed PCIe 4.0 = Gen4.
My bad. Apologies.
Looks like Gen 3 for me.

You can still use a gen 4.0 SSD in a gen 3.0 board but it will restrict the speed although if in the future you upgrade to a rocket lake CPU then it might run at gen 4.0

Cavallino · 29 Nov 2020 at 19:21

alex h said:
I keep looking at that one myself the 2tb wd

The WD Black?

Joxeon said:
You can still use a gen 4.0 SSD in a gen 3.0 board but it will restrict the speed although if in the future you upgrade to a rocket lake CPU then it might run at gen 4.0

Ah really? Interesting. But surely you would need a new mobo?

Alex h · 29 Nov 2020 at 19:29

Cavallino said:
The WD Black?
Yeh looking at getting rid of my 1tb rocket and swapping if for the 2tb black I've just added a sata wd blue 2tb for pictures so have a spare 1tb wd sata drive as well and then a 1tb gaming ssd so could put games on wd black and sell the 2 x1tb blues

Cavallino · 29 Nov 2020 at 19:32

Ive always wondered if people use these drives for storage of important photos/documents etc? Surely with the TBW limitation these will one day conk out and better to have them on more reliable medium?

Alex h · 29 Nov 2020 at 20:42

Cavallino said:
Ive always wondered if people use these drives for storage of important photos/documents etc? Surely with the TBW limitation these will one day conk out and better to have them on more reliable medium?

All my stuff is backed up on 2 external drives so have 3 copies of important pics and documents

Cavallino · 29 Nov 2020 at 20:44

Ah sweet. Is that external NAS or just USB HDDs?

Alex h · 29 Nov 2020 at 20:55

Cavallino said:
Ah sweet. Is that external NAS or just USB HDDs?

usb hdd again western digital

d_brennen · 29 Nov 2020 at 21:01

Cavallino said:
Ive always wondered if people use these drives for storage of important photos/documents etc? Surely with the TBW limitation these will one day conk out and better to have them on more reliable medium?

SSDs tend to be obsolete before the TBW figure is reached unless you are doing enterprise level stuff, if you are you should know better! Any and all media is susceptible to failure, even RAID arrays, so backups of anything important is mandatory IMO. OneDrive and Google drive, etc are convenient, just know they are crawling over every piece of information and even scanning pictures for anything they can add to your advertising profile...

A bit annoyed with myself that I went with a 1TB NVMe as I only have 190GB space left and have had to swap games about to my SATA SSDs and hard drives and games aren't getting any smaller