Windows 10: Samsung introduces the Samsung 970 PRO and EVO NVMe M.2 SSDs

CountMike · Apr 24, 2018

Was more pointing to the fact he is getting a new motherboard/cpu, which will mean a different set of drivers. Can be done, but may run into quite a few issues.
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W10 is surprisingly able to switch platforms. I'm on third one without a clean install.

CountMike · Apr 24, 2018

Well I bet the Samsung NVMe driver and Magician will be getting updates soon then*Wink
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I don't think they would release it without drivers or without compatibility with old drivers.

Cliff S · Apr 24, 2018

I don't think they would release it without drivers or without compatibility with old drivers.
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I'm sure it's compatible, but they will definitly want to tweak the drivers for these new ones.#

You don't even need NVMe drivers at all, you can use Intel RST ones just as well(By turning RAID on in the BIOS).

CountMike · Apr 24, 2018

I'm sure it's compatible, but they will definitly want to tweak the drivers for these new ones.#

You don't even need NVMe drivers at all, you can use Intel RST ones just as well(By turning RAID on in the BIOS).
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My worked better with newest drivers, v2.3 in this case.

Cliff S · Apr 26, 2018

Concluding
For your normal consumer, performance wise you're not going to notice any difference in between an EVO or PRO unless you precisely measure it in a synthetic manner. The main difference is the way the NAND cells are written, three bits per cell for the EVO, and two bits per cell for the Pro models.

So what it the gain then? Well, a perf increase at incredibly high and complicated workloads. Also, writing 2 bits per cell places less strain on that NAND cell for the number of times it can be written, and that increases lifespan. If you purchase a Pro model, you do that solely for the reason of Endurance, which is the number of terabytes written before the NAND cells die off. I've mentioned it a couple of times in my reviews already, and will keep doing so; the MLC (Pro) versus TLC (Evo) discussion as far as I am concerned can be put to rest, SSDs with TLC NAND has proven to be extremely long-lasting and reliable thanks to the latest technologies. Samsung will give you a 5-year warranty on both the 970 product series (that or the TBW value whichever one comes first) and that in technology land is a nice warranty to have, 5 years always is preferred.

Remember, even with the slowest SATA3 SSD, you can find, the access times will make a tremendous difference as you do not have a mechanical magnetic head seeking data on platters. HDDs, however, are still relevant, for big storage and perhaps games. But for your OS a proper fast SATA3 SSD in the 400~500 MB/sec range already is really good. Some, however, want that platinum experience, going from a fast SATA3 SSD towards NVMe M2 again is a much faster step, but less noticeable compared to that regular SATA3 SSD, as you already have the fast access times and split-second application loading. You'll benefit from NVMe SSD storage units if you have the workloads for it, writing continuously, video editing and so on. For just gaming and OS functionality, however, the differences are in a very thin margin to be able to measure, as your PC file-IO is becoming the bottleneck.

So how fast do SSDs really need to be? Storage technology not evolving would mean us still be in the stone-age technology wise. The coming years will be all about lower prices and increased capacity and endurance. That said and done, the 970 Pro is impressive, but so is the EVO, which makes more sense value for money wise - it is as plain and simple as that. With an M2 SSD of this class, please check with your motherboard manufacturers if the board can support M.2 with four PCI-Express lanes (Gen 3.0) and NVMe. Whatever you are planning to do with this storage unit, you are good to go from gaming, overall net pc usage (albeit overkill) to video transcoding, virtualized workloads, editing and content creation, this is by far among the fastest SSD series available for I/O intensive workloads, consumer grade that is.

If you are hunting down an M2 unit with a nice black PCB and very proper performance metrics, hey this might be it for you. At the moment of writing the 512GB Pro model sells at roughly 289 Eur, with the 1TB version listed at 549 Euro, that is just very expensive TBH. The 970 Pro series come highly recommended a top pick, lower prices would be needed though as I find it hard to recommend the Pro over the Evo series, but sure, these are the Samsung flagship NVME SSDs and we know they'll sell like cute little puppies regardlessly.
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Samsung 970 PRO M.2 512GB NVMe SSD review - Introduction

Windows 10: Samsung introduces the Samsung 970 PRO and EVO NVMe M.2 SSDs

Samsung introduces the Samsung 970 PRO and EVO NVMe M.2 SSDs

Samsung introduces the Samsung 970 PRO and EVO NVMe M.2 SSDs

Samsung introduces the Samsung 970 PRO and EVO NVMe M.2 SSDs

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