"Cheapest" way to get into M.2 PCI-E NVMe SSDs, for multiple PCs?

[VirtualLarry]

Been looking at ebay.

Found some $145 "new OEM" Toshiba NVMe 512GB drives, those seemed like an honestly good deal.

Could scrounge some SM951 drives. Those performed well.

Could slum around with the Intel 600p drives, but I got "pauses" with a 256GB drive, and overall poor performance. ("Poor" being relative, to my 128GB SM951 drives. Also benchmarked worse.)

The one PC I put an Adata XPG SX8000 128GB in, I'm getting sporadic spontaneous reboots, where the M.2 NVMe SSD disappears, until the next hard power-down.

I can get a 128GB SX7000 (3D TLC, rather than the 3D MLC of the SX8000) for around $72-75 on ebay from Newegg.

 

[cbn]

Phison E7 with Toshiba 15nm MLC, $65.72 free shipping:

https://www.mydigitaldiscount.com/m...xsearch_e11=MyDigitalSSD+BPX&xsearch_e20=80mm

 

[jkauff]

Phison E7 with Toshiba 15nm MLC, $65.72 free shipping:

https://www.mydigitaldiscount.com/m...xsearch_e11=MyDigitalSSD+BPX&xsearch_e20=80mm

I had one of these, and although performance was good it ran VERY hot, even at idle. Bought two case fans, pointed them directly at the drive, and it still ran hot. Finally replaced it with a Samsung 960 EVO and have had no temp problems since.

 

[fluffmonster]

Phison E7 with Toshiba 15nm MLC, $65.72 free shipping:

https://www.mydigitaldiscount.com/m...xsearch_e11=MyDigitalSSD+BPX&xsearch_e20=80mm

I put the 480gb one of these with h270 and a G4600. Super snappy.

 

[whm1974]

@VirtualLarry are you sure you need M.2 PCIe NVMe SSDs? I mean most people for most use cases wouldn't be able to tell the difference in performance between a SATA SSD and a NVMe SSD anyway.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

@VirtualLarry are you sure you need M.2 PCIe NVMe SSDs? I mean most people for most use cases wouldn't be able to tell the difference in performance between a SATA SSD and a NVMe SSD anyway.

I wouldn't disagree with that, but I'm a hardware junkie with a "big habit" myself. Larry has been someone to watch for looking at the good deals on lesser NVMe drives as compared to 960 Pro or even EVO.

I bought the 960 Pro 1TB NVMe M.2 back in January or February. I should kick myself for shelling out $600 clams, but I can't do it -- I can't really kick myself. I'm still trying to decide whether performance is slightly degraded for using the PCIE x4 through the chipset as opposed to one of the two x16/x8 slots, but the benchmarks show sequential reads above 3,000 anyway. I'm still contemplating what to do with the spare x16/x8 slot.

I use 100GB of the Pro NVMe to cache a 5,400 rpm Barracuda 2TB spinner, and the remainder as a Win7/win10 dual-boot drive. Best system I ever built, and best I ever had . . .