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new gaming PC why dont they have 2 x M2's
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happyhero
Posts: 1,277 Forumite


in Techie Stuff
Hi I am thinking of either buying or building (had some previous experience) one of these liquid cooled gaming PC's for my son mainly but me a bit too and I notice so many of them often have 1 x M2 drive and then an additional ordinary moving parts drive, not even an SSD. I understand prices have an effect but with the prices of these PC's being often around £800 to £1000 plus the difference in drive cost between and ordinary drive and an M2 it doesn't seem worth the saving especially when you consider speed is important in a gaming machine. Surely you would just get a PC or motherboard with 2 x M2 slots and buy 2 x M2 drives to maximise everywhere. Plus wouldn't an M2 be more reliable with no moving parts so less chance of failure?
I mean it seem odd to want a fast machine and then use to ends of the spectrum for drive speed. Wouldn't you at least make the 2nd drive and SSD drive?
I have an old PC (i7 5 years old) currently which I have an SSD with Windows 10 on and my files are on an ordinary Western Digital drive and I sometimes wish my files were on an SSD as some take longer than I'd like to open. Ok I'm being fussy maybe but I'd just like to understand why the drives are being chosen like this in new fast Gaming PC's.
Any help/info appreciated.
I mean it seem odd to want a fast machine and then use to ends of the spectrum for drive speed. Wouldn't you at least make the 2nd drive and SSD drive?
I have an old PC (i7 5 years old) currently which I have an SSD with Windows 10 on and my files are on an ordinary Western Digital drive and I sometimes wish my files were on an SSD as some take longer than I'd like to open. Ok I'm being fussy maybe but I'd just like to understand why the drives are being chosen like this in new fast Gaming PC's.
Any help/info appreciated.
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Comments
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The idea is the M.2 for the Operating System and most games, and the regular hard drive for extra storage for stuff like music and photos. It means they can market high speed and high capacity, but only some of the capacity is at the high speed.I agree that with current drive prices, unless you're going for multiple terabytes the cost saving is fairly modest, but system builders would always like to cut costs.
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happyhero said:Hi I am thinking of either buying or building (had some previous experience) one of these liquid cooled gaming PC's for my son mainly but me a bit too and I notice so many of them often have 1 x M2 drive and then an additional ordinary moving parts drive, not even an SSD. I understand prices have an effect but with the prices of these PC's being often around £800 to £1000 plus the difference in drive cost between and ordinary drive and an M2 it doesn't seem worth the saving especially when you consider speed is important in a gaming machine. Surely you would just get a PC or motherboard with 2 x M2 slots and buy 2 x M2 drives to maximise everywhere. Plus wouldn't an M2 be more reliable with no moving parts so less chance of failure?
The reason for the fact that you might not be able to buy one off the shelf with two M.2 drives in place is probably just a lack of demand, there would be nothing to stop you putting one in the second slot if the MB had one.
Solid state stores is roughly on a par in terms or reliability with spinning rust, but tends to have different failure characteristics, there are benefits to both.happyhero said:I mean it seem odd to want a fast machine and then use to ends of the spectrum for drive speed. Wouldn't you at least make the 2nd drive and SSD drive?happyhero said:I have an old PC (i7 5 years old) currently which I have an SSD with Windows 10 on and my files are on an ordinary Western Digital drive and I sometimes wish my files were on an SSD as some take longer than I'd like to open. Ok I'm being fussy maybe but I'd just like to understand why the drives are being chosen like this in new fast Gaming PC's.
So in summary, an SSD for where speed matters, accepting the additional cost, an HDD for where speed is less important, but bulk storage and cost per GB is more important.
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An excellent answer above but just to add that £800-£1000 gaming rigs are really only entry level, I know that sounds bad as it is so expensive but on a machine like that where £300 of that cost should be on the graphics card, penny pinching elsewhere in the spec is vital.
Once a game is loaded and in play, the graphics card will be mostly be responsible for the experience in the game, not the disk - so this is where the money must go.
You could buy 2 TB in either
£300 2TB SSD
or
£75 (£25 250GB SSD plus £50 2TB spinning disk)
On a tight budget the latter makes more sense as most of the gaming experience is down to the GPU - that £225 saved is paying for a better graphics card that you will feel the difference for in 99% of the time playing the game.
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Nothing stopping you adding a 2nd or 3rd or even a 10th NVMe drive.But adding a 2TB HDD = sub £50 compared to £200+ for a 2TB NVMe.8TB HDD to store all those steam games costs less than £150. Thats the bonus of a PC if you wanta dozen NVMe drives then add them.Censorship Reigns Supreme in Troll City...0
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forgotmyname said:8TB HDD to store all those steam games costs less than £150. Thats the bonus of a PC if you wanta dozen NVMe drives then add them.
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feolojad said:But be aware that apart from one or two of them you'll only get speeds the same as a regular SATA SSD due to the fact there are a limited number of PCIe lanes available that's shared between the PCIe 16x slot the GPU goes in and the NVME drive slots.Eaily solved with a Threadripper.Censorship Reigns Supreme in Troll City...0
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