NGFF M.2 SDD

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Hi

My mother board a H110M-A/M.2 has an M.2 slot.

It appears to be an NGFF compatible. Are these obsolete?
What can I buy now to fit this slot ?
e.g from samsung
EVO ? NVMe ?

Thank you
 
Stick a Samsung Evo 970 NVME drive into it and your OS will fly.
Dont go any less than 1tb.
Also look at the WD black/blue NVME.
 
Last edited:
ah... how about looking for a bios upgrade?
https://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/H110M-A-M-2/HelpDesk_BIOS/

Note: When a SATA mode M.2 device is installed, the M.2 socket shares bandwitch with the SATA6g_1 port.

No mention of NVME in the manual so looks like you can only add an SSD.

I'm not sure if the difference matters. (as in I dont know)

I googled if it can - this was the main hit.
https://forums.tomshardware.com/thr...vme-m-2-ssd-with-an-asus-h110m-a-m-2.2873441/
NVME is faster.

SATA connections from SSDs to the motherboard are the traditional way to transfer data. SSDs are so fast they get limited by that connection.

NVME is a faster connection.

You probably wouldn't be able to tell the difference z and if you're going from a spinning disk then the M2 will be massively faster.
 
I have both NVME and SSD drives so I know its faster.
Perhaps you can advise if he can use an NVME drive on that board or what would be the next best option
 
I have both NVME and SSD drives so I know its faster.
Perhaps you can advise if he can use an NVME drive on that board or what would be the next best option
Yeah, nope. The H110 chipset is entry level and doesn't have enough lanes spare for NVME. The manual states it shares bandwidth with the other SATA devices, it's not NVME compatible.

99% of people are best buying the cheapest SSD for the money. They're all fast enough the difference between them is fairly negligible. I'm not up to speed on the current leaders but Samsung have been a solid bet for years.
 
NGFF is just another name for M.2

M.2 slots come in a wide variety of different keyings. However the two that are relevant for storage devices are B and M. While both keyings in theory support a variety of interfaces the two we care about are PCIe and SATA.

In practice SATA only M.2 slots usually use the B keying while M.2 slots that support PCIe (and may or may not also support SATA) nearly always use the M keying. SATA M.2 SSDs are nearly always double-notched so they will fit in both B and M key slots.

With PCIe drives there is the additional complication that PCIe is not a dedicated storage interface. So there has to be a protocol on top for storage. Nearly all PCIe M.2 drives use NVME, though there were apparently some AHCI ones out there too.

I doubt there will be an explicit option for NVME in the BIOS. I suspect you will find it is bootable though once you install an OS on it but the only way to find out for sure is to try it.

Yeah, nope. The H110 chipset is entry level and doesn't have enough lanes spare for NVME.
The H110 chipset has 6 PCIe lanes. Further as with all recent intel mainstream desktop platforms you get 16 lanes direct from the CPU.

Looking at the H110M-A/M.2 specifications I see three expansion slots, one x16 which will be run directly off the CPU and two x1. I don't see any on-board peripherals that would require PCIe, so that leaves four lanes left for the M.2 slot.

The manual for the H110M-A/M.2 motherboard is one of the worst I've ever seen, but it does say.

"1 x 20Gb/s M.2 Socket 3 with M Key, type 2242/2260/2280 storage devices support (both PCIE & SATA mode)*"

It doesn't mention NVME specifically but I'm more inclined to think that is an omission in the manual than an actual lack of support.
 
NGFF is just another name for M.2

M.2 slots come in a wide variety of different keyings. However the two that are relevant for storage devices are B and M. While both keyings in theory support a variety of interfaces the two we care about are PCIe and SATA.

In practice SATA only M.2 slots usually use the B keying while M.2 slots that support PCIe (and may or may not also support SATA) nearly always use the M keying. SATA M.2 SSDs are nearly always double-notched so they will fit in both B and M key slots.

With PCIe drives there is the additional complication that PCIe is not a dedicated storage interface. So there has to be a protocol on top for storage. Nearly all PCIe M.2 drives use NVME, though there were apparently some AHCI ones out there too.

I doubt there will be an explicit option for NVME in the BIOS. I suspect you will find it is bootable though once you install an OS on it but the only way to find out for sure is to try it.


The H110 chipset has 6 PCIe lanes. Further as with all recent intel mainstream desktop platforms you get 16 lanes direct from the CPU.

Looking at the H110M-A/M.2 specifications I see three expansion slots, one x16 which will be run directly off the CPU and two x1. I don't see any on-board peripherals that would require PCIe, so that leaves four lanes left for the M.2 slot.

The manual for the H110M-A/M.2 motherboard is one of the worst I've ever seen, but it does say.

"1 x 20Gb/s M.2 Socket 3 with M Key, type 2242/2260/2280 storage devices support (both PCIE & SATA mode)*"

It doesn't mention NVME specifically but I'm more inclined to think that is an omission in the manual than an actual lack of support.
It states using the M2 slot will share bandwidth with one of the other SATA slots. That means it's using a shared lane, which means not NVME as they get a dedicated lane.

I would bet small sums on it not working.
 
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