All Linux Things

Which WD is it? I've got the SN520 (low end, dramless, 2230/2242 3.0x2 for WWAN slots), SN550 (low end, dramless 3.0x4 but only performs at 3.0x2 speeds due to limitations of controller and NAND, although I do love this drive, it's just incredibly reliable performance), and SN750 (old high end before PCIe 4.0, 3.0x4). I want to get a SN570, while it's still considered an entry level drive, because of improvements in controllers and NAND, it performs near on par with early high end 3.0x4 drives.

WD SN550 is the one I ordered as their drives are incredibly reliable. Im also running the SATA version of this drive in the other 7270 and the 7470.
Ive been cautious as Ive read some people had issues with the 7270/7470 and NVMe drives. Recently I found that wasnt the case so given the price is the same as SATA drives I bought one. Given the performance of even the entry level drives is far better than the SATA drives Im pleased with the performance. My days of using spinning drives is just about over.

crosscourt wrote: ↑Fri Nov 26, 2021 8:44 pm Recently I found that wasnt the case so given the price is the same as SATA drives I bought one. Given the performance of even the entry level drives is far better than the SATA drives Im pleased with the performance. My days of using spinning drives is just about over.

Yeah, and the SN550, while it is entry level max performance, the sustained performance is amazing. It basically ALWAYS gives you max performance. Because it does use a 3.0x4 connection, but is artificially limited to 3.0x2 performance due to it's limited controller and the lack of parallelism in NAND, it's able to basically maintain full performance from first read/write all the way to being full. So it's honestly a FANTASTIC drive. And it's SIPS power, so even better when in a laptop where battery life is a concern.

Some NVMe drives really suck the power as one of my friends found out. He switched to a WD SN550 and is a lot happier for it. My other SATA drives are fine for now and I may replace them down the road.

The Pinebook Pro allows for a very power draw from its expansion ports, which means you need to be fairly fussy on how much power an NVME drive uses.

This wiki page from Pine64.org list the power consumption use by various NVME drives and the power states they support.
<https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/Pinebook_P ... patibility>

This page details commands that can be used to force NVME drives to use a specific power state. The above page list what the various drives will support.
<https://wiki.pine64.org/wiki/Pinebook_P ... Me_adapter>

For the Pinebook Pro I chose a Kingston A2000 NVME drive, because it can be set to just sip power.

Except for my laptops, power usage with NVMe drives really isnt a concern. The WD drives as tlmiller mentioned really perform very well given they are budget drives but are still good from a power standpoint.

It was a pain getting Win10 on my Dell e6430. Microsoft can be really frustrating when thry dont follow their own rules. I eventually got Win7 installed and activated, then installed Win10 and they activated it. At least right now if you have a device with an activated Win7 install they are honoring the free upgrade to Win10. They just make it as tough as possible and go to great lengths using your Microsoft account to hassle you as much as possible,

Just upped the ram to 16gb in my Dell 7270, but still waiting on the NVMe 512gb drive and USB adapter to clone the OS onto it.

WD SN550 %00gb NVMe drive just came but the adapter hasnt shown up yet, so probably wont be able to install till the weekend.

Just cloned my NVMe 256gb drive to my new 500gb NVMe drive on my Dell 7270. These drives are fast as it took 8 minutes for the cloning to finish which even compared to the M.2 SATA drive is three times faster.