Cooling a M.2 drive

[mutantaxe]

GamerNexus really attacked MSI for their heatshield for M'2 drives.

Anyway basically when they get hot they throttle and I have an awful Aorus 1080ti that produces heat on the backplate just below the M.2 slot. So I put my M.2 drive in the bottom slot on the motherboard and just by 3x120 mm intake fans to produce enough airflow to keep cool.

May be getting Rog Hero X mb and it has a bracket to enable small fan on the bottom but as can be seen on the Hero IX the bracket can make using the connections below a big problem. Maybe on the Hero X it would have fixed this




Maybe just put a fan on the floor of my 780T and that will get more then enough air flow over the M.2 drive.

any other suggestions for cooling M.2 ...maybe wont need it as I wont push it enough

 

[Eddie long]

Ever thought of EK/Aquacomputer heat sink for the m.2 which i have fitted , I have a 780T with a 120mm rad/fan in bottom , and i don't seem to have had any issues , although my m.2 sits vertical on the board , but it still half covered by a 1080ti poseidon

 

[WYP]

Quick question. Are you asking advice for a system you are about to build/upgrade or do you already have an M.2 drive that is throttling?

Also what M.2 SSD are you using/planning to buy?

 

[trawetSluaP]

I have an EK heat sink on mine. Plus my Mobo comes with a DIMM bracket, think it's called "DIMM.2" but you'd need the appropriate slot on your motherboard.

 

[BigDaddyKong]

What temps are you actually getting on your M.2?

 

[trawetSluaP]

Sat at 45-48c at idle and load.

 

[mutantaxe]

Quick question. Are you asking advice for a system you are about to build/upgrade or do you already have an M.2 drive that is throttling?

Also what M.2 SSD are you using/planning to buy?

I have a z370 system with a 950 pro but am getting a different motherboard and a 1TB Samsung EVO M.2 . Will use what I have to replace my old backup PC .

As for throttling, well its hard to know but I always like to be prepared and make sure it doesn't happen. Current m.2 is sitting at about 44C just after starting up according to LINK software . Using Samsung Magician and a 35 second benchmark and it went up to 59C......

And I dont need a M.2 drive but I want one. Thinking about 1TB in bottom and 512gb in top and then using external drives to back up stuff

Its my Birthday on the 4th so treating myself to a waste of money

and the good thing is it will help me lose some weight as I wont be able to eat


and as Eddie said, maybe a heat sink at the bottom with the extra fan in bottom of the case giving plenty of air flow to the fins


btw" what is a good benchmarking/testing program that will let you see temps and when does throttling kick in ..around 85C ?

 

[tinytomlogan]

 

[AlienALX]

Gonna whack a EK on mine next week. Don't need it (as not NVME) but it will hide the nasty green PCB

 

[WYP]

I have a z370 system with a 950 pro but am getting a different motherboard and a 1TB Samsung EVO M.2 . Will use what I have to replace my old backup PC .

As for throttling, well its hard to know but I always like to be prepared and make sure it doesn't happen. Current m.2 is sitting at about 44C just after starting up according to LINK software . Using Samsung Magician and a 35 second benchmark and it went up to 59C......

And I dont need a M.2 drive but I want one. Thinking about 1TB in bottom and 512gb in top and then using external drives to back up stuff

Its my Birthday on the 4th so treating myself to a waste of money

and the good thing is it will help me lose some weight as I wont be able to eat


and as Eddie said, maybe a heat sink at the bottom with the extra fan in bottom of the case giving plenty of air flow to the fins


btw" what is a good benchmarking/testing program that will let you see temps and when does throttling kick in ..around 85C ?

Well Samsung's new 960 Evo SSD has much less of a thermal throttling problem thanks to Samsung's newer, cooler running, controller. TBH the main benefit of additional cooling is for benchmarks or insane users that can somehow keep the drive fully loaded (mosty writes) for extended periods. Fast M.2 drives are usually so fast that the drive is never fully loaded for long enough to overheat, though some NVMe controllers are hotter than others.

Given the cost of M.2 drives, I would get a heatsink for the extra peace of mind given how affordable they are.

If I remember correctly the Samsung 960 series typically takes three times longer to throttle than the 950 series. I think Puget systems tested that. Even then can you think of many workloads that require 60GB of random writes within 120 seconds?

For thermal benchmarking people usually use IOMeter or repeated runs of CrystalDiskMark.

 

[mutantaxe]

thanks wyp ...yes, for peace of mind a block will be good in the Australia summer ..should get air conditioning unit but would prefer to spend on computers

watched the vid and thankyou......pretty sure it will be going in the bottom slot if I get the hERO.....and something like that sitting on it with the bottom fan blowing onto it will do the job


and they ship to Oz by the look of this

Notice for international shoppers: Due to its light weight and compact size, we can offer attractive shipping costs of EUR 5.00 for this product to any destination outside the European Union, EUR 5.95 including VAT for any destination within the EU. Please select shipping option "Padded envelope" during checkout for economy shipping.

 

[XPredator]

Well, i dont know if you guys are aware of this chinese manufacturer called JEYI. I found this one to be interesting, and they have more M.2 cooling heatsinks. Ive used one with no fan on a client build, 10c temp drop with it. Give it a try, its dirt cheap (i actually posted the mini blower one, i will buy one just for the sake to try, and it looks cute lol)

https://pt.aliexpress.com/item/JEYI...of-barra-de-ouro-NVME-NGFF-M/32846679587.html

 

[mutantaxe]

it looks like a Chinese knockoff off the EK M.2 NVMe Heatsink down to the disk on top