m2 second ssd, can it be sata?

[nek4d]

Hi everyone,
Waiting for my new AMR5 to arrive.
Got a few m2 ssds and was wondering, is sata protocol supported in the 2nd free slot?
Did not see that in any review or product specs page or topic here.
Because I would prefer to use one existing sata.
I know it has lower speed, it is fine with me as secondary and since I have it already, otherwise I will use another m2 pciex gen 3.
Of course, I can test it myself when I have the mini pc on my desk sooner or later, but thought to ask as well here, so that future readers find it handy.

[Gabe]

You should be able to use either one in either slot, as in the regular m.2 SATA SSD or NVMe, or mix and match, like you're thinking of doing. So adding an m.2 SATA SSD drive to the second slot for storage or whatever else, while the first has the stock m.2 NVMe it comes with, should work just fine.

[nek4d]

Thanks a lot for your feedback Sir!
I will use the sata m2 then initially, after 1st setup, probably and hopefully by next week upon receiving the beautiful AMR5

[Gabe]

Thanks a lot for your feedback Sir!
I will use the sata m2 then initially, after 1st setup, probably and hopefully by next week upon receiving the beautiful AMR5

You're quite welcome.

Edit: Just for the heck of it I put the 128GB m.2 SATA drive that originally came in my AM02 into my AMR5. At first there was a bit of a clash in the form of a warning and keeping the drive offline, as it still had Windows 11 on it from the AM02, but once I changed it to online and formatted it using MiniTool Partition Wizard, it was fine.

Screenshot 1.jpg (14.78 KiB) Viewed 3738 times

I then ran a benchmark on each drive. For reference, the NMVe in my AMR5 is not what it came with. I upgraded it with an ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro, which is about 50% faster than the NVMe drive the unit came with.

m.2 NVMe...

Screenshot 2.jpg (61.73 KiB) Viewed 3738 times

m.2 SATA...

Screenshot 3.jpg (60.18 KiB) Viewed 3738 times

[nek4d]

Thanks again for the useful info dear Gabe!

I came back to report my results and just seen your post.
I received my AMR5 today and after initial windows setup, I added the sata m2.
It worked just fine directly, as per your observations too.

What is further interesting nonetheless, my AMR5 came with a sata m2 itself!
(model CYX-SSD-S1000).
Thought it would be pciex gen3.
Ok, cost cuts but no worries, insignificant for me, as I prefer windows 10 (instead of 11 that is shipped now) and as I expect and also your charts confirm (pciex nvme is multiple times faster than sata), I will install another good m2 pciex gen3 in the future, together with a new installation of windows 10.
Although not soon probably, I just set it up and want to use it as it is for some time.
Positive detail, the pre-installed internal sata m2 came with a nice cooler attached to it, kind of "after-market", showing that the company takes care of the health of the drive and its temperatures.

[Gabe]

ned4d,

I'm glad to hear that it worked without issue. That the drive it came with is SATA rather than NVMe is weird, but it's actually not the first time I've seen someone mention this. Last year another person mentioned getting an SATA drive in their ARM5 on here. If this link doesn't work, it's on page 2 of the "RAM Upgrade Issue" topic in this same 'AMD Ryzen 5 5600U(AMR5)' section. I thought they were all supposed to come with NVMe drives, but it could be like you said, as a cost cutting measure. Or it could be they were short on NVMe drives. Who knows.

The m.2 SATA drive that came in my GK3 Pro had a nice heatsink on it too. It has these two little black straps to hold it onto the drive. To be honest, I like that more than the ones held on with adhesive. It benched pretty well. I didn't take the heatsink off to see what brand it was, but it might be the same as what you got in your AMR5.

Just some advice in regard to your future plan of installing Windows 10, I'd be sure to save your driver folder of the current install, even with it being Windows 11. Many of the drivers are the same between W10 and W11. Saving the driver folder is one thing I always do with a new mini PC, just in case I need drivers in the future, whether because of a clean install or whatever else. I save them to a USB flash drive. You can find the driver folder inC:\Windows\System32\DriverStore. It's titled File Repository, or something like that. It tends to be around 2GB - 3GB.

[nek4d]

Thank you dear Gabe for your wise remarks!

Yes, I could not imagine it would be a sata drive, until I run typically afterwards some specs utilities (like speccy and hwinfo) that reported so, to my surprise.
No problem with me.
Could not resist now and I finally decided to clone it with Samsung Tools (worked directly) to a new Samsung 980 and keep the initial ssd as secondary storage, great use for sata.
All these until I reinstall from the scratch windows 10, let me check those windows 11 once again, aaa, I dont like them, ok, that is another matter.

For the drivers, you are totally correct to advise a copy of them.
I have some experience and I always take drivers backup to every pc that I receive with windows preinstalled for the future, along with its windows key (this one has a bios key, thus can be recognised directly by any new windows install).
I always use doubledriver portable utility, old one, but does the job, keeping only the non-microsoft drivers, which are not necessary for re-installation anyway.

For the factory ssd heatsink, I also liked what you described, the 2 little rubber straps, which hold great!
They have a thermal pad in-between. The temperatures of the drive are great too with this combo.
I searched to find and purchase such rubber bands/straps (they must be special for ssd, meaning, temperature resistant) and could not find much..., yet.
Because I have many ssd coolers that I have attached to various drives/PCs with double-sided thermal adhesive tape. I would prefer thermal pad and rubber straps, they would work better than my combo, especially on drives whose chips do not have the same height, where I do tricks (eg double tape in lower chips) which seem to not work so efficiently.
The only similar product I found is "Delock Rubber Ring"
https://www.delock.com/produkt/18409/merkmale.html
but it is not available in my country in Europe and havent found available on Amazon or similar (as I need European based delivery for not paying big custom duties and not delaying 2 months).
If anyone is aware of similar product, let me know please.
Sorry for the side matter, just happened to see it with my eyes with AMR5 ssd and really liked those straps.