P50 - PCI-e/NVMe SSD - risk of overheating?

[tk-don]

Hi,

I'm quite much in doubt of whether I should go for the more "modern" (cutting edge) PCI-e/NVMe SSD drives when configuring my P50. One thing that really makes me doubt the durability is how much they heat up during usage. For example, see this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3GlInzvHr8

My questions are, as I couldn't see this properly from images:

Do one or both fans create an airflow past the M.2 slots?

Alternatively, since the SM951 are OEM and "customized" for Lenovo - are they throttled down to slower speeds in order not to generate as much heat? Or do the NVMe SSDs just fry in silence?

[Phil__C]

If you follow the review link below the youtube video, it explains that the 950 has built in throttling to control heat under high workload.  This temporarily slows the drive down a bit, but keeps it a lot cooler than the 951.

The pics in this early review of the P50 clearly show that the fans are nowhere near the M.2 SSD slots.

There is no way to know if Lenovo has somehow customized the 951 to run cooler, but I doubt it.  I think this function would have to be built into the drive by Samsung.

You always take your chances with new technology.

I will put two 950's in a P50 (once the sound problem is solved), and feel safer with them than with 951's.  Also, no RAID 0 for me, thus eliminating an extra fail point.  And I will faithfully backup, backup, backup.  At least those backups will be FAST.

[tk-don]

Thanks Phil. That is indeed what speaks against the 951 and for the 950. Witht the cooling by fans, I was hoping for something even as simple as a plastic guide that could lead just a little air from the fans to the M.2 bays. But looking closer at the fan assembly, it looks as this would be impossible.

The plan with the 950s sounds like a good idea that I'll likely copy, and then just order the P50 with a HDD, which I can always use elsewhere.

Does anyone know if cloning the HDD to the PCIe/NVMe SSD is the way to go, or would it not boot? If it won't work, I'd assume installing Windows 10 on the SSD would work, but won't I miss some of the Lenovo recovery partitions - or aren't these implemented nowadays? I come from a sadly defective T60p, and I'm sure something must have happened in this regard since then....

I keep an eye on the other thread regarding the fresh install of W10 on a PCIe/NVMe SSD, but as this is not going to be a dual boot, I'd like to maintain any recovery partitions if possible.

[Phil__C]

You can clone the HDD to the M.2 SSD, but there are some things to watch for.  DSperber has several long posts in a couple of threads here that detail his success in doing this.

I've been leaning toward Win 10.  The P50 I get will likely have the Win 7 downgrade on the HDD, so I'm thinking of dumping that OS and removing the HDD, although I could make a recovery USB drive before doing so.  And yes, there is a recovery partition on Lenovo systems.

I can then download Win 10 from Lenovo and create a USB Win 10 installer that I can apply to the blank 950 M.2 SSD.  The way I understand it, that installer will apply the full Lenovo system including most drivers AND a Lenovo Win 10 recovery partition.  Just the way Win 10 would have come installed from the factory.  I would still need to install the Samsung driver for the 950 to get best performance.

If I am wrong about how the Lenovo Win 10 installer works, maybe someone here will correct me.