Query to do with NVMe "priority"...

[MikeWalsh]

Afternoon, gang. Got a query here, which I'm hoping some of you may be able to shed light on.

I was browsing some of the tech blogs on Sunday - as you do. (I belong to a few from the Valnet publishing group; MakeUseOf, HowToGeek, and XDA-developers, amongst others). Came across an intriguing article on MakeUseOf, about what are being referred to as "OEM NVMe 'pulls'.

The handheld gaming boom accidentally created the cheapest SSDs on Earth (for now)

Handheld upgrades left behind a strange surplus of barely used, dirt-cheap SSDs.

www.makeuseof.com

Essentially, this 'market' has been created by Steam Deck owners buying the cheapest base model, then upgrading the eMMC storage to a 'proper' NVMe SSD, due to the former coming in the M2 2230 form factor. And this, apparently, works out quite a bit cheaper than what Steam themselves would have charged for the higher-spec models at the checkout...

This is a somewhat 'opaque' market, since these are the smallest possible M2 cards, and by default come in far smaller capacities than what enthusiasts are interested in.....typically, either 128GB, 256GB or 512GB for those who want to push the boat out. As many of you will be aware, it's the larger sized 'sticks', in TB+ sizes that everybody wants.....and it's these that have ballooned to utterly ridiculous price levels.

Anyways....

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Looking for these on eBay, there's listing after listing for 'em, so I've treated myself to a 256 GB M.2 2230 NVMe, from eBay, for the princely sum of GBP £22.56p.....along with a PCIe adapter for it, for another £9.99. I know this sounds tiny to most of you, but if all goes to plan this should work great as a boot drive for Puppy (if it WILL boot, per se). My 'kennels' - all 14 current occupants - including their various save-folders, are presently using a tad over 106 GB ATM, so this should still leave plenty of space for future expansion.

And this brings me to my question. The bit I can't really find any definitive answer to on-line. If, as & when I get around to installing this thing after it turns up, will it change my existing drive order? In other words, does PCI-e take precedence over SATA.....is it considered 'higher priority' by the kernel?

(Bear in mind we don't really use fstab under Puppy. We have our own, custom scripts that allow Puppy to perform the same functions while at the same time tying things into the aufs 'layering' file-system.)

Any insights would be appreciated..!


Mike.

 

[Brickwizard]

Mike check, again, eMMC can be M2 so can a SSD, but they are different pin config from M2NVMe

 

[MikeWalsh]

Mike check, again, eMMC can be M2 so can a SSD, but they are different pin config from M2NVMe

@Brickwizard :-

I would expect that. They're not the same thing at all.

As I understand it, the base model was given as an example of a prime case for somebody wanting to upgrade. AFAICT, I'm not buying an M.2 2230 eMMC card, I'm buying an M.2 2230 NVMe SSD......supposedly, at any rate! Seems that a fair number of these smaller 256 GB NVMe drives were also removed by Steam Deck owners, purely to replace them with larger ones.

I can understand why people would wish to replace eMMC if there was an easy way of doing so, 'cos that stuff is SLOW. The way I read the article, the trick wasn't ONLY performed with the eMMC modules. Some people already HAD the 'smaller' M.2 2230 NVMe, but simply wanted to cheaply upgrade to a larger version before they'd got all their stuff installed. Which makes sense. Since that's not what I'm buying, I don't quite see the relevance..?

Anyways, if I have got this completely arse-about-face, it's not exactly going to bankrupt me. Not at that price. And assuming it's functional, the very first thing I shall do is a full format (no idea what it may or may not have on there!), and then run a speed test.....so's I have some idea of what I'm dealing with.

It's only an experiment..!


Mike.