NVME M.2 SSD working in SP513-51-311K laptop

stevie_b

I was unable to find any evidence on the web of someone replacing the original SATA SSD with a NVME one.

ACER Support were useless in that they claimed a replacement had to be SATA (2 different queries) but couldn't explain why.

Even drivesolutions only gives SATA drives as suitablehttps://drivesolutions.com/amfinder/?find=acer-laptop-spin-series-acer-spin-3-sp315-51-laptop-436245&sid=MLfcJe6krb

I can confirm that my NVME SSD is successfully recognised and working for anyone wanting to make the change to an admittedly old laptop. My specific model is SP513-51-311K.

[Edited the thread to add model name to the title]

stevie_b

Billsey, either the diagram or your interpretation of it is wrong.
The very fact that NVME is working shows that at least 2 lanes are in use.
Hwinfo64 reports the NVME SSD as ‘NVME (PCIe x4 8.0 GT/s @ x2 GT/s)’
Headline speed figure in crystaldiskmark5 is 1665 (SEQ1M Q8T1)

If I move the SSD to my desktop PC :-

Hwinfo64 reports it as ‘NVME (PCIe x4 8.0 GT/s @ x4 GT/s)’
Headline speed figure in crystaldiskmark5 is 3540 (SEQ1M Q8T1)
So using twice as many PCIe lanes and roughly twice as fast.

As another comparison the crystaldiskmark5 figure for the original SATA SSD (admittedly nearly full) in my Acer Spin 5 was only 531 (SEQ1M Q8T1).

Hope this info helps someone.

billsey

That model shipped only with SATA SSDs in the M.2 slot, and though the block diagram does show a single PCIe channel going to it, NVMe requires two or four channels:

stevie_b

Billsey, either the diagram or your interpretation of it is wrong.
The very fact that NVME is working shows that at least 2 lanes are in use.
Hwinfo64 reports the NVME SSD as ‘NVME (PCIe x4 8.0 GT/s @ x2 GT/s)’
Headline speed figure in crystaldiskmark5 is 1665 (SEQ1M Q8T1)

If I move the SSD to my desktop PC :-

Hwinfo64 reports it as ‘NVME (PCIe x4 8.0 GT/s @ x4 GT/s)’
Headline speed figure in crystaldiskmark5 is 3540 (SEQ1M Q8T1)
So using twice as many PCIe lanes and roughly twice as fast.

As another comparison the crystaldiskmark5 figure for the original SATA SSD (admittedly nearly full) in my Acer Spin 5 was only 531 (SEQ1M Q8T1).

Hope this info helps someone.

stevie_b

Billsey, either the diagram or your interpretation of it is wrong.

The very fact that NVME is working shows that at least 2 lanes are in use.

Hwinfo64 reports the NVME SSD as ‘NVME (PCIe x4 8.0 GT/s @ x2 GT/s)’

Headline speed figure in crystaldiskmark5 is 1665 (SEQ1M Q8T1)

If I move the SSD to my desktop PC :-

Hwinfo64 reports it as ‘NVME (PCIe x4 8.0 GT/s @ x4 GT/s)’

Headline speed figure in crystaldiskmark5 is 3540 (SEQ1M Q8T1)

So using twice as many PCIe lanes and roughly twice as fast.

As another comparison the crystaldiskmark5 figure for the original SATA SSD (admittedly nearly full) in my Acer Spin 5 was only 531 (SEQ1M Q8T1).

Hope this info helps someone.