GA z87 ud4h PCIe m.2 adapter

robb7979

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OK, I've been searching here and with my friend google. I want to upgrade to a PCIe m.2 drive as my main boot drive. I have found conflicting information. My mainboard does support UEFI bios. The information I have found indicates it will, or will not allow me to set the PCIe adapter as a boot device. What is the correct answer? Will I be able to boot from this adapter?

GA-Z87x-UD4h
i5-4670k
WIN-10 64
 
Solution
I think the Windows Boot Manager will allow you to boot from a PCIe SSD if you do a UEFI install of the OS. There are SATA and PCI-e models.

One thing to remember is that motherboard does NOT support any kind of NVM Express (NVMe) drives. Non-Volatile Memory Host Controller Interface Specification (NVMHCI) is a logical device interface specification for accessing non-volatile storage media attached via PCI Express (PCIe) bus. There is no BIOS support for NVM on Gigabyte Series 8 Intel chipset motherboards.
 

Anurag20

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The GA-Z87X-UD4H does not have an onboard M.2 slot.. To be sure I compared it with the Z97-UD5H board..

http://www.gigabyte.in/products/comparison/list.aspx?ck=2&pids=4488,5378

One can clearly see the M.2 listed under the "Storage Interface" heading for the Z97-UD5H.. Are you planning to install an add-on M.2 card or a native PCI-E X4 based SSD ??

A PCI-E X4 SSD like the Intel 750, will definitely boot but you'll have to remember that even though its after-boot performance is Phenomenal, it will add 8-10 secs to ur boot times.. What with the PCI-E Initialization sequencing at booting..
 

robb7979

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I was planning on an add-on M.2 (Samsung 950 pro) in a PCIe X4 adapter. The slower boot times agree with what I have been seeing online. I understand that the MB doesn't have native NVME support, but shouldn't the PCIe interface negate this? I can set the BIOS to boot from a PCI-e device with CSM and a UEFI install. I guess that is where I would run into the slower boot times. I currently boot from a 2.5 Samsung 850 pro.
 

robb7979

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I have a technical document from Intel on booting from PCI-e connected NVME on z87x chipsets.
 

Anurag20

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That you can definitely do, but as you already have the 850 pro would it be worth it ?? Unless you plan on getting an M.2 Z170 or X99 board later-on.. From what I have seen, the 950 pro would be of advantage only to Content creators/Editprs or those dabbling in a Scientific Compute/ Media Production usage..
 
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robb7979

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You are correct. It's already on the way, so I'll mess with it for fun. I do plan on upgrading to a 9 series board in the future.
 

Anurag20

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Congrats dude, :)) I still believe it takes a sec-or two more than the 850 Pro to boot, doesn't it?? After booting, the 950 the 850 doesn't stand a chance.. I think that is the reason ppl I talked to, especially High-end $2K and up PC guys, say they prefer a SATA SSD boot drive but all their games and stuff are on an M.2 or NVMe SSD..

:))
 

robb7979

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Not what I expected, but no. On the 850 pro, I have 18 seconds to desktop. The m.2 is now 7 seconds to desktop, once I enabled fast boot in the BIOS. Maybe post takes a second or 2 more, I haven't timed that, but after post windows loads in literally 2 seconds or less.
 

Roscob

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Roscob

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Hi Robb7979 I have a GA-Z87X-UD5H with a pair of Sata SSD & 5 other HDD's. I run W10 with an Intel i7-4790K & 32GB DDR3 RAM. I decided to install a Samsung 950 Pro 512 NVMe M.2 using a Condoe adaptor. I sent a request to Gigabyte about a week ago re using an M.2 as a boot drive. They answered saying I would need to update my BIOS with a beta bios. Next day I received another advice saying they had tested a new version of Bios to overcome my problems. Version 10d is now available from Gigabyte web site. I produced a bootable USB stick using Microsoft download. I started a clean install & always disconnect all my drives except the new boot drove drive. I updated my BIOS using Q-Flask. I checked the new bios with Speccy & simply reading the version in Bios itself. Samsung also have a driver for the NVMe M.2 drive in their article "Samsung SSD 950 Pro NVMe Driver" Installation Guide Version 1.1(rel Jan 2016). Open this Zip file to get the Driver.exe file.

A check in Device Manager shows Storage Device Controller, when expanded, shows the new NVMe controller.
I have evrything in place but when I get to loading the W10 via the USB stick, I cannot get the setup to create a New partition. The "New" is greyed out. Even though it shows the correct partition details on screen. Reconnecting all my sata data cables & restart gives me back my starting system that I'm using to write this. I will probably go back to Gigabyte to try & conclude this exercise.
Have a look at Tinkertry.com An excellent article by Paul Braren.
Good luck. I hope this may throw some light on your problem. Let me know How you go.
Roscob
 

indio22

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Hello robb7979, I have the same GA-Z87X-UDH4 board. Do you recall in which pci-e slot did you install the Samsung 950 Pro?

I assume you installed in either the second x16 sized slot that splits lanes with the first graphics card slot, or the third x16 sized slot that has it's own 4 lanes coming from the chipset (when configured in the BIOS to use all 4 lanes).
 

indio22

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Ok thanks for the info. I need to use a graphics card, so looks like I would have to either plug the pci-e drive into the slot that shares lanes with the card (cutting the card lanes to 8), or into the slot that has it's own 4 lanes coming from the chipset (although those are 2.0 lanes not 3.0). I might go the latter route, because even though it would bottleneck some, I bet the 4 lanes at 2.0 standard would still be quite a bit faster than a single sata port used with regular SSDs.

 

robb7979

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Are you gaming? This MB has onboard graphics if you have an i5 (I believe).