Samsung 980 PRO M.2 NVMe SSD (MZ-V8P1T0BW), 1 TB, PCIe 4.0

Samsung 980 PRO M.2 NVMe SSD (MZ-V8P1T0BW), 1 TB, PCIe 4.0, 7,000 MB/s Read, 5,000 MB/s Write, Internal Solid State Drive


Samsung PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD 980 PRO

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¹Performance may vary depending on the SSD’s firmware version and the system hardware & system configuration. Performance measurements are based on IOmeter 1.1.0. The write performances were measured with Intelligent TurboWrite technology being activated. The sequential write performances after Intelligent TurboWrite region are: up to 500 MB/s(250GB), 1,000 MB/s(500GB) and 2,000 MB/s(1TB). ²Results are based on a comparison with Samsung PCIe 3.0 NVMe SSDs and SATA SSDs.

³To maximize the performance of the 980 PRO, please check whether your system supports PCIe 4.0 at the Intel or AMD website.

⁴Source: 2003-2019 IHS Markit data: NAND suppliers’ revenue market share.



Weight: 8 g
Dimensions: 8.01 x 2.21 x 0.24 cm; 8 Grams
Brand: Samsung
Model: MZ-V8P1T0BW
Colour: Model specific
Batteries Included: No
Manufacture: Samsung
Dimensions: 8.01 x 2.21 x 0.24 cm; 8 Grams

50 Responses

  1. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    After discovering my motherboard had a suitable slot I purchased this device and Adobe Lightroom runs so much faster now definitely added to the speed of my editing, worth every penny. Delighted with the boost in performance.

  2. TanishaGrooms says:

     United Kingdom

    Easy to install and seems very fast indeed. Samsungs disk utility confirms the speed excellent. Been using it for a while, no issues at all. Backward compatible with PCI 3. To get the best out of it you need PCI 4

  3. RubinPleasant says:

     United Kingdom

    I bought the Samsung 980 pro for a 10gbps nvme enclosure, it gets fast speeds but it’s pretty much the same kind of speed as a gen 3 we green nvme. Because an nvme enclosure is external, no matter how fast your nvme enclosure is today, it will never be fast enough to account for the full speed of the 980 pro. I know this SSD is going to be speedy fast but for my use case, it was not worth it and you should just get a regular 980 or any gen 3 nvme.

  4. AugustaWild says:

     United Kingdom

    Came packaged really well, solid, mnimal chance of the drive being damaged.

    Slotted into the pcie motherboard slot easily. Most new motherboards now have a little rubber screw with a clip to hold these down now rather than an actual screw.

    Once I installed Windows I was well on my way.

    Every time I boot my PC it’s lightning quick and boots to my login screen within seconds.
    Plenty of room for games and programs to keep me going for sometime too.

    Definitely happy with my purchase and may end up buying a second for additional storage.

  5. Alley Hector says:

     United Kingdom

    Annoyingly, the game console companies don’t give us enough storage space – so it’s inevitable that you’ll not have to get an SSD. I got this because it was recommended from online reviews. Easy to install and setup. Games work fine from it.

  6. Esquire Editors says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 2 From Our UsersI love it. My PS5 is incredible right now. The initial SSD on it was not enough in terms of size, so the additional SSD it’s a brilliant option. Speed is fantastic as well, never imagined games could load this fast.

    5.0 out of 5 stars Ps5 is flying

  7. AstridGass says:

     United Kingdom

    Purchased two as precision but only needed one and returned the other. Product is quick and easy to install and the returns process is equally as good. Great customer service

  8. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Upgraded from Samsung 960EVO 500GB to 980PRO 1TB – mainly due to capacity constrains rather than speed.
    Tested both drives (results attached) – main difference is in writing performance, my read performance has not really changed however this is due to my motherboard constraints rather than drive itself.
    For any operations including gaming it is more tan I can expect.
    Some of the games I play require loads of loading, for example Baldurs Gate 3 – I had it on installed on HDD and it was terrible idea, too much time wasted on just waiting game to load, SSD was a massive improvement.
    Bottom Line – I am happy with the purchase, could have gone for 990PRO model but my current PC setup would not allow me to see speed improvement so I ahve stayed with cheaper 980PRO model.

    5.0 out of 5 stars Decent M2 SSD drive

  9. Karen says:

     United Kingdom

    Bought as a secondary storage drive. I’ve got the newer 990 pro as my primary boot drive, but I wanted a little extra storage, so this was a perfect addition, especially as it was on offer. Good quality, and the heatsink keeps the temps low. Excellent drive and would happily recommend.

  10. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 2 From Our UsersI have a 4k gaming computer. my C: drive burnt out. When I removed the heatsink from it the plastic layer underneath that clearly said remove was still there. so I replaced it with the same drive with a heatsink already fitted now my 4k computer works a dream and my C drive shouldn’t burn out again. Next computer I buy, I’ll check it first.

  11. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Samsung known for their reliability and speed. I have been using the 970 EVO for years and I finally get the chance to step up to the 980 PRO. I’m building a new 13 gen gaming system so I thought I would put the 980 PRO in for storage.

    5.0 out of 5 stars Quick read/write access.

  12. VickiV13wmhvn says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 2 From Our UsersPreviously had a WD SN770 m.2 fitted and while that m.2 drive seemed ok something just didn’t feel quite right while working on my pc, so i swapped it out with this Samsung 980 Pro and now my pc seems really responsive and much quicker. I’m no pc component expert but the SN770 used the hbm method ( host buffer memory) using the pc’s onboard memory instead of its built in memory like a regular m.2 drive and the Samsung 980 pro does not and I’m guessing apart from the obvious read/write speed difference this was causing a more laggy experience.
    I definitely recommend the 980 pro as it’s made a world of difference using my pc.

  13. nbcxhzcxz says:

     United Kingdom

    Delivery came a day earlier than expected. Easy to install. It’s a must if you have a lot of family members play as their saves can eat up the console memory. Would recommend to anyone who asks.

  14. Christy says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 3 From Our UsersI’m impressed with it so far. Exactly what I want and it was a great price. I haven’t had any issues fingers crossed, And hopefully I don’t encounter any in the mean time. So if you’re uncertain that this works with the ps5 it does!

    5.0 out of 5 stars It works with PS5 flawlessly (So far)

  15. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    These were dropping in price so decided to bite the bullet and get one. Glad I did. No more space worries on my PS5 and impossible to know whether it’s running off the additional card or internal. This is a good thing!

  16. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 2 From Our UsersExcellent drive used for my pc rather than ps5 like most people. Just bear in mind that while it carries the pro branding it actually uses 3bit nand rather than 2 bit. Assuming this is to save cost and bring the price down while still carrying the pro branding.

  17. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 4 From Our UsersInstallation was very simple on the playstation requiring nothing more than a simple screwdriver, speeds are fast and the extra space is life-saving, theres also no hassle with installing your own heat sink

  18. Ben Mansill says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 3 From Our UsersTook 5 min to install into PS5. You are able to use the full capacity of the M.2 unlike with a normal hard drive were the usable storage is always less that quoted. Can’t fault it up till now, very fast.

  19. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Love this , higher spec than most other PS5 memory ssd and is the cheapest at the moment , got in a prime day sale and loving the spare space for more games lol

  20. EstellaKable says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 3 From Our UsersBought to increase PS5 storage. Very easy to install, setup is then as close to automatic as you can get with on screen instructions guiding through every step.

    Speed test confirms read speed is very close to maximum stated speed. All good.

  21. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 3 From Our UsersJust recently purchased a PS5 and was looking at getting a SSD External drive for extra space, and somehow came across this little gem. So easy to install I think no more than 5 mins, and it’s up and running. To think this is cheaper to install than getting a SSD external. Highly recommended for all those PS5 users

  22. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Got this to expand the storage on my PS5 and it works great. The installation process was very simple, once I got the right screw, and the set is very stright forward.

    It loads games just as quick as the normal SSD on the console does, barley any difference noticeable.

    Highly recommended to anyone that needs a bit more space on there console.

  23. Gabe Gurwin says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 3 From Our UsersBought this after my seagate firecuda failed within 3 months. Seagate were hopeless but luckily currys refunded me. Bought this as it was cheaper and it hasn’t disappointed. The minor speed difference between this and the firecuda is negligible and not noticeable. I’ve heard the the expanded SSD on the PS5 can burn out if put into rest mode. Not sure how true that is but it seemed to do it to my firecuda so just be careful.

  24. PaulaToRot says:

     United Kingdom

    Very happy with my purchase. Needed to expand my storage in my PC. This slotted straight in and worked with no issues. Nice and fast too.

  25. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    After doing extensive research on the best storage device for the PS5, this was highly rated and good value for money.
    I would recommend watching a video on how to remove the cover of the PS5, but actually installing the device is VERY easy.

  26. HermanHarman says:

     United Kingdom

    Great price, storage space is as described and the speeds match too.
    These are very easy to install but the speeds are limited by the motherboard so you may not experience full speeds with an older board (I believe you need a gen 4.0 M.2 slot on your motherboard)

  27. JeanettQuinto says:

     United Kingdom

    2tb bought as extra storage for the ps5. Installed in minutes and get the full 2tb of storage. Had other SSD’s which claim 2tb but are actually only 1.8tb. Formatted in seconds and working perfectly.

  28. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Used it for my PS5. Nice and easy to install.

  29. MariettStoate says:

     United Kingdom

    This SSD is very good, but there is a layer of heat sink case, and removing this heat sink case is not so easy.

  30. AnhQ86hscnzbuzp says:

     United Kingdom

    works amazing, i ordered the heat sink version initially and this arrived faulty, so returned and went for the none heatsink version and works as expected (added my own heatsink since as i know these do need it)

  31. Trapping Value says:

     United Kingdom

    I bought this item on reputation, and having used this type for years.
    There has been reported this item failing. The fix is to update the firmware to the latest version using Samsung Magician software. My items came already with the latest firmware installed.

  32. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Amazing upgrade for my PS5

    Speeds so much faster when downloading games

  33. WoodrowCJN says:

     United Kingdom

    Adds more internal storage space to your playstation 5, easy to install and games load quicker.

  34. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 4 From Our UsersThe SSD I purchased in November 2022 was made in October 2021 and came with the bad 3B2QGXA7 firmware. Thankfully no damage was done before I realised and updated it. Ensure you install Samsung Magician and check as soon as you can.

    Otherwise this SSD is superb, very fast indeed. I only buy Samsung SSDs and I’m happy with this one.

  35. JacklynJoslyn says:

     United Kingdom

    was quick delivery and easy to install on my ps5 fast speeds i got the 1tb version.

    if you are getting it for the ps5 recomend you get the version that has the heatsink unless you know how to put one on your self highly recommend this.

  36. gshoesd44 says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 4 From Our UsersA great product. Its samsung, so its obviously well made. After doing my own research it appears that this is one of the best SSD m.2’s on the market for next gen consoles.
    Your games will run faster and smoother (they must be installed onto this ssd which only takes seconds to transfer).
    If you’ve got the money then this is a quality recommend from me.
    If you have lots of money to dump then get the 2TB instead and future proof yourself.

  37. Nigel Barlow says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 8 From Our UsersSamsung’s disk cloning software is in a class of its own, and it only works with Samsung drives. It’s the kind of thing that you don’t need until you do, then you’ll be tearing your hair out instead of drinking a beer like me.

    The NVMe4 drive itself is also very VERY fast. It’s actually a little unnerving to see a 2GB file transfer in a quarter of a second. The dialogue doesn’t even have time to appear, the file just teleports.

    I can’t say I’ve noticed a massive performance improvement over SSD in all games, though. My entire 32GB of DDR5 RAM should be filled in ~4 seconds from this drive, yet some games (Fallout 4 +mods) can still sometimes take 30-40s to load. I guess it’s a software/optimisation issue from the game itself.

  38. VernonMccleary says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 3 From Our UsersI am using this SSD in a Thunderbolt 4 enclosure, connected to my Mac Studio.

    For light duty /read/write (i.e. documents) it’s fast – Blackmagic typically shows ~2700MB read and write.

    However, for sustained large data transfers, i.e. reading / processing / saving my photo library (integrating and de-duplicating several libraries from an aggregate of >600GB down to ~250GB) the drive/enclosure gets quite hot and the SSD is clearly throttling the data transfer speeds accordingly – the performance reduces substantially.

  39. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 5 From Our UsersThis SSD is a very good purchase for anyone who is moving a lot of files or installing lots of intensive games. The speeds which this can go is amazing provided you are installing it in a PCIe Gen 4 slot.

    Install speeds are very fast on this and loading times are practically non-existent. I’ve never seen the drive get close to being over 40% usage on task manager even whilst installing 100 GB worth of files in one go. This is also dependent on your pc but it’s a peek into the amount of performance that this drive can do.

    If you are video editing as well, this drive is very good at handling the live timeline in Adobe applications. This drive is highly recommended and can often be found on sales.

    I have used my motherboard m.2 heatsink for the product and depending on your workflow this would be a recommendation but if you are going to be using it mostly for games or more ad-hoc work then you don’t really need any aftermarket heatsink.

  40. RetaDesjardins says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 7 From Our UsersThe Samsung 980 PRO M.2 1TB SSD with a built-in heatsink is an excellent choice for anyone looking for top-notch performance and reliability in an NVMe PCIe 4.0 solid-state drive. With 1TB of storage, it offers plenty of space for storing your operating system, applications, games, and other data.

    One of the standout features of the Samsung 980 PRO is its exceptional speed. The NVMe PCIe 4.0 interface provides lightning-fast read and write speeds, making it an excellent choice for demanding applications such as video editing and high-end gaming. The built-in heatsink also helps to keep the drive cool and stable, ensuring consistent performance even under heavy loads.

    Another great feature of the Samsung 980 PRO is its durability. The drive is built with high-quality components and is designed to withstand heavy use, making it a reliable choice for anyone who needs to store and access large amounts of data on a daily basis. The drive also supports AES 256-bit encryption, providing an added layer of security for your sensitive data.

    In terms of ease of use, the Samsung 980 PRO is simple to install and use. The M.2 form factor makes it easy to integrate into your computer, and the NVMe PCIe 4.0 interface provides plug-and-play compatibility with modern motherboards. The drive is also compatible with the Samsung Magician software, which provides advanced features such as performance optimization, firmware updates, and disk health monitoring.

    In conclusion, the Samsung 980 PRO M.2 1TB SSD with a built-in heatsink is an excellent choice for anyone who needs a fast, reliable, and easy-to-use NVMe PCIe 4.0 solid-state drive. With its exceptional speed, durability, and ease of use, the Samsung 980 PRO is definitely worth considering if you’re in the market for a high-performance SSD.

  41. VioletCastella says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 3 From Our UsersI am currently using this in my new build that has a Gen 4 Slot for this drive. The speeds are as advertised and sometimes creep up past the advertised ones. The drive is tiny almost the size of my pinky and absolutely wafer thin so you must be careful when handling it.

    In terms of windows boot times, I noticed no difference coming from a 2016 960 EVO NVMe which is to be expected because once you reach a certain speed point the difference is negligible. Games loaded almost identical with the newer drive loading milliseconds quicker. This is a good purchase alongside another SSD used for storage. I wouldn’t use this as the sole drive in the PC unless you get the largest storage capacity they have to offer.

    One benefit of solid state memory that I see others fail to mention in their review is how it helps your download speed stay consistent. For example I have a 1Gigabit download speed and when downloading games on steam to my hard disk drive it will only download data as fast the hard drive can write. With an SSD 2.5inch or NVMe your speed will be consistent all the way through.

    Overall 10/10 and exceeded my expectations.

  42. JoeHomburg says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 13 From Our UsersDead easy to install. Slide the disc side PS5 panel off, unscrew memory slot cover, unscrew guide spacer, slide SSD into place (resting open edge on top of spacer), screw open edge into place, replace memory slot cover and screw into place then slide PS5 side panel back into place.

    Turn PS5 back on and it should prompt you to format the drive. Once done you’ve got your additional storage ready to use.

    Only niggle (and this is the PS5’s issue rather than the SSD) – whilst the PS5 can read games or apps stored on either the included internal or added/expanded SSD it isn’t smart enough to automatically flip the storage location when the internal drive is full but your shiny new SSD is empty – you have to manually choose the SSD expansion as the save location once the internal drive gets full. Not a big issue if you are doing everything via the console but if you’re trying to use the PS app when you are out and about to download a game ready for when you get home it might be an issue to be aware of.

    All in all very happy with the purchase and would recommend!

  43. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 8 From Our UsersUpgrading my PC I decided to add an M.2 drive to my MSI B550 Unify board. I thought it would be easy but turned out to be fiddly trying to get the screws in place and discovering that the ones that came out of the motherboard wouldn’t go back in with the drive in place. Fortunately I had some spare screws from previous PCs so used them instead and managed to get the cover back on! I couldn’t get Samsung Magician software to clone my old Samsung SSD and ended up doing a complete re-install of everything. This was using an M.2 without a heatsink and utilising the MSI board’s own heatsink. It runs around 30 degrees C in normal use to I guess that’s cool!. From my research this is one of the top M.2s around and I’m happy with it.

  44. BradforSledge says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 11 From Our UsersIf you wanted to upgrade the firmware as well

    As a MacOS user on a 15-inch Mid 2015 MacBook Pro, I burnt the Samsung ISO image to a USB flash drive, then managed to boot on it. Unfortunately, after successful boot process, Samsung Magician was not able to detect the brand new 980 PRO I suspect the NVMe adapter (Sintech NGFF M.2 nVME SSD Adapter Card) that I had to buy as well, because Apple uses a proprietary connector. Note that the SSD has been perfectly detected by MacOS though (System Info’s NVMe section).

    Solution: get another computer. I inserted the SSD into the M.2 socket of another laptop’s motherboard (thus without the need to use the NVMe adapter) and booted on a Ubuntu Live USB flash drive—and selected the “Try” option.

    I executed some CLI commands—blog.quindorian.org/2021/05/firmware-update-samsung-ssd-in-linux.html—and the SSD was successfully flashed. Then, I put the SSD back into the MacBook Pro. Well detected again by MacOS (Monterey) with updated revision number as shown by MacOS System Information app.

  45. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 9 From Our UsersGreat product, installed into a compatible PCIe 4.0 socket, works like lightning. However, I would not say that it is perceptibly faster than a 970 EVO, so we are perhaps talking marginal gains if you already have M.2 NVME drives.
    PROS
    + Good price for class-leading all-round performance
    + Samsung migration software worked flawlessly
    + Not a DRAM-less design or cheaper QLC NAND like the budget 980
    + Does not require over-provisioning as a default but you can set it up like this
    + Samsung Magician software has performance profiles for the drive (e.g. full power, energy saving)
    CONS
    – As usual, no screw, thermal pad or even instructions in the packaging
    – Thermals can get high without proper cooling (light use brings it to 44-45C with a solid aluminium heatsink)
    – PCIe 4.0 does not seem as fast as expected and boot times are not noticeably faster
    – Samsung migration software failed the first time to clone a drive (but this may be due to the NVME enclosure)

    Honestly, I am clutching at straws to criticise the product with my two main gripes being heat generation and the similar boot times from the previous generation 970 EVO. Highly recommended – backed by Samsung quality, performance and warranty – just make sure you cool the drive adequately.

  46. AugustusLinsley says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 8 From Our Users250GB and 2TB
    This is the second 980 Pro I have bought.
    These drivers get very hot so you will need a suitable cooler.
    They are fantastically fast. The speed increase over the PCIe 3 is really amazing. You won’t notice much until you copy files or load very large applications, but if you need the speed then you really are going to notice the performance increase these drives bring. I think the one thing that is slightly annoying about the advertising for the PCIe 4 drives is that they often describe them as gaming drives. I replaced a SATAIII drive with a 980Pro PCIe 4 and I can tell you there was almost no noticeable increase in performance. However, in one game I noticed a distinct advantage using the PCIe 4 drive. In the game Destiny 2, if you know that game there are points where you cross boundaries and it loads in more of the map. With the SATA III drive there was a delay of one to two seconds. With the PCIe 4 drive this reduced to “a slight glitch”. The difference was very noticeable and gave you several seconds of advantage over other players. Whether you consider that worth the cost, well, that’s up to you.
    Highly recommended, but don’t upgrade just for speed, you may not notice any increase at all.

  47. JohnieBrandenbu says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 13 From Our UsersSo yea when you install it also download Samsung magician. this will let you install latest drivers for the drive.

    then pop into bios and make sure you are set for pcie 4.0. if your board doesn’t support that do not buy. facts you are being silly to even consider if you do not have pcie 4.0 set up on motherboard.
    cool benchmark it in magician. cool its fast but no as fast as it states ok so optimize it in magician. run it in power hungry mode and make sure your windows power settings are not echo or balanced that has caps on performance related to pcie.

    ok bench again happy I was as well. month later bench it yea slower trim drive and bench again yea faster but not as stated….all the time. there are other pcie 4.0 that beat this, even when the drive is filling this however just gets slower.

    oh and yea its Hot by its own software’s standards about 50c it states hot. it idles at around 43c but after few hours gaming states too hot, continues to operate but do nit like my system to state any temp issues.
    worth it kinda and kinda not. perfect for an os only drive or games with a lot of loading areas.

  48. AngieGoossens says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 12 From Our UsersAfter the release of the lates PS5 firmware update allowing you to increase internal memory and as my SS5 memory was 75% full I wanted to add more memory. The choice of drives with the required specifications is very limited and they are quite expensive.
    I would have like a larger capacity but they are way too expensive, so I opted for the 2TB version for the time being, in the future when the price drops I will change it for a larger capacity and install this in my pc.
    I do have a 2TB Samsung T7 SSD connected via a usb socket on the back of my PS5 where I have installed all my PS4 games and they have run without any issues.

    I also purchased a Heatsink as recommended by Sony, you do have to be aware of the size of heatsink as where it is installed has limited space, I purchased the (One Enjoy M.2 Heatsink Cooler) which cost 10.99 from Amazon, at the time of writing it is out of stock, I presume people are also upgrading their PS5’s.

    It was easy to install the drive into the Heatsink and just plug it into the M.2 and secure with the fixing pin which is inside PS5 M.2 slot. Just turned on the PS5 and followed the on screen prompts.

    I have run games from this drive and have not seen any drops in performance compared to the PS5 installed.

    I highly recommend this drive especially if you want to add more storage to your PS5, it is extremely easy to do and there are videos on YouTube walking you through the process. I think the prices may rise in the short term because of demand but in a few months as more manufacturers make these drives the price will drop.

  49. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 283 From Our UsersI bought this for my PS5.

    I’m currently using the (PS5) beta firmware and one of the enabled features was the activation of the m.2 port. I wasn’t lacking in available space as there is not a real lot of ps5 games released that actually interest me, I was getting by with my 4tb external drive and the stupidly small amount of internal SSD space on the console itself but I figured I would go ahead and buy a drive anyway.

    Sony recommend you attach a heatsink to your nvme drive if it doesn’t come with one as standard,

    After looking at factory heatsink nvme drives specifically the WD-Black SN850 1tb, it became apparent you pay a heafty price on top for the heatsink, At the time of writing it was 150 for the 1tb WD black and 235 for the same drive with a heatsink attached, probably hiked in price due to a Sony guy tweeting it was his drive of choice.

    Anyway I decided to buy the 980-pro (this drive). It was marginally more than the SN850 and I’m presuming other people were showing interest as Amazon’s price algorithm jumped from 176 to 188 (then back down to 179 immediately after I bought it).. thanks for that, just my luck.

    The heatsink I paired it with was the ‘EZDIY-FAB M.2 2280 heatsink’ (ASIN: B086X79CSN).
    11.99 at the time of writing this.

    Installing the heatsink and installing the drive was really straight forward, it fits in the bay nice and snug and the cover screws back down fine.
    The drive installs (into the PS5) Samsung label/chip side up (facing you/installation door), so install the heatsink accordingly.

    I have a external harddrive for PS4 titles which I will continue to use.
    I moved all my ps5 titles from the console SSD to the m.2 and set the console to install to that drive from here on in.

    I have been playing pretty long and hard today and not noticed any laggy frames (apart from a little screen tearing on AC: Valhalla, which happened occasionally when using the built in SSD)
    Overall load times and performance is no different than the Sony SSD.

    I do think the prices are outrageous, 350/450 for 2tb and the best part of a grand for a 4tb, hopefully the prices will come down in time, but as demand increases (when the firmware goes public). It wouldn’t surprise me if they get worse before they get better.

    The SN850 is a little cheaper (none heatsink) and maybe a better choice.
    Both drives offer the same limited warranty (5years or 600TB written, whichever comes first).

    I can’t think of anything else to say, I should of taken a few pictures before I closed/plugged in my ps5. I will maybe open it up and take a few in the next few days..

    Edit: There seems to be misinformation floating around regarding the removal of the Samsung sticker, It’s my opinion that you should not do this for two reasons..
    1. It’s a thermal sticker designed to redistribute the heat, so it’s only going to help the tape/heatsink.
    2. More importantly removing this will void your (Samsung) warranty.
    Of course in the end the choice is yours.

    Buy with confidence!
    I hope this review helps in some way.

  50. Anonymous says:

     United Kingdom

    Golden Review Award: 83 From Our UsersIt took me 30 minutes to install this tiny thing, update its firmware, copy my filled up C: to it, flip drives over, and hey presto my filled up 120GB C: is now a 500GB C: The free Samsung software made this all possible – absolutely brilliant!

    The software doesn’t come with it. You need to search for “Samsung Magician” and download that – that updated the firmware to the latest version in seconds. No need to mess with the Samsung “Firmware Update Utility” which I’d downloaded just in case.

    Then download “Samsung Data Migration” app – this copies your old C: (all of it – not just Windows) to the shiny new drive. My 100GB took about 15 minutes to copy. I created a “Windows Recovery Drive” while I was at it (USB “emergency” disk), using the Windows tool, not the Samsung app.

    Each step (firmware + migration) shuts down Windows so you need to power PC back up. A “cold start” is always best to properly reset plugged in hardware.

    After the data migration I had 2 drives with identical drives labels and identical folders/space used – that’s a good start! My old C: was still C: – I just wanted to check the new Samsung drive was “all there”. It was (this became E: – your system may differ depending on other drives you already have).

    I changed the drive label to “Samsung 980” to avoid confusion.

    Another reboot, into BIOS, made the Samsung “boot order #1”, which pushed my old boot drive off the top spot. Restarted…

    Woohoo! Windows came up in a flash. No message about “you’ve changed your system please contact Microsoft” like old versions of Windows might have. It just worked. “Samsung 980” was now C:

    Thank you Samsung software – the software made this the easiest major flip I’ve ever done.

    Performance…my mobo (Asus Z270 P) is old school “PCIe 3”, not the “PCIe 4” this NVMe can run at. I figured I’d update the mobo one day and made sense to be a step ahead, so purchased my new “C:” to be future proof (ish).

    The only performance test I did was to run “tree c: > nul” from a command prompt and roughly time it. “tree” walks the directory structure printing it to screen as it goes. Adding “> nul” just hides the screen output to remove graphics from the timings. tree took about 15 seconds on the 980.

    Ran “tree e: > nul” to do same to old SSD. 1 minute 30 seconds. Exact same directory structure.

    For this rather lame performance test the NVMe took 1/5th of the the time my old drive did it.

    It would be nice if they included a tiny M.2 screw. The attention to detail with the packaging, manual, software, hardware is “pro” but the omission of such a cheap tiny thing is annoying. Luckily I had a few from old mobo boxes. This doesn’t merit an entire star being knocked off – the free Samsung software easily makes up for it, but nonetheless I’d expect OEM “white boxes” to omit such things not premium Pro products.

    I gather most manufactures omit this little M.2 screw so let’s not dwell on it too much.

    I’m very pleased with this. The intention is to install the new MS Flight Simulator on it. That needs 150GB which is more than my entire old C: drive.

    A big thumbs up from me. Again, the free Samsung software made upgrading my boot drive a cinch.