28.10.20 Samsung 860 EVO 1TB + M.2 970 EVO 1TB SSDs fitted and working.

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Because of the problems with the M.2 970 Pro SSD I ordered a 1TB Samsung 860 EVO for the internal SATA port. There is only one M.2 port and no other HD installed on my ASUS 552VW. Which greatly complicated data migration.

Samsung Magician recognized the new SSD drive on a newly purchased USB3 to SATA cable. So I felt confident to install the drive internally in the empty HD tray. I removed the battery and fitted my anti-static bracelet to avoid potential problems. The HD tray is exposed on the 552 under the long cover plate.

Once installed in the SATA port I used Samsung Data Migration software to send the 256MB SSD with W10 OS to the 1TB 860 EVO. All went smoothly and now the 1TB 860 EVO SSD is booting the laptop. Samsung Magician shows a healthy drive. Phew!

The next step is to try installing the M.2 970 Pro into the M.2 NVMe port, in place of the original Samsung 256MB SSD. To be used as additional, simple, internal storage. Fingers crossed! 🙏 Oddly they don't do a fingers crossed emoticon.

Same precautions as before: The M.2 970 EVO is installed and is now recognized by Samsung Magician as an empty, healthy drive. So now I have 2TB of fast, onboard storage instead of only 256GB as purchased. 

What a huge relief! I already have 16GB of DDR4 RAM so that should be enough for high frame rate imaging. Though I could max out at 32GB. It could be just my imagination but the laptop feels much more responsive than before the new SSD changes.

Google Blogger won't let me place the image properly regardless of size.

 

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