Don’t be afraid of PCIe or NVMe
Though the idea of installing your operating system to the Intel SSD 750 might seem wary, but it couldn’t be much easier.
In very early April, Intel put a shot across the bow of the storage world with the release of the SSD 750 Series of storage devices. Using the PCI Express bus but taking advantage of the new NVMe (Non-Volatile Memory Express) protocol, it drastically upgrades the capabilities of storage within modern PC platforms. In Allyn's review, for example, we saw read data transfer rates cross into the 2.6 GB/s range in sequential workloads and write rates over 1.2 GB/s sequentially. Even more impressive is the random I/O performance where the SSD 750 is literally 2x the speed of previous PCIe SSD options.
A couple of weeks later we posted a story looking into the compatibility of the SSD 750 with different motherboards and chipsets. We found that booting from the SSD 750 Series products is indeed going to require specific motherboards and platforms simply due to the "new-ness" of the NVMe protocol. Officially, Intel is only going to support Z97 and X99 chipsets today but obviously you can expect all future chipsets to have proper NVMe integration. We did find a couple of outliers that allowed for bootability with the SSD 750, but I wouldn't count on it.
Assuming you have a Z97/X99 motherboard that properly supports NVMe drives, of which ASUS, MSI and Gigabyte seem to be on top of, what are the steps and processes necessary to get your system up and running on the Intel SSD 750? As it turns out, it's incredibly simple.
Step 1
Make sure you have enabled NVMe in the latest BIOS/UEFI. The screenshot below shows our ASUS X99-Deluxe motherboard used during testing and that it is properly recognizing the device. There was no specific option to ENABLED NVMe here though we have seen instances where that is required.
You also want to make sure that UEFI boot is enabled but in our experience that is the default setup for the boards we have tested.
Step 2
Boot your Windows 8.1 installer and your drive should just show up!
Windows 8.1 includes a driver that recognizes NVMe hardware and allows you to easily install the operating system.
If you are running Windows 7 or Windows 8.0 (why??) then you will need to install a driver during initial setup.
After you load the driver, the installer will see the SSD without issue and the installation will continue.
Step 3
After you get into Windows on your SSD 750 Series product, you'll want to visit Intel's driver page and download the latest software package.
You don't need the driver to get up and running, but installing it after your Windows setup will unlock its full performance.
Step 4
That's it, you're done!
It really is that simple to get up and running on the Intel SSD 750 Series though it does require you to install on a platform with proper NVMe support. As other NVMe products make their way to the market, like the Samsung SM951, we will surely see motherboards and system integrators continuously upgrade and add support for the drastically improved storage protocol of the future.
What are the boot times?
What are the boot times?
Some sites have reported
Some sites have reported longer than normal boot times. Those longer boot times are the fault of BIOS enumeration of NVMe devices. That's not the fault of the SSD 750 specifically. Also, a few more seconds during a boot is only relevant if you are spending all day rebooting your machine.
Is there going to be a
Is there going to be a “compatibility” list that can identify what motherboards/bios version support this? I hate to see people spend this kind of money on something their system won’t ever support.
Any issues with a Windows 7
Any issues with a Windows 7 install?
You have to install the
You have to install the driver during the install for the Windows 7 installer to see the drive. We've done it here and it works.
Can an existing Win7 boot
Can an existing Win7 boot drive on a SATA SSD be cloned to the Intel 750 NVMe & should it boot OK when the SATA SSD is removed from the system after the clone?
that is a very good question
that is a very good question
Provided the driver is
Provided the driver is installed and the drive seen *before* cloning, you should be good. You'd have to have the driver installed to see it to clone to it if that process was initiated from within Windows. The only question would be if your system hardware also supports NVMe boot.
Thanks Allyn!
That does bring
Thanks Allyn!
That does bring up an interesting question though.
Do existing cloning programs, many of which that I have seen do their own booting in order to clone the windows boot drive, have the ability to see the NVMe drive to get the clone to work? Any idea of one that would work?
According to the folks on
According to the folks on OCN, Paragon Migrate OS to SSD was able to successfully clone win 7 from a SSD to the 750.
Bootable images / ISOs might
Bootable images / ISOs might have a hard time, but cloning operations initiated from within Windows (even if they reboot) should be relying on the Windows device drivers and therefore should work.
Good point, Allyn. By way of
Good point, Allyn. By way of a comparable analogy, in each of our workstations, we format a primary NTFS partition of identical size on all drives in any given chassis. Then, we write a drive image using Symantec’s GHOST, and restore that drive image to the primary partition on a secondary drive. If/when our primary OS gets “hosed” for any reason, we simply re-boot, change the boot drive, and do exactly what you advised: restore a good drive image to the primary partition on the primary drive. We resorted to this general practice primarily because the GHOST restore CD was just too slow, and the Windows device drivers work a lot faster. This practice appears to work well, chiefly because malware is not usually aware that a second OS is hosted on secondary drives, a third OS on tertiary drives, etc. MRFS
Can I put this 750 with my
Can I put this 750 with my old i5-750 and a nVidia 750ti?
I’m sorry, that was worse than I expected, I deserve nothing, my rig should be dismantled.
Also, I think I have a 750gb hdd somewhere….. SORRY, forgive me, it’s irresistible!
But do you have good power
But do you have good power suply, something just above 700W?
I bet it would look great in
I bet it would look great in the corsair 750d case
I will miss my raided 840
I will miss my raided 840 Evo’s……..Not I’m thinking.
I have a asus rampage 4 black
I have a asus rampage 4 black edition can I install a OS on intel 750 400 gb pci-e ssd
I do miss my 840 Evo’s
I do miss my 840 Evo’s raided! I got better reads, and writes on them based on my HDtach numbers. Oh well! I could always revert back to them.
Thanks guys for confirming
Thanks guys for confirming what I expected to be the case last night after the podcast for this situation. I should have thought it through more.
I forgot about the z97 just being a slight upgrade MB. Now I am wondering if I should upgrade to Haswell-E or wait for the Skylake tick?
That 8 core for a 1000 bones
That 8 core for a 1000 bones is looking interesting to me now.
When I try to install this
When I try to install this drive onto a new MSI X99A MPower board (latest BIOS), I’m getting a device driver cannot be installed error after pointing Windows 7 to the latest drivers I downloaded for the 750. I get the same error using the Intel CD that came with it. Any ideas?
Are you booting from some
Are you booting from some other storage device, and then trying to add the 750 driver when Windows asks for it? You might do well to contact MSI for help with that problem: it’s likely that they already have experience with same e.g. MSI may have needed to modify a driver for that motherboard.
p.s. Try looking at Windows
p.s. Try looking at Windows Event Viewer: there might be a clue in those event records, with more information for troubleshooting. Also, check your UEFI settings: the motherboard may be failing to identify the 750 properly in the slot in which you installed it e.g. it might be expecting a video card in that expansion slot, instead of a PCIe SSD.
I just installed a brand new
I just installed a brand new Intel 750 PCi SSD on a ASUS X99 Deluxe, I needed to update both the X99 BIOS (to 1801) and the SSD driver (to 1.2.0.1002-x64) before I had any success.
About to begin a Asus Z170
About to begin a Asus Z170 Deluxe/Skylake build with a Intel 750 PCI-E.
There is a lot of somewhat conflicting info. on the web concerning which PCI3 slot to use on X99/Z79 motherborads, but precious little on Z170 Motherboards which have more lanes courtesy of CPU (and chipset.Soem of the info recommend Hyperkit only in some situations.
On the Asus Z170 Deluxe I plan to use the 3rd slot, following your advice above, and see if it works.
What are your thoughts on the newer Z170 setups?
Did you have any luck norvil?
Did you have any luck norvil? I’m attempting it with the ROG HERO 8 and Windows absolutely refuses to install to with or without partitions.
Using GIGABYTE GAZ170XGAMING7
Using GIGABYTE GAZ170XGAMING7 1151 ATX and the 1TB Intel 750 PCIe SSD and was able to install Windows 10 to the drive. However, when I turn off PC and boot it up it only boots to BIOS. ??
Allyn, would you happen to
Allyn, would you happen to know if NVME is supported on the Z87 platform?