Heat Concern between M.2 SSD and GPU?

            I know this is not recent but
since I came across it that must mean it's still findable.   I
came across this searching for issues of having the m.2 in between the
motherboard and the gpu. I have an asrock z170 oc formula, zotac amp extreme
1080 in the main (1st) pcie slot, and a BPX m.2 nvme in the first m.2 slot as I
use it for windows os boot and easy recovery if anything gets blue on the
screen.

Anyways, I ran the AS SSD benchmark program and monitored the temperatures
of the M.2 WHILE I ran a Valley Benchmark on extreme hd presets. I figured
that'd be the most extreme environment that could cause high temperatures on
the M.2 with the GPU and the M.2 being benchmarked at the same time.

 On the specifications for my M.2 it
says Operation Temperature 0 to 70°C and Storage Temperature -40 to 85° C. The
highest temperature the M.2 reached was 73°C and that?�s after running a 3GB AS
SSD benchmark and TWO Valley Benchmarks back to back (the ssd benchmark was
longer than the gpu so I just ran the gpu again). The space between the Zotac
1080 and M.2 has got to be nearly touching, though, I cannot confirm for
positive but it is so close that I thought I might have snapped it in half when
I inserted the GPU on top of it. 
 

With that being said, I do not think the case or the fans would do a whole
lot (not including the hot boxers) being that they are basically on top of
each other and I am pretty sure unless the motherboard is some type of
layered/3D in/out style (like a 4-inch-thick motherboard) that the
situation will be the same on all motherboards with a M.2 inserted into the
slot under a Zotac 1080 amp extreme and most of the larger gpus in general. 
 

To save time, variables include a Thermaltake Overseer Full-Size Case,
a 120mm Thermaltake riing fan at the bottom as an intake, a 200mm case fan on
the side for intake, two 200mm case fans on top as exhaust, a 120mm lepa on the
back for exhaust, and two 120mm Ek-furious fans on bottom cpu
radiator, and a 200mm fan on front for intake. Couldn't live with myself with
empty fan spaces though it does get breezy while I'm at the computer, a little
chilly sometimes.

Can not figure out how to make this look readable, I did the normal indentations and space between paragraphs but that posted as no spaces and just indents. I then pasted in word, pasted on here and now its all spread out. Give up. Also, I used hard disk sentinel to monitor the temps of m.2.
 

Edited by droseofc - 28 Mar 2017 at 10:29am

You are really worrying about nothing using an M.2 SSD in that M.2 slot. Otherwise, you could get an M.2 to PCIe adapter card, and use it in the PCIE4 slot. That would give it more breathing room. I added a tiny aluminum heat sink on the SSD controller chip, which makes a big difference. Plus I have plenty of cool air coming in the front of the PC case, blowing over the video card and 950 Pro.

Standard 2.5" SSDs have a nice metal case for their heat sink, which we take for granted. Take that away, and SATA SSDs would be hotter too.

The Samsung 960 has an added thin copper plate over the SSD controller and NAND chips, that the 950 Pro and other Samsung M.2 SSDs do NOT have. That is claimed to improve cooling, which I imagine it will, but the only users that have problems with the 950 Pro are those that do not have adequate PC case ventilation. Samsung has sold so many 950 Pros and SM951s, if everyone had problems with over heating, they would not be selling well.

The reality of all the PCIe x16 slots not being x16 electrically is this:

All Intel CPUs of the "Mainstream/Performance" type (not X99/socket 2011 v3 HEDT processors) only provide 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes to the board. Your 6600K is of that type, and gives 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes to the board.

The Z170 chipset has a few PCIe 2.0 lanes left over, but those are used by the PCIe x1 slots. Trying to combine the CPU and chipset PCIe lanes is apparently not easy or worth it.

Splitting the 16 PCIe lanes is only done in multiplies of two. So if a board had three PCIe x16 (physical) slots, the lane allocation is 16 0 0, 8 8 0, or 8 4 4.

Wiring three or even just two PCIe x16 slots to all of the PCIe 3.0 16 lanes costs money. While I too would prefer having all or just two of the PCIe x16 physical slots being all x16 electrically, there is a tradeoff in flexibility and price of the board to consider. Plus there must be switching chips added for each PCIe x16 lane.

Then the limitation of only 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes is there too. It can be asked, what is the point of having two or three PCIe x16 slots all connected to the 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes, since as soon as you use more than one card of any kind in an x16 slot, you just split the lanes into two x8 lane, x16 slots, even if you only use one or four PCIe lanes in the second x16 slot.

Also the difference in performance of any modern video card with 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes compared to 8 PCIe 3.0 lanes, is 1% difference.

There are valid points to both sides of this, I am simply giving you the reasoning about why things are the way they are. The two biggest motivators are reducing the cost and complexity of the board, and the limitation of only having 16 PCIe 3.0 lanes. I'm not saying you are wrong, I actually wish all lanes were x16 electrically too. But I can also understand why they aren't.

You must study the PCIe lane to PCIe slot allocation on a board very closely, if that matters to you. Adding those extra connections is not free at all, and doing that would cause the expense to be passed on to the buyer. Assume nothing about a PCIe x16 slot on ANY board, you would need to really search for a Z170 board that had even two x16 slots both connected to all of the 16 PCIe lanes. If you find one, you'll know it by the price.

Plus ONLY on Intel 100 series chipset/Z170 boards, for the first time the M.2 slots are NOT using the PCIe lanes from the CPU. The Z170 chipset has the equivalent of PCIe 3.0 lanes that are used by the M.2 slots. On all earlier Intel boards, the M.2 slots used the CPU's PCIe 3.0 lanes. Add one M.2 SSD, and your video card is running at x8 electrically (except X99/HEDT boards.) Why have all the PCIe x16 slots connected to 16 PCIe lanes, in that situation?

Maybe I am completely wrong but the OP  wants to use the M.2 as the boot drive. Therefore even under load, it's not the M.2 that is going to be working hard and heating up? I've been watching my M.2 that is underneath my video card (Evga 1070) and it's temperature does not move from 45'C

DaCurryman wrote: GFX card: ASUS ROG GeForce GTX 1070 STRIX OC

Awesome card

Go for the 960 SSD. Still plenty fast.


Edited by wardog - 28 Nov 2016 at 2:35pm

Thanks for the response!  Looks like I'm going to have to forego the M.2 then - which is a real shame.  Especially since I don't think I can let go of my 1070 STRIX or change it to liquid cooling.