CQ40 I think is still running Sata2.

oh my. it's not that hard to find a video tutorial like this, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jh4uRhWwZT0 at youtube :/

wow. considering weak ringgit and all, it's really a damn good deal.
yeah ssd raid0 should speed up productivity in your work. however, why do you need to remove hdds? i think it's still better to have a fixed hdd for data storage. (much faster than external storage)

although it doesn't matter, your ramdisk is kind of slow. (maybe due to single-channel mode) but how come your ram is running at single-channel mode? 16gb should be 2x8gb no? i thought with a pair of ram should run at dual-channel mode. the seq. speeds of my laptop with ddr3 1600mhz is running at 9k read, 12k write:
[attachmentid=5632389]

on a side note about single-channel, dual-channel and quad-channel modes in ram, tbh their performance is about the same in common usage. yeah benchmarks will show otherwise, but most users don't buy computers just to run benchmarks.

.. and imo it's better for you to find time to fix the mobo.

guys, so i kinda noticed that my motherboard (Asus Maximus VII Gene) has a M.2 slot (picture below), was wondering are there any real differences
in performance when comparing between both M.2 vs standard sata ssd? (apart from speed ofc).

If yes, i might be inclined on using that opportunity and buying a M.2 stick myself. Do you have any recommendation on the models around 120GB range?

Thanks 

[attachmentid=5678530]

ok hehe imo in m.2 form, the main downside is overheating of controller.

i use bplus m2p4a currently. it's good. apparently it supports pcie 3.0 x4 also.
- http://www.hwtools.net/Adapter/M2P4A.html
- taobao link: http://world.taobao.com/item/37633868328.htm

i have posted an image about bplus m2p4a previously, https://forum.lowyat.net/index.php?showtopi...post&p=71040951

after all this while, there might be other options. previously this was the only one with heatsink.

edit: btw, you need some thermal pads to ensure proper contacts between the ssd and heatsink. for some sata ssds, their aluminum case is actually used as heat spreader.

it's an adapter with heat sink. the link has its package specification. the soft-padded thing is called thermal pad, sometimes called thermal gap filler. i already told you guys everything lol except for where i got my thermal pads, because it's not available anymore from where i got it from. (fujipoly GR-m, conductivity of 6W/mK. i initially bought it for future replacement of pads on gpu vrms) however with a quick search i think you can find it else where. alternatively, iinm you can get some from lelong.my too (i think the conductivity is around 3W/mK)

as for the thickness of thermal pads, 0.5 to 1.5mm should be good. (mine is like 1.3mm)

on a side note, regarding thermal pads used in gpu, from what i have read normally a pad with conductivity of 3 to 5W/mK should be good enough. of course if you wanna have really good stuff there are top of the line pads from fujipoly, like their XR series (up to 17W/mK) but the price is kind of on the high side (very high). in the case of XR-m (with the highest conductivity), its texture is relatively hard. if i wanted to go for that series i will go for XR-e (11W/mK)

edit: just did a refresh about thermal pads and found out a good stuff from gelid (released in September last year). now you can get gelid gp-extreme (12W/mK) at performance-pcs.com (0.5mm and 1.0mm @USD 5.99) i think the price is good, compared to fujipoly's.

edit.2: it's recommended by ekwb that a small drop of thermal pastse, like mx-4 or gc-extreme, is applied to chips first. it's said that this will furher improve heat conductivity.

oo, so if I don't want to clone my current C drive, then I just need to purchase the sata cable ?
if want to clone then only buy both sata cable and sata to usb adapter ??

if correct is it once I buy the ssd, and sata cable (since I don't want to clone), connect the sata cable and power cable from motherboard and power supply and then can proceed to install to windows ?
but before that I need to wipe the C drive that exist on HDD

ya, after transfer all the stuff to external HDD I can proceed to wipe
just wondering since my current hard disk is 1TB, which I split into 2 partition, C and D
by default install Windows on C drive, so before I install Windows on ssd, just wipe C drive can already right ? no need to wipe D drive
by default already set AHCI
as I mention at above, since my hard disk is 1TB, and I split into 2 partition, C and D
is it I just need to wipe C drive only as I install Windows on C drive, after wipe it then only proceed to install to Windows in ssd ??

looks complicated, for my laptop I straight away wipe everything as I buy the ssd after 1 week