2TB Samsung 980 Pro PCIe M.2 Gen 4 Internal Solid State Drive SSD w/ Heatsink Expired

This or the Corsair MP600 Pro LPX deal that has been going on for a while? Mainly want it to expand my PS5 storage. Thanks.

If you were using this for a Windows boot drive in a desktop computer (e.g. non-laptop0 will it fit in the slot with a heat sync or should I get one without the heat sync?

I was also looking at the newer ssd 990 and there are a lot of reports of it failing after a few months on Amazon. Not sure if that is corrected by firmware or if there is a manufacturing issue.

Thoughts?

Yes, the entire point of the latest firmware update is to fix that flaw.

The vast majority of all motherboards have room for a heat sink on the motherboard's m.2 slots. Most of those that don't, already come with a heat sink. But they are usually removable. The biggest problem you could possibly have is if the placement of the m.2 slot is too close to the video card or CPU fan, making placement tight, but that's generally only a problem with some of the SSD's with very big heat sinks (inches tall, vs this smaller one that's pretty flat.)

It's generally not a good idea to go without any heat sink for gen 4 and gen 5 SSD's because they tend to run very hot. When they get TOO hot, the computer will automatically throttle the drive to a much slower speed to protect it.

Thank you for the information. I went and ordered the 990 without the heat sink. So when I build my new computer I will need to order one and install it. I should be able to see how much room I have at that time. Is one brand better or is there a brand I should be looking at?

Again, thanks for this information.

This one is ideal for PS5 expansion. $122 and includes heatsink.

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/cruc...6468904.p?

Since SSD heatsinks are a pretty niche market (especially since so many of them come with them,) there hasn't been any real testing I know of of the various heatsinks. I'm not an expert, but I've found that all the ones I've bought have worked at least relatively well. Given that, and the lack of serious testing publicly available, I'd guess that it probably doesn't make too much sense to spend more than $10-20 on one. (The most expensive one I bought from an SSD manufacturer didn't work noticeably better than the cheapest.)

Probably the best piece of advice I can give - based more on conjecture and logic than anything else - would be to go with one that's more than just a flat sheet of metal. Get one with fins or heat pipes to spread the heat out more and provide more surface area contact with air passing through your case to help dissipate the heat. If the SSD is double sided, it's probably best to get a double sided heatsink (although the back likely won't be finned, but it will help spread heat from the back.)

That said, even the official heatspreaders from most SSD manufacturers - such as the one in this deal - are rarely much more than a metal sheet. So maybe it's overkill? But since you can find dozens of decent finned heatsinks on Amazon for around $10, better safe than sorry, I'd say. I imagine that some of the larger, more complex heatsinks that are several inches tall are probably overkill. Most of the $10 ones are less than 1/2" tall. They nearly all come from no-name Chinese companies and usually have similar designs. So, clearance probably won't be an issue.

Also, many modern motherboards come with decent heatsinks built in to at least one of their m.2 slots. If so, it will probably do the job just fine.