@Fernando
Thanks for your benchs result.
So you did also tested v5.5.0.1360 with a non Xenon CPU and get a very good ANVIL scores very close to v3.2.0.1002 score.
By the way,dDid you tested Intel SSD tool 'optimize' function. I am curious if you get the red error message (10/114) which is nowhere documented by Intel ?

@Fernando

Thanks so much for your tests

A quick System i750 400GB NVMe driver compare test done under X99.
Intel v5.5.0.1.1360 slightly better than v4.3.0.1006.

Are there any benchmarks for these on Windows 7 x64 ?
I recently installed / upgraded from a 950 pro ssd to a 970 pro NVME (m.2) by way of the Samsung data migration tool.
My bios supports Legacy, UEFI, & the CSM thing. I'm currently running the system in Legacy mode(MBBR) (I think AHCI is the only option in this mode) & I see the drive in the bios & booting into it with windows 7 x64 works fine.
But I'm trying to figure out if doing a complete reinstall using UEFI mode & seeing if there is an NVME mode instead of AHCI will help me boost performance? (The AHCI mode I'm looking at may not matter since it's connected to an m.2 slot, I just thought I would mention it.)

Upgrading to Windows 10 is not an option for me at the moment, but I want to squeeze out performance as much as possible.
I installed the Samsung drivers but apparently Microsoft is forcing me to use their driver? Even after attempting to uninstall it via device manager.
Windows shows my NVMe Samsung SSD 970 SCSI Disk Device
Driver Provider: Microsoft
Driver Date: 6/21/2006
Driver Version: 6.1.7601.19133
Digital Signer: Microsoft Windows

I'm reading all over the forums & I've downloaded the drivers on this forum, but Microsoft keeps telling me "The best driver for your device is already installed"; which doesn't make sense to me, I'm just not sure what to do.

I really want to see what this is capable of on my Windows 7 x64 box but am concerned that switching to UEFI mode will be a big waste of time if the performance benchmarks don't show faster speeds.

Here is my current benchmark:
https://imgur.com/a/9wws4K5

@Fernando ,
I did choose to format it as an MBBR type, my bios says Legacy, it's the only drive currently connected to my system.
I see 2 partitions which was the exact way my Samsung 950 PRO was configured (with an automated Windows 100mb first then my C drive of 476.84gb ) & this NVME drive is just a clone of that with the magician software.
IF the boot sector is elsewhere I would certainly like to know where it is.
What information can I provide to determine where it is located and/or prove it's working for me?
Screenshots of my bios?

My Device Manager under IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers shows
ATA Channel 0
ATA Channel 0
ATA Channel 1
ATA Channel 1
ATA Channel 2
ATA Channel 2
ATA Channel 3
ATA Channel 3
ATA Channel 4
ATA Channel 5
Intel(R) C610 series/X99 chipset 6-Port SATA AHCI Controller - 8D02
Intel(R) C610 series/X99 chipset sSATA AHCI Controller - 8D62

(Driver Version: 9.4.2.1013, Date: 7/30/2013, Provider: Intel)

@Fernando ,

Here is my imgur link:
https://imgur.com/a/5zWHe0F


Here is a more thorough link:
https://imgur.com/RuYtlQ5

Diskpart showed as well:
https://imgur.com/a/UsbLrhx

@Fernando ,
Thanks for helping me verify, but my question still stands, which is better for performance?
I don't really care about "boot times", but gaming or other intensive task & benchmarking are my top interest.

Is it worth it to rebuild as UEFI? Write-caching is enabled on my drive, is there anything similar to Rapid mode for NVME or any tweaks, alternate drivers, etc.. or are my options basically 0 for Windows 7 x64 ?

When you say "Option ROM", do you mean that both my drives have it, or that the 970 has it, or that the 970 had it copied over from the 950 during the clone?

Hello everyone,

I got a new 970 Evo Plus 500GB, this is how things look like on a 8700K/Z370 platform with all the Meltdown/Spectre fixes applied (SSB is disabled as that's the default). Other details: Intel RST 17.5.3.1026, Samsung NVMe 3.1.0.1901, although I doubt they matter much. The 4KQ8T8 score in CDM looks kind of small, or am I mistaken? Also the Magician IOPS score (although I am unsure how the test is ran) are nowhere near the advertised 480000/550000 R/W max IOPS (at 4KB QD32).

I wonder if there are other people with the 970 Evo Plus, are the scores similar to yours? Thanks.

EDIT: adding Anvil test.

2nd EDIT: adding new, improved Anvil result after I installed a heatsink.

Anvil Pro run with heatsink and no throttling:



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I have been reading tons trying to avoid having to ask the question, but what is the best way to set up 2 Intel 7600 Pro 512GB NVMe on a Z390 board? I used the BIOS remapping RST in the BIOS and installed using UEFI and looks great but my performance in Anvil is about 15% slower than the single Samsung drive setup above... I'm guessing that A. RAID doesn't do much as the 2 drives are sharing the same max bandwidth of the PCIe and/or B. Intel drives are just slower... I am installing from fresh, but since I want them to be fully bootable, this is my only choice? If so, would I be faster just using them in single mode with one bootable and the other as storage? TIA! Some very helpful people on here like @Fernando I hope can help!