MSI Spatium M480 Play 2 TB

[W1zzard]

With the M480 Play, MSI upgrades its SSD offerings to use the latest and greatest 176-layer 3D TLC flash from Micron. What MSI also improved is the heatsink, which is now fully compatible with the Sony PlayStation 5 and looks fantastic, thanks to a great mix of colors and a matte surface structure.

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[bug]

Waaay too expensive.

I can see heatsinks becoming a problem. Manufacturers should settle whether heatsinks should be installed by the SSD or the motherboard manufacturers. Many motherboards incorporate heatsinks in all kinds of shrouds and those don't work with SSD preinstalled heatsinks. At the same time, motherboard provided heatsinks come with preinstalled pads that won't survive more than a few SSD replacements.

 

[Chaitanya]

Waaay too expensive.

I can see heatsinks becoming a problem. Manufacturers should settle whether heatsinks should be installed by the SSD or the motherboard manufacturers. Many motherboards incorporate heatsinks in all kinds of shrouds and those don't work with SSD preinstalled heatsinks. At the same time, motherboard provided heatsinks come with preinstalled pads that won't survive more than a few SSD replacements.

For SSD makers pre-installed heatsinks are going to be a issue for usage in laptops as well so having a WD, Corsair, Gigabyte and Samsung esq approach of offering SKUs with and without heatsinks would be the way forward. Most motherboard "heatsinks"(recent Gigabyte boards are exception) are just solid slabs of aluminium with little to no actual fins to heat dissipitation and from that perpective having preinstalled heatsinks are added assurance for users of having no thermal throttling and PCI-e 5.0 is going to make matters worse in terms of heat output.

 

[chrcoluk]

I like preinstalled, it took way too long but glad its happened now, both my boards main rig and ryzen dont have slot covers, the drives are exposed.

 

[trsttte]

I can see heatsinks becoming a problem. Manufacturers should settle whether heatsinks should be installed by the SSD or the motherboard manufacturers. Many motherboards incorporate heatsinks in all kinds of shrouds and those don't work with SSD preinstalled heatsinks. At the same time, motherboard provided heatsinks come with preinstalled pads that won't survive more than a few SSD replacements.

Yeah, it's a bit weird but in a capitalistic sense it allows them to upcharge both the SSD and the motherboard (the tiny heatsink either of them includes is marginal on the final price but can be a cool 20$ extra on the product price).

Motherboard pads can be easily replaced, though I prefer the SSD heatsink to the board one, I'm not into the trend of hiding components

Most motherboard "heatsinks"(recent Gigabyte boards are exception) are just solid slabs of aluminium with little to no actual fins to heat dissipitation

For the vast majority of SSDs it's plenty enough to soak the short heat bursts during write. PCIe 5.0 is likely to change that of course.

 

[Dammeron]

The heatsink should be included in the package, but for DIY installation (like stock coolers come with CPU box packages). That way You can easily mount it in a laptop, or use a MB heatsink.

 

[bug]

The heatsink should be included in the package, but for DIY installation (like stock coolers come with CPU box packages). That way You can easily mount it in a laptop, or use a MB heatsink.

There's a number of ways to handle this properly. But both the SSD and the mobo manufacturer including heatsinks inevitably leads to some wasted parts.

 

[Dammeron]

There's a number of ways to handle this properly. But both the SSD and the mobo manufacturer including heatsinks inevitably leads to some wasted parts.

Wasting parts is one thing, but the annoying thing is dismantling the SSD heatsink to put it in a laptop.

 

[chrcoluk]

Are people really buying them for laptops? if you laptop has a m.2 slot it has one probably preinstalled?

 

[Dammeron]

Are people really buying them for laptops? if you laptop has a m.2 slot it has one probably preinstalled?

What if You got a stock 512GB one inside and You need at least 2TB of space?

 

[bug]

Wasting parts is one thing, but the annoying thing is dismantling the SSD heatsink to put it in a laptop.

Or on a motherboard that has its own heatsink. Or replacing the pads on said heatsinks after a few SSD changes. Or cooling a NVMe SSD in a laptop.
Yes, there's a number of things to consider.

 

[SN2716057]

Great performance, well done MSI. Now just lower the price a bit.