M.2 SSDs are very compact plug-in cards that are connected to a special port on the motherboard. Thus, these SSDs do not occupy any drive slots in the case. The SSDs can either be connected via SATA-3 (6 Gbit/s) or via PCI-Express (up to 32 Gbit/s) (depending on the motherboard).

While the SATA-3 variant is the least expensive, the PCIe variant offers the full speed advantage.

Compared to conventional HDDs, the space-saving modules are very robust and reliable, since they have no moving parts. This makes them ideal for rougher environments, where mechanical hard drives would fail.

M.2 SSDs are perfectly suited for use as boot drives, backup-recovery devices, license drives or OS installation devices (as a replacement for DVD-ROMS).

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