Is more than 1 M.2 slot a thing?

[TemjinGold]

It seems all the 170 boards I've seen have only 1 M.2 slot. Anyone know if multiple such slots are slated for a future board?

 

[UsandThem]

There are already several z170 boards that have more than one m.2 connection.

For example, my GA-Z170X-UD5 which I bought in November 2015, has two. There are some high-end boards that come with three m.2 connections (like the Asrock Z170 Extreme7+).

 

[TemjinGold]

Oh wow had no idea...

 

[UsandThem]

Oh wow had no idea...

No problem.

Just one thing to watch out for is if using more than one M.2 slot is something you definitely are going to do, be sure to look in the motherboard's manual at the section which shows what connections get disabled, or the speed lowered when adding a PCIe or SATA-based M.2 drive.

It differs on every motherboard. For example, on my motherboard if I use a PCIe x4 based M.2 drive, the SATA3_0 through SATA3_3 connections get disabled, and only SATA3_4 and SATA3_5 work. However, if I instead used a PCIe x2 M.2 drive, only the SATA3_2 and SATA3_3 connections get disabled.

You really have to pay attention to this when deciding on a motherboard, based on what you want to use in your system. Also, sometimes adding more than one M.2 drive will disable PCIe slots (like the ones you install sound cards in such in). It's usually the bottom slots, like a PCIe x4 slot.

 

[TemjinGold]

Ahh good to know. Wasn't aware.