Thinkpads Forum

Anyone know if the Gen. 3 still has the M.2 SSD type for the 128gb option? If so, can it be upgraded like Gen. 2?

Yes, it does have 2280 (80mm) M.2 SSDs, which are upgradeable.

Thanks for the quick response.

One more question. The web site shows only the 512gb as PCIE, does this mean that the other sizes are SATA as in gen. 2? I don't know how they could do that unless there are different MBs.

The X1C3 uses a PCIe based M.2 2280 SSD and not a SATA M.2 2280 SSD found in the X1C2. I don't know if SATA SSDs are compatible.

But with PCIe M.2 SSDs you can exceed the SATAIII limited performance.

Benchmarks in my X1C3 reach 1.35 GB/s in Crystal Disk Mark.

In the parts list it shows 4 planers for the 5300. I ordered the 5300 with 4gb RAM and 128gb SSD. The only difference is the RAM and TPM
Planar i5-5300U 4gb, NOK, Y-AMT, Y-TPM
Planar i5-5300U 4gb, NOK, Y-AMT, N-TPM
Planar i5-5300U 8gb, NOK, Y-AMT, Y-TPM
Planar i5-5300U 8gb, NOK, Y-AMT, N-TPM

I wonder if TPM indicates whether there is PCIE or not.

I'm interested because I want to upgrade to 512gb. I didn't go with the Lenovo SSD because the 512gb upgrade was $700.

The M.2 slot in the X1 Carbon Gen 3 uses M.2 SSDs of length 80mm and supports the following interfaces:

• PCIe 2.0 4x (faster)
• SATAIII

sorapp wrote:I wonder if TPM indicates whether there is PCIE or not.

All system boards support PCIe 2.0 x4 via the M.2 slot, TPM only indicates if there's a "Trusted Platform Module" or not.

I've also got a pre-release gen3 Carbon.
The PCIe 512GB SSD in it is a Samsung MZHPV512HDGL-000L1 (http://www.thessdreview.com/daily-news/ ... sung-sm951) and in synthetic benchmarks it scores 2.5x higher than the SATAIII Samsung 840Pro in my X220's main drive bay.

To fully clarify, the gen3 Carbon supports both SATA *and* PCIe-attached 22x80mm SSDs via its M.2 connector. Currently, according to the store's system configurator, of the 5 SSD options, only the 512GB drive is PCIe. Considering that the SM951 is bleeding-edge, I'm not at all surprised that it's a $700 addition.

Cheers.

Thanks all for the useful detailed information. This helps me understand the options much better.