Should I upgrade from Gen3 to Gen4 NVMe SSD?

Posted by hard2resist@reddit | buildapc | View on Reddit | 12 comments

I have a 1TB WD NVMe SSD from my old Legion 5 2021 laptop that I'm now using in my desktop. I'm thinking about upgrading to a Gen4 SSD and have some questions: 1. Is Gen4 much faster than Gen3? Is it worth the upgrade? 2. What does DRAM do in Gen4 SSDs? Does it make a big difference? 3. My motherboard only has one M.2 slot. Should I upgrade now or wait a year? My current setup: 1TB WD Gen3 SSD (only one M.2 slot on my board) Looking for advice on whether the upgrade is worth it for everyday use.

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12 Comments

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whomad1215@reddit

What do you do that would benefit from upgrading the ssd

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hard2resist@reddit (OP)

generally browsing and playing games. nothing much

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whomad1215@reddit

So, no

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hard2resist@reddit (OP)

Thanks for the suggestion. If I use an SSD with an external enclosure since I lack an M.2 slot, will it perform optimally?

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whomad1215@reddit

No, it will be limited to USB speeds

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Cer_Visia@reddit

Gen4 drives have more modern (i.e., faster) controllers without a much higher price, so if you upgrade, you should upgrade to Gen4. But the difference is not large enough that you _need_ to do it; wait until you run out of space or the old drive becomes too slow. NVMe drives without DRAM cache use part of the PC's memory as cache (HMB = Host Memory Buffer). The higher Gen4 bandwidth makes the HMB work faster, so with Gen4 drives, DRAM is even less necessary than with Gen3. For general office tasks or gaming, it makes no noticeable difference and is not worth it.

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faustin228@reddit

The speed difference isn’t significant — in fact, you probably wouldn’t even notice it. While bandwidth is technically twice that of Gen3, it doesn’t show any meaningful performance boost for most real-world tasks.

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hard2resist@reddit (OP)

Thank you for the insight. I'm particularly concerned about gaming performance, as I plan to play AAA titles on my newly built PC. Given this use case, would you still recommend staying with Gen3, or is this a scenario where Gen4 might provide tangible benefits?

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faustin228@reddit

If you have a high-end PC and spending a lot isn’t an issue, then upgrading might make sense. Personally, I also have a WD Gen3 SSD and have no complaints when it comes to gaming performance.

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hard2resist@reddit (OP)

Thanks for the advice. I'll stick with my current SSD and wait for December deals before upgrading.

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Adept-Recognition764@reddit

Nope, pretty sure your laptop only supports PCIE3.0, pretty common for that year. Dont do it, unless you do heavy productivity tasks, you will see no performance gain.

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hard2resist@reddit (OP)

Perfect - my 1TB NVMe still has 98% health after 4 years of use since 2021.