Multiple Drives

Steinberg Lounge
1

Hi
Im just building another pc and a used motherboard has come with a M.2 memory next to the CPU.
So, is it best to use the M.2 and 2 ssd drives or
Not use the M.2 and use 3 ssd drives ?

2

Use the M.2 for Cubase and the SSD drives for everything else including the Cubase projects.

3

Thanks Paul.

4

It’s completely upto :
For me , using M2 for the OS and a separate M2 for the Projects and Steinberg content was the way to go , a 1TB M2 C drive is a bit OTT if your only installing programs and no Acustica audio plugins , i found a remarkable difference in speed using the second M2 for projects and content , lightening fast .
Halion 7 opens instantly .
Cubase , i no longer see the licences being checked on start up
GA , Padshop load instantly , the only one i have issues and sluggishness with is BackBone loading content for some reason .
Project opening has improved vastly and absolutely stabilized the Asio meter and even more headroom ( most of removed a small bottleneck .

I really didn’t want anything else stored on the C driver due to having clumsy fingers and i found this works very well for me :+1:

5

Thanks,
What O.S is the best do you think. ?
I’ve seen that many different versions of Windows 10 and 11 I’m not sure what to go with.

6

@Highly-Controversial I also second 1TB M.2 drive for everything else.

@ADRIAN_DIX Myself I’m using Win10 Pro Version 22H2, My system is not upgradeable to Win 11 , I could install it with a workaround but I will not install Win11 unless I’m forced to.
If you are doing a fresh install on a new system you may not have a choice but to go with Win11, although I’m sure you could get a copy of Win10 and buy a key for it legitimately. The time line for Win10 support is closing soon though (2025?)
If only Steinberg would go with Linux I’d be a happy camper !

7

Thanks Paul,
May go to Windows 10 myself i’ve still got a copy but it’s the home edition.

8

Not clear to me what you mean by “ssd drives” that are not M.2 ??
If by that you meant 2.5inch ssd drives, than BEWARE of the difference between SATA and NVMe.

Most commercial 2.5in drives are SATA, which badly affect the performance of modern SSDs.
While the M.2 slots on any modern mobo will be NVMe (aka PCIe).

These days, the best SATA SSD can still be 10x to 20x SLOWER than most NVMe SSDs.

So a 2.5in SATA SSD is still very usable, but not the best pick for large sample libraries, for ex.

9

Thanks.
I’ve used a M.2 drive and 2 SATA drives

10

@Y-D What are you smoking ?

11

Would you care to elaborate if you disagree with something I said?