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<< Solved >> Do the Samsung 970 EVO Plus drives work ? New Firmware Available 2B2QEXM7

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Never mind. I figured it out.
 
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For anyone facing issues with the keyboard input not working in the firmware updater, it is a driver issue in syslinux (the mini-OS that the firmware updater uses). It fails to initialise the USB ports - there may be a fix for that, but the easier workaround for me was to use a USB to PS2 converter with my keyboard. Using the converter, I was able to go through the update process without any issues with both of my EVO Plus NVMe drives installed in the M.2 sockets. If you have multiple NVMe drives connected, the updater goes through them successively, asking the Y/N questions about each of them separately and identifying them by their serial numbers, so you don't need to worry about unplugging one to update the other. Also, updating the firmware did not break the Windows installation I already had on one of my drives, even though the updater warned me of the possibility.

EDIT: Just to note that updating the firmware fixed the kernel panics during installation on my build, and I can highly recommend the EVO Plus NVMe drives now that there is an easy fix available. I now have a working Hackintosh build thanks to the firmware update. :)
 
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If the price of the WD is similar or less than the 970 Plus I would go with the SN750. The warranty is just as good and WD's quality control is among the best in the industry.

To follow up on this, I went with the 970 Plus. Two 1TB 970 Plus, one Windows, one macOS. Updating the firmware for both drives went smoothly. Just booted from USB stick, pressed "Y" a couple of times and done. I had Windows already installed on one drive before the upgrade while the other was untouched. No issues with either drive, no issues installing Mojave, no issues migrating 400 GB from my old Hack to the new drive (twice actually, because I made a mistake the first time). No issues with some heavy working for the past days. All fine. I can recommend using the 970 Plus with the new firmware.
 
I can recommend using the 970 Plus with the new firmware.

I had the 970 EVO Plus but returned it due to the Kernel Panics. Two months later a firmware fix is released for the 970 Plus and it's too late for me to return the 970 EVO. :-/ Oh, well... Good the difference isn't too big (same controller).
 
Hi,

yes it finally works after the firmware patch.
But on my motherboard Gigabyte H170N-Wifi and CPU INTEL i5-6500 the performance is a disappointment.
I "only" get 2400 and 2600 MB/s for read and write tests.

Quite far away from the 3500MB/s as advertised.

is it my hardware that is too old ?

JF
 
Hey everyone, first time posting here. I just received the 970 Evo Plus today only to discover it isn’t working on Macs. I would like to use it on OWC enclosure via thunderbolt so not for booting and OS, only for work with files. Reading through the comments - did the firmware fix the instability? Is it reliable now? I don’t want to switch it for regular Evo as speeds are too low, but if it’s still unstable, I guess I’ll have to.

Either way, is there a guide on how to update the firmware, I’ve never done it. Someone said you cannot update via thunderbolt cables etc... I do have a PC with Windows 10 too but I think I aready have a PCIE M2 in the only slot there. Can I still update it somehow? Again, I wont use it for boot, only video files access & work via Thunderbay6 / 4M2.
 
Hey everyone, first time posting here. I just received the 970 Evo Plus today only to discover it isn’t working on Macs. I would like to use it on OWC enclosure via thunderbolt so not for booting and OS, only for work with files. Reading through the comments - did the firmware fix the instability? Is it reliable now? I don’t want to switch it for regular Evo as speeds are too low, but if it’s still unstable, I guess I’ll have to.

Either way, is there a guide on how to update the firmware, I’ve never done it. Someone said you cannot update via thunderbolt cables etc... I do have a PC with Windows 10 too but I think I aready have a PCIE M2 in the only slot there. Can I still update it somehow? Again, I wont use it for boot, only video files access & work via Thunderbay6 / 4M2.

Hi,

You can use the RUFUS application within Windows, to "prepare" a usb key
(formatting the key using the iso you provide)

it takes a couple of minutes, then eject the USB key and boot from it !
It will detect your Samsung SSD and upgrade it.

As I had problems (before the firmware upgrade) with the EVO plus, I bought a WESTERN DIGITAL WD BLUE 500.
On paper it's slower, using only 2 PCI lanes, for a speed of approx 1200 MB/s.
Honestly I would not detect any speed difference between the Samsung EVO plus and the WD BLUE !!!

On my previous mackintosh I had a SATA SSD, which was noticeably slower.
These new NVMe SSD's don't need cables !, and offer greater speed.

Do not focus on speed only, but on ratio Speed/Price.
The WD 500 blue is far better than the Samsung (half price I remember, for similar feeling of speed)

JF
 
Hi,

You can use the RUFUS application within Windows, to "prepare" a usb key
(formatting the key using the iso you provide)

it takes a couple of minutes, then eject the USB key and boot from it !
It will detect your Samsung SSD and upgrade it.

As I had problems (before the firmware upgrade) with the EVO plus, I bought a WESTERN DIGITAL WD BLUE 500.
On paper it's slower, using only 2 PCI lanes, for a speed of approx 1200 MB/s.
Honestly I would not detect any speed difference between the Samsung EVO plus and the WD BLUE !!!



JF
Thank you for this - the problem is however that I have a Z140 Extreme4 mobo which only has 1 PCIE M2 slot and I already have my old ssd in there which has Win10 in it. Is it somehow possible to do this without booting into Windows? Prep the USB and firmware, take out Win10 bootable PCIE ssd and put in the Evo Plus just to upgrade the firmware?

And just to confirm, which formware should I look for?
 
Thank you for this - the problem is however that I have a Z140 Extreme4 mobo which only has 1 PCIE M2 slot and I already have my old ssd in there which has Win10 in it. Is it somehow possible to do this without booting into Windows? Prep the USB and firmware, take out Win10 bootable PCIE ssd and put in the Evo Plus just to upgrade the firmware?

And just to confirm, which formware should I look for?
You just need to prep your USB stick using Rufus (or any equivalent software package you may prefer), and boot into it with the EVO Plus connected to the mobo. The firmware upgrade comes as a bootable image, that is what you are installing on the USB drive- i.e. your USB drive is what you will be booting into rather than Windows. Hence, you do not need your Windows drive for this procedure.

I can also confirm that the upgrade will make your EVO Plus fully compatible with OS X, you can use it as you OS X boot drive. As @bootpcanon kindly shared with us, Samsung's upgrade package is available at this link. If keyboard input does not work, try using a PS2 keyboard or a USB to PS2 converter.

Best of luck!
 
Firmware update working great for me. Thanks for the heads up!
 
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