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> The drives use a proprietary form-factor, which is logical as the SSD controller resides in the SoC, and the drives themselves do not need to carry one No, i
by sofixa 5y ago
> The drives use a proprietary form-factor, which is logical as the SSD controller resides in the SoC, and the drives themselves do not need to carry one
No, it's not logical, they still could have used a common form factor like M.2.
- Eric_WVGG 5y agoWhat, make a socket matching the M.2, that M.2s would be incompatible with?
- formerly_proven 5y agoIntel actually does just that with wifi cards (CNVio/2 cards only work with specific chipsets and don't use PCIe/USB, while using the same keying as normal wifi cards).
- wmf 5y agoAn M.2 2230 slot should be able to take Wi-Fi or NVMe since they're both PCIe devices. In practice there aren't many 2230 SSDs.
- Tijdreiziger 5y agoCNVi isn't PCIe; non-CNVi platforms can't take CNVi Wi-Fi cards. > CNVi or CNVio ("Connectivity Integration", Intel Integrated Connectivity I/O interface) is a proprietary connectivity interface by Intel for Wi-Fi and Bluetooth radios to lower costs and simplify their wireless modules. In CNVi, the network adapter's large and usually expensive functional blocks (MAC components, memory, processor and associated logic/firmware) are moved inside the CPU and chipset (Platform Controller Hub). Only the signal processor, analog and Radio frequency (RF) functions are left on an external upgradeable CRF (Companion RF) module which, as of 2019 comes in M.2 form factor (M.2 2230 and 1216 Soldered Down). Therefore, CNVi requires chipset and Intel CPU support. Otherwise the Wi-Fi + Bluetooth module has to be the traditional M.2 PCIe form factor. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CNVi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CNVi
- wmf 5y agoTrue; I was thinking of normal Wi-Fi cards.
- aenis 5y agoRight, but that would hardly serve any practical purpose, as one still couldn't plug an off the shelf m.2 device and expect it to work. So - why constrain yourself with someone elses connector design if if adds no value?
- rowanG077 5y agoThat would make 0 sense. It would be confusing even since no M.2 device would work in that slot.
- addaon 5y agoBesides how malicious it would be to use an M.2 physical connector for a non-M.2-compatible protocol, the pin count on the Apple connector is much higher for a reason. Adding a chip on to the SSD to mux between the different flash signals and retransmit them over a reduced number of high speed transceiver lanes would be cost-wise most of the way to putting a traditional PCIe controller on the SSD, without the benefits.