Omen 45L GT22-1470se additional storage

[Bendmac]

Greetings...

I just ordered up an HP Omen 45L GT-22-1470se desktop from HP; not yet built but should be built soon and here by end of the month.

Initially, when I spec'd this out, I ordered it with a 1TB WD Black PCle 4x4 NVMe TLC M.2 SSD for the main storage. (For whatever reason, I also had them add in a 1TB 7200rpm SATA HDD...lol, old habits die hard!). I SHOULD have ordered it with the 2TB SSD instead of the 1TB but HP won't accept any changes now that the order is in without charging me for canceling and then reordering...

For expansion slots, it lists (3) M.2 slots...(2) PCIe x4 for SSD and (1) for WLAN. I couldn't care less about the WLAN at this point.

Questions:

1. Can one / both of those M.2 slots SSD slots be used for additional storage, with something like this? (Not necessarily Samsung and not necessarily 1TB each but you get the idea)...
2. I'm unable to find a diagram of the expansion bays and / or the motherboard (Arctic or BlizzardOC?) but it APPEARS those additional slots are located under the graphics card, yes? (Spec'd with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060Ti). That would require removal of the GPU, adding the additional SSDs and then reassembling?
3. Finally, if those types of SSDs are used for additional storage, do they need heat sinks?

Apologies for the noob questions...I understand just enough to make myself dangerous! 

Thanks in advance!

Bendmac

[Bill_To]

Greetings

Welcome to the HP Forum.

Good choice. I like the 45L case; very upgradable and it should provide years of fun.

You will have a second, empty M.2 drive socket. You should be able to add any M.2 NVME PCIe SSD you want in the second M.2 socket. HP may provide a heatsink for this socket.

HP usually has the primary M.2 socket (with heatsink) located between the CPU socket and the graphics card.

The second M.2 socket could be below the graphics card or somewhere else on the MB. You may have to remove the graphics card to install a second M.2 SSD.

The third M.2 socket will have a WIFI card.

PCIe Gen 3 SSDs don't usually require heatsinks. The faster Gen 4 and Gen 5 NVME drives can run hot without a heatsink.

Regards

[Bendmac]

Thanks for the speedy and very educating reply, Bill.

HP didn't offer any other SSD upgrades beyond the primary storage; they DO offer a (1) or (2)TB SATA HDD upgrade (I opted for the 1TB).. So them offering a heatsink for a secondary M.2 drive is a non-factor...

I did some checking for various brands (Crucial, Samsung, WD, etc.) but don't see anything with an included or optional heatsink.  If they aren't made that way, would you recommend some thermal tape? Or is that all a non-factor?

Finally...with the primary being a WD SSD, better to stick with WD for the secondary as well? Any size limitations on that secondary M.2 stick?

Cheers!

[Bill_To]

Greetings @Bendmac 

My pleasure.

You could check Amazon or Newegg for add-in M.2 drive heatsinks for the second M.2 socket.

I can't find any specs for your HP provided Intel Z790 MB so I don't know where the second M.2 socket is.

Successfully doing a retail heatsink would depend on where the second M.2 socket is and nearby components.

I can't say if thermal tape would help, never tried this. I have installed retail M.2 heatsinks when the MB manufacturer did not provide a heatsink.

Gen 4 and Gen 5 M.2 system drives would probably require a heatsink. But the second M.2 data drive would probably be inactive most of the time.

You can do whatever brand drive you want in the second M.2 socket.

W11, using UEFI and GPT, can support up to 9.4 zettabytes (ZB) of disk capacity. See Here for supporting info.

Regards