Intel Optane needed with EVO 970 Pluse SSD (500GB)?

[mackayadam79]

I have an HP Omen laptop and recently upgraded the stock SSD to a 970 EVO Plus (500GB). This laptop also comes equipped with 16GB Optine drive, but I don't know if it's any longer in use or whether it needs to be used.

• Question - with the 970 EVO Plus SSD, is there any advantage to using the 16GB Intel Optine drive?
  • If YES, how should it be set-up and configured?

It should be noted, while the 970 is extremely fast, I have noticed the boot time isn't as fast as I would have thought (BIOS startup currently 7.2 seconds)

[Huffer]

You would have had to remove the Optane module in order to install the 970 Evo Plus so I am confused. 

[mackayadam79]

If you look at the specs for my computer (15-dc0051nr), I believe it came with an SSD and a separate 16GB Intel Optane module...unless I'm missing something. The 970 EVO has been installed and I can still see 16GB drive which I'm assuming is the Optane, but the drive is red (i.e., I don't think it's in use) 

Was the Optane part of the old SSD which is basically null with the EVO installed or do I still have Optane? It's an HP model and I am not a computer/technical expert.

[Huffer]

So you did not actually do the installation? There is a single M.2 slot. This would hold either the Optane module OR an M.2 SSD such as the Samsung Evo 970. The laptop came with a 1 TB 7200 rom SATA hard drive originally. Can you post a screen shot of where you are seeing the 16 GB disk or perhaps the device manager or disk management console?

[mackayadam79]

I installed the Evo 970 myself into the m.2 slot (replacing the previous drive). After install there was 16GB I believe assigned somewhere as a partition and it was showing as in RED as it's own drive. I couldn't figure out how to make it go away so I just hid it. 

Are you able to tell anything from this screenshot?

[Huffer]

I see no 16 gig drive here. I see 4 disks...a 1 TB which I assume is the hard drive; a 512 gb which is likely the M.2. I also see a 32 gig drive which looks like maybe its a USB thumb drive and then a 256 gig drive which may be an external usb drive?

[mackayadam79]

That is 100% correct. Not sure where the oprane went..maybe it was a partition in my old SSD or my Intel 1TD HD that was removed or nullified when I installed the EVO? The laptop definitely came with Optane and all I did was swap out the m.2 intel ssd with Samsung. 

You’re correct about the other drives.  I’m using the (D:) 1TB HD for old files and C: recovery + system image backup. The other two drives (thumb and microSD) are performing the same tasks for 2x recovery redundancy in case of system failure. 

Is there anything I don’t need here or you’d recommend repartition to optimize performance? Like what’s that Fat32 and is my EVO partitioned correctly to maximize processing power?

Anything else you can see that can be optimized or better partitioned for performance? 

[Huffer]

If there was an Optane you removed it when you installed the current M.2. Not physically possible for both to be in the laptop at the same time.