Samsung NVMe [2.2 Drivers - Not Signed] [2.3 Drivers - Signed] Boot Critical WHQL

[NeoBeum]

UPDATE 25th OCT 2017

Samsung released WHQL Signed NVMe Drivers a few hours ago...

http://www.samsung.com/semiconductor/minisite/ssd/download/tools.html

They are still 2.2, but actually signed now

Samsung's Site has hit the limit for SSD Downloads, so here:
https://github.com/NeoBeum/ASUS-G751JY



updated title for the thread
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Hi, I'm posting this here just for a heads up for some people - who may or may not experience problems with Samsung drives on the ASUS Notebook range.
Errors should only start to manifest if the device is attempting to use secure boot with the current NVMe 2.2 driver from Samsung.

This driver can be loaded multiple ways - Windows will use it's own NVME driver until the Operating System is online, then load the Samsung Driver - however if Windows has installed it in such a way where the notebook attempts to load the driver during POST or prior to Windows Operating System - the device may fail to boot.

I'm going to be sending Samsung an email too - to see if they can get the driver signed. Fairly simple process... I was going to do it myself - but it needs Samsung's certificate, not mine.

I haven't been able to get this driver working properly in the PE while Secure Boot is enabled in my G751 Recovery Tinker Project - https://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?94784-G751JY-Windows-Server-2016-All-Drivers-amp-Hardware-...

If you're not having issues - don't worry about this - but if you have experienced problems using a NVMe Storage device, this may be one of the factors attributing to the fault.


Thread in Hardware section for mod/admins

[R5Eandme]

JustinThyme wrote:
Honestly I don’t bother with all the hoopla over Samsung drivers. We have beaten this horse to the grave and back multiple times. There is no tangible difference from running the Samsung drivers. They only work on the consumer version drives, won’t even work on an SM961 which is a Samsung Drive, just OEM. Then you have to have the raid disabled aka bios setting of AHCI or Raid which is inaccurate and should be labeled raid enabled/disabled as NVMe is not AHCI. Why must you do this? It’s a shortcoming on Samsung’s part where their software can’t see past a raid controller. It’s been this way since the 840 EVO was introduced and the same on all platforms, laptop or decktop.*

So save yourself the trouble and just use the native drivers and load IRST on install. *

Interesting. When I first installed Win 10, the Samsung 960 Pro was using the Windows-provided "Standard NVM Express Controller", but I replaced it with "Samsung NVMe Controller". For my SATA-connected SSD, Windows provided the "Standard AHCI Controller" and when I replaced that with the IRST driver, without a RAID array, that is when Samsung Magician complained about the IRST being incompatible with Magician. So I rolled back the IRST to the "Standard AHCI Controller". Now, you are suggesting that I can roll back the Samsung NVMe Controller to the "Standard NVM Express Controller" that Windows provided, uninstall Samsung magician, and re-install the IRST driver for the SATA-connected SSD? What is the advantage over my present arrangement? Also it seems to me that the "Standard NVM Express Controller" and the IRST driver are two separate Intel drivers, one controls the M.2 -connected NVMe drive, the other the SATA-connected SSD drivers. I could be wrong of course 🙂 Thank you for your thoughts.

[JustinThyme]

R5Eandme wrote:
Interesting. When I first installed Win 10, the Samsung 960 Pro was using the Windows-provided "Standard NVM Express Controller", but I replaced it with "Samsung NVMe Controller". For my SATA-connected SSD, Windows provided the "Standard AHCI Controller" and when I replaced that with the IRST driver, without a RAID array, that is when Samsung Magician complained about the IRST being incompatible with Magician. So I rolled back the IRST to the "Standard AHCI Controller". Now, you are suggesting that I can roll back the Samsung NVMe Controller to the "Standard NVM Express Controller" that Windows provided, uninstall Samsung magician, and re-install the IRST driver for the SATA-connected SSD? What is the advantage over my present arrangement? Also it seems to me that the "Standard NVM Express Controller" and the IRST driver are two separate Intel drivers, one controls the M.2 -connected NVMe drive, the other the SATA-connected SSD drivers. I could be wrong of course 🙂 Thank you for your thoughts.

Like I said before we have beat this horse in the ground.

So many people were freaking out over the Samsung drivers not loaded as most G752 machines come with raid enabled.

If you are happy with what you have, thats great.
What I am saying is there is zero advantage to running the Samsung Driver and all Samsung magician is good for is updating firmware. As I stated the reason magician doesn't work is Samsung does not find it necessary to have their software where it can see drives past a raid controller. They have one focus, that it can see a Samsung consumer drive on a standard controller, thats it, no more no less.

I realize you are newer to the forum and haven't had the chance to read around yet. Take some time and search out the beginning of the debacle with the G752 and the 950 pro NVMe. We ran it 100 ways from Sunday and back again. We put them in raid 0 and stand alone. I ran so many benchmarks comparing every possible scenario with both SATA SSDs and NVMe SSDs being the SM951 (950 pro OEM) and the 950 pro that I was tired of seeing then and could cite them from memory. Then repeated it all again a year later when the 960 pro hit the shelves.

What was proven hands down is there is absolutely zero difference performance wise between the two other than if you have magician running you are simply wasting resources running a background app that does nothing.

For your Sata SSDs you are still on an standard controller. The Samsung driver only applies to the NVMe.

So in the end if you are having issues with the Samsung driver not loading, giving errors, lacking signatures or anything else you don't need it so don't install it.
If you are already running it and its working fine for you then leave it there if you want.

Im running two 512GB 950 pros in raid 0 on my G752VY-DH72 with no samsung drivers of course. The reads are not much higher due to the DMI bottle neck but the write speeds have more than doubled and almost as high as the read speeds on a single drive. Why did I do it? because I can and adding to the forum here of what happens when you put two in raid 0

[R5Eandme]

JustinThyme wrote:
Like I said before we have beat this horse in the ground.

So many people were freaking out over the Samsung drivers not loaded as most G752 machines come with raid enabled.

If you are happy with what you have, thats great.
What I am saying is there is zero advantage to running the Samsung Driver and all Samsung magician is good for is updating firmware. As I stated the reason magician doesn't work is Samsung does not find it necessary to have their software where it can see drives past a raid controller. They have one focus, that it can see a Samsung consumer drive on a standard controller, thats it, no more no less.

I realize you are newer to the forum and haven't had the chance to read around yet. Take some time and search out the beginning of the debacle with the G752 and the 950 pro NVMe. We ran it 100 ways from Sunday and back again. We put them in raid 0 and stand alone. I ran so many benchmarks comparing every possible scenario with both SATA SSDs and NVMe SSDs being the SM951 (950 pro OEM) and the 950 pro that I was tired of seeing then and could cite them from memory. Then repeated it all again a year later when the 960 pro hit the shelves.

What was proven hands down is there is absolutely zero difference performance wise between the two other than if you have magician running you are simply wasting resources running a background app that does nothing.

For your Sata SSDs you are still on an standard controller. The Samsung driver only applies to the NVMe.

So in the end if you are having issues with the Samsung driver not loading, giving errors, lacking signatures or anything else you don't need it so don't install it.
If you are already running it and its working fine for you then leave it there if you want.

Im running two 512GB 950 pros in raid 0 on my G752VY-DH72 with no samsung drivers of course. The reads are not much higher due to the DMI bottle neck but the write speeds have more than doubled and almost as high as the read speeds on a single drive. Why did I do it? because I can and adding to the forum here of what happens when you put two in raid 0

Since you've done all that comparison work I don't doubt that the Samsung NVMe driver does not offer better performance over the native drivers. It is useful to know. And I understand that the Samsung NVMe driver will not allow you to set up RAID 0 for your 950 Pro pair, but the IRST will. Wow, it must be fast striping two NVMe drives! Even one of them is impressive enough. My R5E has only one M.2 slot so I guess I won't be setting up RAID, but nice to know someone has. Thanks for all the information, it is a great forum.

[NeoBeum]

Samsung released WHQL Signed NVMe Drivers a few hours ago...

http://www.samsung.com/semiconductor/minisite/ssd/download/tools.html

They are still 2.2, but actually signed now

[Clintlgm]

You asked we answered with what we know, if your system is working why are you concerned, My 960 Pro works perfectly on the IRST driver than came pre loaded. When I got my G752VY the very first thing I did was use Macrium Reflect to clone my stock 961 to my 960 Pro 512GB. I haven't looked back since. No one has shown me that any other drivers will make my notebook work any better nor my SSD work any better.
I don't get where you getting that IRST if for Spinners, we have been using them for SSD that I know of since the G75 I bought in early 2012 at that time it was a consensus that the RAID driver was a better match for our SSD than the SATA drivers were so most of us installed them

[R5Eandme]

Clintlgm wrote:
You asked we answered with what we know, if your system is working why are you concerned, My 960 Pro works perfectly on the IRST driver than came pre loaded. When I got my G752VY the very first thing I did was use Macrium Reflect to clone my stock 961 to my 960 Pro 512GB. I haven't looked back since. No one has shown me that any other drivers will make my notebook work any better nor my SSD work any better.
I don't get where you getting that IRST if for Spinners, we have been using them for SSD that I know of since the G75 I bought in early 2012 at that time it was a consensus that the RAID driver was a better match for our SSD than the SATA drivers were so most of us installed them

Thanks again. I am not concerned, am just seeing what others have used and if I can learn something from their experiences. I do remember with my old system that with IRST installed you can enable or disable RAID in BIOS, but I didn't know that it provided a better driver for SSD than the native SATA/AHCI driver. For my new system with the Samsung 960 Pro, everything is working fine with the Samsung NVMe driver, so if it ain't broke ... And yes, after the 960 pro there is no looking back!

[Clintlgm]

LOL yea imagine what the next generation are going to be able to do, it the speed can increase with the same percentages of the 960 over the 950. Personally the SSD took there time getting here hard drives have been the bottle neck for a number of year.
I guess the the future is computer that we talked to and the talk back to us. This is still quite creepy to me and I don't speak clearly so for not have really worked for me. I just don't think I like my commuter knowing what I'm doing or thinking when I not engaged.

[R5Eandme]

Clintlgm wrote:
LOL yea imagine what the next generation are going to be able to do, it the speed can increase with the same percentages of the 960 over the 950. Personally the SSD took there time getting here hard drives have been the bottle neck for a number of year.
I guess the the future is computer that we talked to and the talk back to us. This is still quite creepy to me and I don't speak clearly so for not have really worked for me. I just don't think I like my commuter knowing what I'm doing or thinking when I not engaged.

I hear you. I don't use Cortana assistant on Win10, and I don't use the Google voice assistant on my Android phone either. It feels weird to be having a conversation with a computer and to be having it listening all the time. I like watching science fiction movies, but am not ready to be in one. Maybe someday.
The Rampage VI Extreme has these DIMM.2 slots near the RAM slots, which use an ASUS DIMM board that you can mount NVMe drives on it. And there is a VROC PCIe card that lets you put multiple NVMe cards in a virtual RAID array. These adaptations give faster write speeds apparently, but the R6E and multiple NVMe cards are expensive. Sometimes the prices don't come down much with time either. Thinking about the RED team for the next build.

[pgrey]

This is interesting, I found this thread, because I was looking for a solution to my 16299.15 upgrade issue (drive has to be placed back into a RAID-IRST set, even if single, AHCI won't work, you'll never be able to boot), which was driving me nuts.

That said, I get about 2800/2100 vs about 2050/1800, using the Samsung NVME driver/Inbox (about 40%). I just did a re-install of the driver too, since I had to make my single drive under IRST, in order to upgrade. Same deal, I ran the numbers both ways again after moving to 15299.15, and got the same ranges.

It's interesting, I wonder why I'm the only one seeing the clearly better numbers, and why? I wonder if the test is RAM or CPU bound, or possibly somewhere else on the BUS or PCH? I'm on a x299 Deluxe, so my 960 runs on a x4 lane, 4000mb/s max for that connection.

[R5Eandme]

pgrey wrote:
This is interesting, I found this thread, because I was looking for a solution to my 16299.15 upgrade issue (drive has to be placed back into a RAID-IRST set, even if single, AHCI won't work, you'll never be able to boot), which was driving me nuts.

That said, I get about 2800/2100 vs about 2050/1800, using the Samsung NVME driver/Inbox (about 40%). I just did a re-install of the driver too, since I had to make my single drive under IRST, in order to upgrade. Same deal, I ran the numbers both ways again after moving to 15299.15, and got the same ranges.

It's interesting, I wonder why I'm the only one seeing the clearly better numbers, and why? I wonder if the test is RAM or CPU bound, or possibly somewhere else on the BUS or PCH? I'm on a x299 Deluxe, so my 960 runs on a x4 lane, 4000mb/s max for that connection.

My results with Samsung NVMe driver are 2123/1854 (960 Pro 1TB). This comparable to what you are getting with the standard NVMe driver instead of the Samsung NVMe driver?