Defender P15 notebook - how to fit additional data drive

[Ticket]

I have a Medion Erazer Defender P15 MD62294 laptop/notebook, MSN 30031897

I think it has a spare slot for an additional (data) drive.

What kind of data drive can I put in?  2.5 inch SATA?

Also, how do I open the rear panel to access the drive bay? 

(sadly the online manual has zero info on how to do this).

Thanks!

[Fishtown]

Hi @@Ticket and welcome

Look here:

https://community.medion.com/t5/FAQs/FAQs-about-ERAZER-Defender-P15-Notebooks/ta-p/124545?search-act...

Bye Fishtown

[Fishtown]

Hi @Ticket 

you have a barebone clevo NH77EPY-M

Look here :

https://my.hidrive.com/share/yze8mg-wf8#$/CLEVO%20Service%20Manual%20Books/N_Series/NH/NHxxExx/NHxxE...

download this zip: NH7xEPx_SM(20210319).zip

there you will find information on how to open it to upgrade it.

bye Fishtown

[Ticket]

Thanks everyone for your quick replies, much appreciated!
Thanks also for the link to the service manual - now I know how to open the machine.

Reading the service manual, there appear to be these slots on the motherboard for mass storage devices:
[1] HDD SATA drive
[2] M.2 Card Connector (SATA/PCIE SSD) (thicker thermal pad), size 2280
[3] M.2 Card Connector (PCIE/SSD only), size 2280

Slots [2] and [3] are next to each other on the motherboard.

What I want to do is fit a 1TB data drive into the laptop.
The question is where and what interface to use.

From the product description, the laptop Operating System is on a PCIe Gen3 x4 SSD card.
(By the way, is this the same as an nVME card?)
I haven't taken off the laptop base yet (it's a brand new laptop!), so I am guessing for now the OS is in slot [3].

So that would leave slots [1] and [2] available.

Slot [1] appears to be for a 2.5 inch HDD or SDD SATA drive, but the service manual says:
"The SATA Storage is a reserved design and not supported yet. For more detailed information, please contact your Sales/FAE representative."
So is using slot [1] a no-go?

That would leave only slot [2]. So would a standard nVME PCIe card fit into this?
What is the difference between slots [2] and [3]? ('SATA/PCIE SSD' versus 'PCIE/SSD only')?

Overall, are these my options: 2.5  inch SATA drive,  OR  M.2 nVME PCIe SSD ?

Thanks!

[Fishtown]

Hello @Ticket 

you can only retrofit an M.2 PCIe 3.0/2280 (2TB max.), see also the link from message 2.

bye Fishtown

[Ticket]

Hi Fishtown,

Would this be suitable:

Samsung 970 EVO Plus 1 TB PCIe NVMe M.2 (2280) Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) (MZ-V7S1T0)

[Fishtown]

Hi @Ticket 

Buy recommendations are not given,

The chosen one should fit just like any other commercially available one.

because of the HDD / SDD 2.5 "it just occurred to me that we have already made a difference here. in the general description of clevo it said "not available" but the user wrote that the connections were there and that he could retrofit a hard drive. but that was another model from clevo. When installing the m.2, check to see if the connections are not there.

bye Fishtown

[Ticket]

I understand specific hardware cannot be recommended.

So please let me re-phrase : Would hardware described as:

PCIe NVMe M.2 (2280) Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

work in this system as a data drive?

[Fishtown · Accepted solution]

Hi @Ticket 

That is correct and has already been clarified!

The selected one also fits.

There is a misunderstanding, there is generally no specific brand / model recommended, everyone has to decide for himself.

bye Fishtown

[Ticket]

Some extra info, now that I have managed to remove the back panel and installed the extra nvme data drive:

The spare M.2 slot available is the lower one if you look at page 2-12 of the service manual.  Here is a photo of my board, the spare slot is on the right hand side: the spare slot is on the left, the uppermost in this picture, above the factory installed system nvme drive (the picture got rotated after pasting!)

The service manual describes the spare slot as "PCIE SSD only".

I'm happy to report my chosen nvme card worked fine in this slot.