Does iMac 21.5-Inch "Core i5" 2.9 (Late 2013) has PCle ssd slot connector?

[zhoubolin]

hey guys

I have an Apple iMac 21.5-Inch "Core i5" 2.9 (Late 2013) , and I don't know if it has a PCle ssd slot connector on the motherboard.

I checked it on Everymac by enter the imac serial number and it says it has, but I am not sure unless I open it up and see it myself.

Storage Dimensions:

2.5" (9.5 mm)/Proprietary*

Storage Interface:

Serial ATA (6 Gb/s)/PCIe*

Details:

*This model has a SATA III (6 Gb/s) connector for a 2.5" hard drive as well as a proprietary PCIe connector for an SSD. As reported by site sponsor OWC, if the SSD is not installed at the time of purchase, the connector still is present and later professional or self-installation of secondary storage is possible.

 

[christiann]

hey guys

I have an Apple iMac 21.5-Inch "Core i5" 2.9 (Late 2013) , and I don't know if it has a PCle ssd slot connector on the motherboard.

I checked it on Everymac by enter the imac serial number and it says it has, but I am not sure unless I open it up and see it myself.

Storage Dimensions:

2.5" (9.5 mm)/Proprietary*

Storage Interface:

Serial ATA (6 Gb/s)/PCIe*

Details:

*This model has a SATA III (6 Gb/s) connector for a 2.5" hard drive as well as a proprietary PCIe connector for an SSD. As reported by site sponsor OWC, if the SSD is not installed at the time of purchase, the connector still is present and later professional or self-installation of secondary storage is possible.

It does. Mine has the PCIe SSD.

 

[xLorak]

for others models

2014 with 1.4 i5 = no, but every higher than this 1.4 i5 yes

and

2012 I was opening last few days 4 the same models and every one had, they got Xeon e3-1230v2 and mSata SSD via adapter (they have smaller sized place for ssd, its fat but short ssd like in mid12 to early 2013 MBP15 so nvme not working, and long sata m.2 will not fit too because of mount to chasis)

 

[DeltaMac]

There is no way to know (for certain) if your 2013 iMac has a PCIe slot, until you open it up, pull the logic board, and look for the slot.
I did this just a month ago on a 2013 21.5-inch iMac. Made me happy to find the PCIe slot, and added one to that iMac.
Any 2013 iMac that shipped with a fusion drive, or an SSD has the slot. I remember reading that some time in the production run for that model, Apple switched over the logic board so all 21.5-inch iMacs came with the slot. Early production, the slot was only for models ordered with an SSD.

 

[TwoH]

Typically all 2012 and 13s tend to have the slot, if it sold with a drive for it or not.

 

[Andrea Filippini]

hey guys

I have an Apple iMac 21.5-Inch "Core i5" 2.9 (Late 2013) , and I don't know if it has a PCle ssd slot connector on the motherboard.

I checked it on Everymac by enter the imac serial number and it says it has, but I am not sure unless I open it up and see it myself.

Storage Dimensions:

2.5" (9.5 mm)/Proprietary*

Storage Interface:

Serial ATA (6 Gb/s)/PCIe*

Details:

*This model has a SATA III (6 Gb/s) connector for a 2.5" hard drive as well as a proprietary PCIe connector for an SSD. As reported by site sponsor OWC, if the SSD is not installed at the time of purchase, the connector still is present and later professional or self-installation of secondary storage is possible.

I own an Apple iMac 21.5-inch i7 3.1 Late 2013 and yes, it has the PCIe SSD slot (my main storage is connected via PCIe). Anyway the w/r speed is limited to 750 MB/s.

 

[zhoubolin]

thank you guys, it has a apple ssd controller (Apple SSD SM0128G)
Link Width: X2
Link Speed: 5.0. GT/s
and the w/r speed is limited to 750 MB/s.

another question

Can I replace the Apple SSD SM0128G with different Apple SSD SMO256G that's
Link Width: X4
Link Speed: 5.0. GT/s
and the w/r speed may be is limited to 1500 MB/s.

I found out that the 2013 imac w/r speed won't get to 3000 MB/s above if it's replace with any NVME SSD ( Link Width: X4 and Link Speed: 8.0. GT/s) with a SSD adapter because of the old firmware and as much as it gets, however if w/r speed gets around 1500 MB/s it would still be pretty good.

 

[DeltaMac]

Unfortuately, no.
2013 iMac does not support 4 lanes (Link Width).
No support in iMacs for X4 (4 lanes) until Late 2015 models.

 

[zhoubolin]

Unfortuately, no.
2013 iMac does not support 4 lanes (Link Width).
No support in iMacs for X4 (4 lanes) until Late 2015 models.

the reason I bring this up is I have been swap 2015 macbook pro fast Apple SSD which is
Link Width: X4 and Link Speed: 5.0. GT/s to 2013-2014 macbook pro, and surprisingly the 2013-2014 macbook pro w/r speed got to 1500 MB/s from 350 MB/s-750 MB/s that's only Link Width: X2 and Link Speed: 5.0. GT/s.

so I am wondering if the fast Apple SSD from 2015 works on the 2013 - 2014 iMac.

 

[DeltaMac]

Yes, should work OK, but you don't get X4 bandwidth if the logic board doesn't support X4.
The 2013-2014 MBPro can be faster, because some do support X4 bandwidth. Support is on 15-inch only, but not 13-inch - I use Mactracker app as source for that info...

 

[zhoubolin]

Yes, should work OK, but you don't get X4 bandwidth if the logic board doesn't support X4.
The 2013-2014 MBPro can be faster, because some do support X4 bandwidth. Support is on 15-inch only, but not 13-inch - I use Mactracker app as source for that info...

I have tried the fast 2015 Apple SSD that's Link Width: X4 and Link Speed: 5.0. GT/s on the 2013-2014 MBPro 13-inch and the w/r speed does gets got to 1500 MB/s.

so I was wondering if it works on 2013-2014 iMac, because it's easy to replace SSD on macbook pro than the iMac's PCle connection slot.

 

[DeltaMac]

The Mactracker app might be incorrect about the bandwidth available on the 13-inch MBPro, so maybe that's it.
I do know that I tried a couple of different PCIe m.2 cards with an adapter in a 2013 iMac a couple of months ago.
It did show X2 bandwidth, but cards were Crucial P2, and some other random NVME card that I don't recall atm - not Apple OEM cards (not worth the money, IMHO.)
The performance went up significantly, over the external USB3 SSD that I had used in that iMac for several years.
The internal SSD, plus increased RAM at the same time, allows me to continue to use that iMac for several more years.

I agree, it's a big adventure to get to the SSD slot on that iMac, so it's a Good Thing™ to know if you can expect a good result. And, I am happy with the result on that iMac - it is SO much faster than the original HDD that a question about bandwidth doesn't mean much to me on a nearly 10 year-old Mac.