diy cfe-b cards

[John Navitsky]

Some folks may have seen posts about building DIY CFE-b cards. Most folks who post that are trying to suggest this for budget purposes.

I think that implies the solution being a bit dodgy, and I took a look at this trying to see how much of the dodgy-ness we could remove from the equation.

Background:

* There are currently small form factor NVME drives called 2230 drives (2230 describes the physical size)
* CFE-b uses NVME, so you only need to accommodate the physical CFE-b plug. that is to say, you don't need any circuitry between the 2230 drive and the CFE-b interface, you just need to accommodate that they have different physical connectors

So the question really comes down to:
* Are there high quality 2230 cards?
* Are they fast enough
* Is there a good enough solution to deal with the physical aspects
* Reliability

First up, when I saw folks posting about this idea a while back, I immediately wondered about doing this for performance, not cost. As a result, I ended up looking around at what 2230 drives might be available.

Most of these drives are not consumer oriented, so there wasn't really any test data easily accessible. This made them somewhat un-interesting to me, because I figured you'd just have to buy and test a bunch of them.

But then I came across this review of the Sabrent Rocket 2230:

Sabrent Rocket Gen 4 2230 1TB M.2 SSD Review – Is this the Smallest and Fastest Storage Combination in the World? - The SSD Review

The theme of the day with respect to solid state storage seems to be form factor; the smaller the be

www.thessdreview.com

This is a fast, modern card. Of course you aren't going to be able to USE all that performance because CFE-b uses only two of the four NVME lanes and it's only PCI3, not PCI4 (while PCI4 drives can be used in PCI3 devices, they get the slower, PCI3, transfer rate). But still, we know this isn't a slow drive.

That solves the first two bullets.

The next thing is the shell. Here I noticed one of the videos used the following shell which is a milled solid aluminum shell. I figured it would be nice an rigid, and also provide something to heat sink to.

I figured the solid aluminum solves a lot of the reliability issue, but I figured there were a couple of outstanding issues.

I figured the screws could potentially come out and cause the card to get stuck in the camera. So I decided I'd locktight them in.

I figured we'd need good heat sinking, so I decided to use thermal paste to ensure a good, high quality bond to the shell, so I picked the Arctic MX-4 paste, which never hardens, is electrically inert and used it on BOTH sides.

I originally was thinking to pot the electronics around the connector and to secure the card in the shell, but in the end I didn't bother, but it might be something to consider to take this to the next level.

I also figured labels coming off might be a potential way things could get stuck in the camera so decided to avoid using stickers on the DIY cards.

I think this deals with the next two bullets.

The only bit of weird thing is it does seem to take a number of insertions/removals before it becomes smooth. I'd probably do this in a card reader before using in the camera.

Results with the 512GB cards suggest they are indistinguishable from my Delkin Black. Running two cards in backup mode also worked as well as with the Delkin Black cards.

All in all, I'm happy enough about this that I've ordered a pair of 1TB cards and shells.

I didn't really come at this looking for a cheaper solution, but, for those who are, it does seem like a performant setup with high quality parts and reliability risks mitigated.

Rocket 2230 NVMe 4.0 256GB

Need to upgrade your Steam Deck, Microsoft Surface, or other device where space is limited? We have you covered. It offers Gen4 NVMe performance in a tiny form factor. Hit up to 5GBps and push up to 800K IOPS with slick responsiveness. Backward compatible with Gen3 and Gen2 PCIe slots with...

sabrent.com

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KZIB1PU/?tag=backcogaller-20
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08VN345D4/?tag=backcogaller-20

Costs:

* 512GB 2230 card $80 / $170 1TB
* Shell $50
* Thermal paste $10
---
$140 512GB card
$230 1TB card

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

 

[Whiskeyman]

Some folks may have seen posts about building DIY CFE-b cards. Most folks who post that are trying to suggest this for budget purposes.

I think that implies the solution being a bit dodgy, and I took a look at this trying to see how much of the dodgy-ness we could remove from the equation.

Background:

* There are currently small form factor NVME drives called 2230 drives (2230 describes the physical size
* CFE-b uses NVME, so you only need to accommodate the physical CFE-b plug. that is to say, you don't need any circuitry between the 2230 drive and the CFE-b interface, you just need to accommodate that they have different physical connectors

So the question really comes down to:
* Are there high quality 2230 cards?
* Are they fast enough
* Is there a good enough solution to deal with the physical aspects
* Reliability

First up, when I saw folks posting about this idea a while back, I immediately wondered about doing this for performance, not cost. As a result, I ended up looking around at what 2230 drives might be available.

Most of these drives are not consumer oriented, so there wasn't really any test data easily accessible. This made them somewhat un-interesting to me, because I figured you'd just have to buy and test a bunch of them.

But then I came across this review of the Sabrent Rocket 2230:

Sabrent Rocket Gen 4 2230 1TB M.2 SSD Review – Is this the Smallest and Fastest Storage Combination in the World? - The SSD Review

The theme of the day with respect to solid state storage seems to be form factor; the smaller the be

www.thessdreview.com

This is a fast, modern card. Of course you aren't going to be able to USE all that performance because CFE-b uses only two of the four NVME lanes and it's only PCI3, not PCI4 (while PCI4 drives can be used in PCI3 devices, they get the slower, PCI3, transfer rate). But still, we know this isn't a slow drive.

That solves the first two bullets.

The next thing is the shell. Here I noticed one of the videos used the following shell which is a milled solid aluminum shell. I figured it would be nice an rigid, and also provide something to heat sink to.

I figured the solid aluminum solves a lot of the reliability issue, but I figured there were a couple of outstanding issues.

I figured the screws could potentially come out and cause the card to get stuck in the camera. So I decided I'd locktight them in.

I figured we'd need good heat sinking, so I decided to use thermal paste to ensure a good, high quality bond to the shell, so I picked the Arctic MX-4 paste, which never hardens, is electrically inert and used it on BOTH sides.

I originally was thinking to pot the electronics around the connector and to secure the card in the shell, but in the end I didn't bother, but it might be something to consider to take this to the next level.

I also figured labels coming off might be a potential way things could get stuck in the camera so decided to avoid using stickers on the DIY cards.

I think this deals with the next two bullets.

The only bit of weird thing is it does seem to take a number of insertions/removals before it becomes smooth. I'd probably do this in a card reader before using in the camera.

Results with the 512GB cards suggest they are indistinguishable from my Delkin Black. Running two cards in backup mode also worked as well as with the Delkin Black cards.

All in all, I'm happy enough about this that I've ordered a pair of 1TB cards and shells.

I didn't really come at this looking for a cheaper solution, but, for those who are, it does seem like a performant setup with high quality parts and reliability risks mitigated.

Rocket 2230 NVMe 4.0 256GB

Need to upgrade your Steam Deck, Microsoft Surface, or other device where space is limited? We have you covered. It offers Gen4 NVMe performance in a tiny form factor. Hit up to 5GBps and push up to 800K IOPS with slick responsiveness. Backward compatible with Gen3 and Gen2 PCIe slots with...

sabrent.com

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KZIB1PU/?tag=backcogaller-20
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08VN345D4/?tag=backcogaller-20

Costs:

* 512GB 2230 card $80 / $170 1TB
* Shell $50
* Thermal paste $10
---
$140 512GB card
$230 1TB card

That's great stuff; I had no idea that this was/is possible. My expectation is that eventually, cameras will be able to utilize more of these cards capacities and features. My biggest concern with it is the potential for the thermal paste to leak from the enclosure into the camera.

Please let us know how these work for you in the long run.

 

[John Navitsky]

My biggest concern with it is the potential for the thermal paste to leak from the enclosure into the camera.

i think it is pretty unlikely. it's very stiff. alternately one could just pot the whole thing, but i suspect (but do not know for sure) that that approach may be slightly less thermally effective

i originally got the following thermal epoxy to do the potting, but so far have decided to hold-off

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HTV1TXA/?tag=backcogaller-20

 

[soundbyte]

I have looked at this cfe-b card solution in the past, there has been a topic about this previously which mainly looked at whether this was a suitable/dodgy solution or not.
I bought 2x2230 128GB cards as well as 2xcfe-b adaptors (not suitable for insertion in cameras) to try.
This setup worked well in camera, no obvious issues apart from not being able to close the card door (MAJOR FAILURE) but the concept is valid.

I consider your approach using the hard metal shell to be the best as you should be able to maximize thermal efficiency.

My only suggestion is that you might consider using Loctite 222 purple for the little metal threads instead of 242 blue.

 

[John Navitsky]

thanks. i didn't think too much about the locktite. my assumption is i would not take these apart didn't think too much about the best one to use.

 

[John Navitsky]

This setup worked well in camera, no obvious issues apart from not being able to close the card door (MAJOR FAILURE) but the concept is valid.

which shell and which camera did you have fitment problems with?

 

[soundbyte]

The problem with not being able to shut the card door was due to the type of adaptor nothing else.
I bought this adaptor (cheap) as it was the type I could easily source at the time, probalby around 7-9 months ago.

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

All parts were bought as a test to see if the cfe-b adaptors would work.
The Sintech adaptors are listed as being around the $A80 mark, not looked at the cost of nvme cards yet.

 

[John Navitsky]

gotcha. the shells i used are decent, but not perfect. in particular, i’m not keen on how far back the screws in the front are

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

 

[Wes Peterson]

Works fine for stills but RAW video chokes after the drive is half way full.

 

[soundbyte]

Looks like lack of real estate for fixings of the type supplied.
Cannot see how that area will get any sideways/twisting pressure applied to it once inserted, clumsy handling and/or insertion into the camera may cause problems.
A very small dab of super glue or some thin double sided tape to the area on final assembly.
Potting might alleviate that issue?

Disassembly of the adaptor I have nothing unusual here just a reconfiguration of wiring between connectors of different type.

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.

 

[Patrick M]

My bet is that, as Hasselblad has done with the X2D, makers will build in a large SSD storage unit, eventually replacing the need for cards entirely. The X2D has a 1Tb internal SSD. It’s massive - even for that camera’s huge files!

 

[MartyD]

I will be trying this myself soon. I have the Sabrent 1TB card and I am waiting for the Monster CFExpress adapter. I was always hesitant to try this because it seemed like you could only find older 2230 drives or pulled drives. I will post back here when I have completed the process. I am interested to see what the Monster adapter is like.

 

[John Navitsky]

@MartyD cool! it would be good to get more info on various adapters

 

[MartyD]

I just completed my build of a 1TB CFExpress card using the Sabrent 2230 and here are my thoughts.

I initially tried the Monster snap together case, this is similar to the Sintech case available on Amazon. It seems like the Sabrent drive may be a little thicker than some drives and it didn't fit in the case without slightly bulging the thin metal side of the case. I was concerned that the case might swell slightly as the card heated up and it might be difficult to remove from the camera. The side of the case that touches the top of card had adhesive tape that would stick to the installed drive to dissipate heat to the metal side. The case did look exactly like cases of purchased cards.

I eventually used the metal case that is closed using the 4 small screws. My concern with this case is that is seems to not slide into the camera as easily as purchased cards. This could be due to the aluminum sliding against the plastic in the camera. Could this cause some long term wear issue with the camera?

In testing it in camera I was really disappointed in it's performance. In my Z9 in only performed about 15% better than my SanDisk 128GB card and at only about 70% of the speed of my Delkin Black or ProGrade Cobalt. This was just a shoot at maximum FPS until the FPS speed slows but that for me is the reason to get fast cards.

I noticed that Sabrent is now selling CFExpress cards and from what I can find the minimum sustained write speed is about 400MBps. The Sabrent 1TB cards on Amazon are $250 and I have $210 in my diy card, not really a great savings.

I'm not sure how I am going to use this card. I may use it in my Z6 for video or I might install the 2230 drive into an external enclosure and just use it as a travel backup drive.

 

[John Navitsky]

I just completed my build of a 1TB CFExpress card using the Sabrent 2230 and here are my thoughts.

I initially tried the Monster snap together case, this is similar to the Sintech case available on Amazon. It seems like the Sabrent drive may be a little thicker than some drives and it didn't fit in the case without slightly bulging the thin metal side of the case. I was concerned that the case might swell slightly as the card heated up and it might be difficult to remove from the camera. The side of the case that touches the top of card had adhesive tape that would stick to the installed drive to dissipate heat to the metal side. The case did look exactly like cases of purchased cards.

yah, i noticed the 1tb card was thicker than the 512gb card

I eventually used the metal case that is closed using the 4 small screws. My concern with this case is that is seems to not slide into the camera as easily as purchased cards. This could be due to the aluminum sliding against the plastic in the camera. Could this cause some long term wear issue with the camera?

this seems to ease up after some use. consider this, i'm guessing it has something to do with the plug side not the overall shell considering the shell isn't likely to change in fitment over time. i recommend plugging/unplugging in your card reader a bunch of times and then seeing if it eases up over time. mine seemed to

In testing it in camera I was really disappointed in it's performance. In my Z9 in only performed about 15% better than my SanDisk 128GB card and at only about 70% of the speed of my Delkin Black or ProGrade Cobalt. This was just a shoot at maximum FPS until the FPS speed slows but that for me is the reason to get fast cards.

I noticed that Sabrent is now selling CFExpress cards and from what I can find the minimum sustained write speed is about 400MBps. The Sabrent 1TB cards on Amazon are $250 and I have $210 in my diy card, not really a great savings.

I'm not sure how I am going to use this card. I may use it in my Z6 for video or I might install the 2230 drive into an external enclosure and just use it as a travel backup drive.

the 1tb card definitely has more performance potential that 400MB/s. i benchmarked mine in my 10Gbs USB reader and pretty much saturated the USB. I checked both the 1TB and 512GB and they both seemed about the same.

THAT SAID, something is a bit weird about these cards. i benchmarked this card in my CFE-b PCI-adapter (direct connection to the PCI bus on my computer), and this card went very slow, maybe like what you are seeing:

I somewhat wonder if it's because the card is a gen4 card that sometimes the host and device get confused in their negotiation about what speed to use.

that said, while i admit i haven't played with the 1tb card in-camera much yet, i didn't notice any performance problems with the 512gb cards in-camera.

while it's probably not helpful, i would recommend doing a full format in your computer (exfat), THEN do a full format in-camera. and see if that makes any differnce.

sorry you're getting a bad result.

 

[MartyD]

that said, while i admit i haven't played with the 1tb card in-camera much yet, i didn't notice any performance problems with the 512gb cards in-camera.

while it's probably not helpful, i would recommend doing a full format in your computer (exfat), THEN do a full format in-camera. and see if that makes any differnce.

sorry you're getting a bad result.

Thanks John, I will give the formatting a try. I did do a full format in camera but I have not done a full format in computer. I will try inserting it in my card reader a few times to see if it helps.

I may decide to use it in my Z9 in slot 2 to record video. It would be great to have 1TB for video storage. The 8K RAW 12 bit 60p videos require 800MBps and I don't think the card is capable of that but I don't shoot in that format anyway.

The interesting thing is that Sabrent is actually offering 2 different CFExpress Type B cards, one rated at 400MB/s sustained write and one rated at up to 1300MB/s sustained write. The faster cards are available for preorder on their web site. It would be interested to know if these are based on the 2230 cards or something different.

 

[John Navitsky]

yes, it would be interesting to know if there is a relationship between their cfe-b cards and their 2230 modules

 

[John Navitsky]

[I noticed I never updated this thread with the most recent numbers for the Sabrent project]

As an aside, in order to attempt to get more accurate numbers for the Sabrent Rocket 2230, I purchased a USB 3.2 2x2 USB (20GBs) pci card, a USB 3.2 2x2 reader (Lexar 2x2) and got the following number:

1482.37MB/s Sabrent Rocket 2230 512GB

When doing benchmark of a known card using the USB 2x2 setup for reference, numbers are a bit lower than when tested with the PCI adapter, but it's clearly better than the 10Gbs readers, so closer to accurate numbers.

So _theoretically_ it could be a bit faster than that, however, the 1482MB/s is just under the Delkin Black, and my observed in-camera performance also suggests it's just a bit under the Delkin Black, so either way the number is in the ballpark.

All in all, I think this solution works although it does have a few quirks, however I don't think I'd _recommend_ it.

The primary objective I had here was to get performance _better_ than we could get with CFE-B cards, and that has thus-far not been observed and considering the various quirks, I think something like the Delkin Power G4 is probably a safer solution if you are just looking for a less expensive option.

 

[wotan1]

I applaud the adventurous but this is nothing I would ever personally want to put into my camera. I am too chicken. I certainly would not trust my own DIY skills. I mean I will do a little soldering now and then but nothing this precise and delicate.

 

[John Navitsky]

Based on some discussions in other threads I decided to give one last shot at a high performance solution in order to attempt to confirm or deny that 1) it's possible to improve on performance vs the current high end cards (ie, Lexar Diamond .. 1666.42MB/s), and 2) confirm or deny that it's possible to get 20FPS lossless compressed in the Z9.

My attempts thus far have been to find the fastest 2230 card I could find, thus the Rocket, but in order to really test the two issues noted above, I thought I'd explore full sized, 2280 solutions since we *know* that these modules are optimized for performance.

In order to do this, I need way to mount a 2280 card. While I normally wouldn't be interested in this type of solution, for this test I've ordered one of the following adapters:

Amazon.com

If that doesn't work, I might pivot to mechanically modifying the same type of aluminum shells I used previously, but that approach would require some hacks I'd rather not take.

I also searched to find the fastest PCI 3 based module I could find and ended up with the Samsung 970 EVO Plus. This basically represents best of breed for the PCI 3 era.

I also decided to basically try the fastest module I could find, regardless of PCI generation, and came up with the Crucial T705 2024. This module turns in MONSTER numbers, HOWEVER it's PCI 5. So it's going to run substantially throttled down for PCI 3, and then like every other M.2 NVME drive, you only get to use half the lanes in CFE-B. But I thought it would be interested to see if it's faster than the 970 EVO Plus when throttled down to PCI 3.

Either way, these are both best of breed modules and it'll be interesting to see how that translates to CFE-B and to the Z9.

Note, the adapter ships from China, so I may not see it till mid next month.

 

[John Navitsky]

I applaud the adventurous but this is nothing I would ever personally want to put into my camera. I am too chicken. I certainly would not trust my own DIY skills. I mean I will do a little soldering now and then but nothing this precise and delicate.

yes, this is more of an experiment than an recommendation

 

[Wes Peterson]

I didnt have any issues with mine until it was around half full....at that point it would instantly choke when trying to record 8k/60RAW. Fill it at least half full of data and re run your test.

 

[John Navitsky]

FWIW, one thing I didn't think of previously when dealing with the Sabrent Rocket 2230 problems was the check for a firmware update. NVME drives periodically have FW updates. I've confirmed Sabrent has a tool to check and update, but I can't actually do it right now because it doesn't work over USB, so I'll have to wait for a situation where I can connect the drive via PCI (it's a hassle).

See the downloads section:

Rocket 2230 NVMe 4.0 1TB

Need to upgrade your Steam Deck, Microsoft Surface, or other device where space is limited? We have you covered. It offers Gen4 NVMe performance in a tiny form factor. Hit up to 5GBps and push up to 800K IOPS with slick responsiveness. Backward compatible with Gen3 and Gen2 PCIe slots with...

sabrent.com

 

[Annette]

I‘ve made (2) 256gb DYI CFexpress cards a year ago and used them in my Z7ii, wasn’t worried about speed too much with this camera.
https://www.makerfabs.com/cfexpress-type-b-to-ssd-adapter-converter.html This is where I got the DIY kit from and bought the ssd from Amazon. They work, no errors or problems so far with a year of use. However I did buy a Lexar 512gb CF express for my Z8, the pricing dif wasn’t as close and I gotta watch out for my new baby!

 

[John Navitsky]

so i got the contraption and it seems to work ok but in-camera performance looks just like the cfe-b cards for both the T705 and the 970 EVO+, which is to say, it cannot run without buffering, with both lossless and he* (you will see the buffer creep down to 0 and then some sputtering. it can *almost* keep up with HE*, but it does not keep up. if it could keep up, the "r"emaining counter would never get to 0)

settings are visible in case anyone spots issues. af disabled, flicker disabled, iso set to manual, 1/3200s.

i may do some benchmarking of this setup out of camera just to see how far the current fast cards are from desktop modules, but so far, all evidence suggests the z9 cannot currently sustain 20fps indefinitely and the likely culprit is the camera, not the cards.

i'm still wondering if there is only one pci lane in use here. my seat-of-the-pants tests suggest it can sustain about 15 fps, maybe a tad slower, which works out almost exactly to one pci lane's worth of bandwidth (note this would be similar to like a Raspberry Pi 5, which supports nvme with a single lane)

You can only see EXIF info for this image if you are logged in.