Late 2015 21.5 inch iMac - new main board with blade SSD slot options?

[dictoresno]

So I decided to order a new logic board off of eBay to upgrade my late 2015 21.5 inch iMac 2.8 ghz from 8GB of RAM to 16 GB. There’s nothing wrong with my original main board, I just wanted to upgrade my RAM.

When I originally purchased the computer in 2017, I swapped out the 1TB spinner for a Kingston 480 GB SSD as my main drive without issue which is my main boot drive. The new main board that I ordered has the PCIe apple blade SSD socket installed so I am wondering what my options are. I was going to try to install a blade SSD in the spot and possibly use it as a boot drive but now I’m reading that there’s nothing really compatible with it. I was going to purchase the OWC 1 TB blade, but everything I read says it’s not compatible, mostly due to hibernation or sleep week issues. But I don’t know if those threads are old and it has been addressed in newer operating systems. I’m also running Ventura 13.2 with OCLP on the machine without issue.

Can somebody break it down for me and tell me if there are any blade SSDs that will work with the OEM socket on the main board for this model. Most of the information I read is for the 27 inch. Not a big deal I can just continue to use my regular SSD but I figured that while I was in there, I would put one in if possible.

This is the one I was going to get. This one definitely will not work? Are there any that are known up-to-date that will especially using OCLP EFI bootloader.

OWC Aura N2 NVMe Internal Solid State Drive, OWCS4DAB4MB10, Blue (SSD Only, 1.0TB) https://a.co/d/fcJX9Uu

 

[dictoresno]

I see some Dataram SSD’s that claim to be compatible with the 2015 iMac 16,2 EMC 2889. Anyone know for sure if these work/fit? Why are these iMac 16,2’s left out of compatibility?

DATARAM 512GB M.2 M-Key PCIe NVMe SSD FOR 2013-15 Apple MacBook, Mac Pro, Air 609713994196| eBay

DATARAM SSD 512GB, PCIe M.2 Internal Solid State Drive, PCIe 3.0 x4 8Gb/s Interface High Speed Read & Write. This SSD has an M-KEY 12+16 pin interface for the listed Apple models. − PCIe 3.0 x4, up to 8Gb/s.

www.ebay.com

And also these Rogob SSD’s claim to work

ROGOB 256GB MAC SSD PCIe Gen3*4 NGFF Internal Solid State Drive for MacBook Pro/Air/Mini 2013-2017 SSD Upgrade https://a.co/d/7LgvKrj

 

[dictoresno]

no one is running a late 2015 21.5 inch iMac with an aftermarket PCIe SSD that was converted from the factory Fusion Drive?

 

[brad.gravesen]

I just installed an M.2 NVMe SSD in the blade slot of a 2017 iMac 21.5 inch. There are a number of adapters you can find on Amazon that will make it possible to use any standard 2280 M.2 NVMe drive in the apple blade drive slot. I then upgraded the OS to Ventura using OpenCore Legacy Patcher. And it all works great. Getting to the back of the motherboard of the iMac may be a little more than the average DIY-er wants to deal with, and it's certainly not small task - removing virtually every part inside the case. But in your case where you have already removed the motherboard, it's as simple as getting a $10 adapter from Amazon.

For those who want to avoid the work/time/risk involved in this challenging upgrade, I recommend taking advantage of the Thunderbolt 2 ports on this model and get an m.2 NVMe SSD from Amazon (cheap these days) along with a thunderbolt 2 adapter/enclosure. Then you can install MacOS on this external drive and still have all of the speedy benefits of the NVMe drive connecting at the speed of PCIe. Much simpler. Just as fast. It just won't look quite as clean as the internal option.

 

[Quinten07]

You only have a PCi-e slot if the logicboard you orderd was orginially configured with a fusion drive. If the standard option of the 1TB HDD was chosen you do not have a slot for a blade drive.

Also, ordering a new logicboard to just upgrade the ram seems really a waste of money and time. You can find 2017-2019 IMacs pretty cheap these days which will crush the performance of this machine in every possible way.