I purchased an ADATA Premium M.2 Gen 4 SSD for my PS5, and it was a steal at 93 CAD (68 USD) with 99% health. While some games load significantly faster, I noticed that the overall speed is about 25% of what was advertised. I did some tests using CrystalDiskInfo and HD Tune, and everything looks good—no errors. My motherboard is the Aorus X470 Ultra Gaming, which has two M.2 slots. According to the specs, it seems like I'm using the second slot that supports PCIe 2.0, while the SSD is a PCIe 4.0 model. I'm confused because I cannot find clear info about the M2B socket's generation online, but I suspect this is affecting my SSD speed.
2 Answers
Yeah, you've nailed it. Having a PCIe 4 SSD in a PCIe 2 slot means you're getting half the bandwidth, so it's no surprise that your speeds are slow. After moving to the PCIe 3 slot, you'll likely notice a big difference, but it won't reach its peak speed just yet. That said, it should still be a solid upgrade overall!
Your SSD's performance issue definitely makes sense. It sounds like you're using a PCIe 4.0 SSD in a PCIe 2.0 slot, which would indeed limit your speed to about 25% of what it's capable of. Essentially, PCIe 2.0 is a generation behind, and it can't handle the speeds that your Gen 4 SSD can provide. If you move it to a PCIe 3.0 slot, you'll see a significant improvement, probably upwards of 50% of its max speed, but you won't get the full potential unless it's in a Gen 4 slot.
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