I'm in the process of building a new PC and I'm currently testing the M2_2 and M2_3 slots on my Asus B650E motherboard paired with a new 7800X3D CPU. So far, it's just the CPU in the setup, with no additional PCI devices. I understand that the M2_1 and M2_2 slots are directly connected to the CPU, while M2_3 connects to the chipset. As expected, the speeds on M2_3 are significantly slower, but it's showing less than half the speed compared to M2_1 and M2_2. With the Samsung Magician software, I'm seeing speeds of 6969 MB/s write and 7453 MB/s read on M2_2, while M2_3 is only hitting 3252 MB/s write and 3283 MB/s read. Is this normal, and is there anything I can tweak in the motherboard settings to improve M2_3's performance?
4 Answers
Your SSD is perfectly fine. The motherboard is working just as it should, so no worries there.
Totally normal! The M.2 slot 3 operates on PCIe 4.0 x2, which caps out around 4GB/s. You’ll naturally see a speed drop and some added latency because it's routed through the chipset. Your results are pretty much in line with what you’d expect.
Yeah, that sounds about right! The speeds on that slot are usually half of what you get from the CPU-connected slots. It's pretty typical.
It's pretty normal. You might want to check your motherboard manual, but it generally only goes over installation. However, like others have said, it’s common to see that speed reduction on slots connected to the chipset.
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