Hey everyone! I recently built a new PC using a B650M PG Lightning motherboard, and I'm trying to get an AX210 PCIe Wifi card to work in the second PCIe slot. I've got bluetooth running fine through a USB port, but the wifi card isn't showing up in device manager at all. It was working perfectly in my old setup just yesterday. I heard that using the top M.2 slot on AM5 boards might block access to the second PCIe lane. I've already installed the Intel wifi drivers and the latest motherboard drivers, but I'm starting to wonder if I need to invest in a USB wifi dongle instead. Is it possible that the second lane on the motherboard is faulty? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
3 Answers
You should double-check which PCIe lanes your M.2 slots use. The primary M.2 slot typically connects directly to the CPU, and it usually won't share lanes with PCIe slots. Look for any lane sharing configurations in the manual; that’ll help clarify what’s going on.
Check your motherboard's specs or manual for details on how the PCIe lanes are configured. Sometimes certain slots can block others from being used when devices are installed. It's important to know the layout of your particular board.
It sounds like your board has a dedicated M.2 E-Key slot for WiFi cards. If your AX210 card is designed for PCIe, it might be worth considering an M.2 version instead. You could also check if your card is a CNVi variant; those can be finicky and only work with certain Intel setups.
Good point! But wouldn’t you need additional pigtails to make those connections work properly?
Definitely! I was caught off guard by that on my Raptor Lake setup. Using a Gen 5 NVMe slot can drop main PCIe lanes to x8, which is why reading the manual is crucial. You don’t want your GPU running at reduced performance!