I recently picked up an ADATA Premium M.2 Gen 4 SSD (2TB) for a great price—about 93 CAD or 68 USD. The SSD works fine, and some games like SF6 load significantly faster, but I'm noticing that the speed is only about 25% of what was advertised. I've checked the health of the SSD using Crystal Disk Info and HD Tune, and everything looks good with no errors. My motherboard is an Aorus X470 Ultra Gaming, and according to its specs, the M.2 connectors support various types of SSDs. It seems I might be using the second M.2 socket, which is limited to PCIe 2.0. Does that mean I'm not taking full advantage of the SSD's capabilities? I couldn't find clear information on the implications of using the M2B socket. Any insights would be appreciated!
2 Answers
Your SSD is Gen 4 but if it's plugged into a PCIe 2.0 slot like the M2B socket, you'll only get about 25% of its potential speed. A Gen 2 slot simply can’t match the bandwidth of a Gen 4 drive, which is why you're seeing such slow speeds. It’s like having a sports car, but only being able to drive it on local roads! Switching to a Gen 3 slot should help, but keep in mind it'll still be limited compared to PCIe 4.0. The upgrades to speed will be noticeable, though!
That totally makes sense. If your SSD is designed for PCIe 4 and you’re using it in a Gen 2 slot, you’re definitely going to feel the speed hit. When you switch it to a Gen 3 slot, you should see a huge improvement compared to the 25% you had before!
Yep, I actually moved it to the PCIe 3 slot and now it's way faster! But still not hitting that 100%—looks like I need to upgrade to fully appreciate it.
So just to confirm, any PCIe 'X.0' indicates its generation, right? Got it—yeah, so moving it to that PCIe 3 slot should give you a bump in speed, but you're still not at max performance until you hit Gen 4.