PCIe NVME SSD only connects with PCIe 3.0 x2 instead of x8

[havoc23]

Hi all,

I own an Asus X570-E Mainboard and since both of my m.2 slots were already occupied, I was very tempted by an expansion slot solution by Western Digital:

https://www.westerndigital.com/products/internal-drives/wd-black-an1500-nvme-ssd#WDS100T1X0L

I bought it and it immediately worked plug and play, but when I wanted to check the speeds, i was irritated:

The Drive only connects with PCIe 3.0 x2 and therefore loses speed rates (at least crystal disk info states so)

My setup is as follows:

PCIEX16_1 is taken by an Nvidia 3080ti

PCIEX_1 is still covered by the graphics card

PCIEX16_2 is kept empty due to proximity to the GPU fans

PCIEX1_2 is occupied by an USB 3.0 hub

PCIEX16_3 is taken by the new Western Digital SSD now

I have found no setting in the Bios that would cause the slot to be slower and in the Users Manual (excuse the screenshots in german) it's only stated that PCIEX16_02 and PCIEX16_03 share their bandwidth, which should not affect me since the _2 slot is empty.

Does anyone have an idea what is the problem here?

Paul

[J_Bish]

Only thing I can think of is that you're being throttled by one of the other devices...??

[ationfictons]

First, I'm not sure if you're wondering about PCIe 3.0 vs 4.0. So, just to get that out of the way up front, according to:

https://www.amazon.com/WD_Black-AN1500-Internal-Gaming-Card/dp/B08HBZCSHW/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_to...

that's a PCIe 3.0 card.

Assuming the issue is with x2 vs x8, I don't know your exact motherboard model, but I grabbed a PDF of the manual for the X570-E Gaming and there's something on page 3-15 that looks odd:



According to that, slot 16_3 is set to X2 if something's in slot 1_3. But, unless I'm misreading something, I don't think there IS a slot 1_3. Maybe it's a typo and is referring to 16_3 (which makes very little sense) or 1_2 (which would apply to you)? But, regardless, if you're using the M_2 slot, I think it says it's going to change 16_3 to x4. I guess I'd recommend checking Onboard Devices in your BIOS and seeing if it's set to Auto or X2 for that slot.

[knt]

Try it in

PCIEX16_2

to see if that makes a difference.

I have Highpoint card and that runs @ X8 in that slot.