Asus Z690-F M.2 Install Question

[Fear4u2envy]

Ok so i have been researching this info for 2 days now. I did get a few answers that i thought would help then i would read something that would make the original answer make no sense so i figured i would ask exactly what i want to know.

I just recently purchased the Asus Z690-F Motherboard and when going to install my 3 M.2 Nvme 4.0 drives i ran into an issue trying to figure out where to install them.



This is in the manual and to me doesn't really help me out much, I have read that putting the m.2 in the M.2_1 slot would bring your graphics card from X16 to X8 then i have read other posts that say that it will not change the graphics card speed. So my question is this I have 3 WD Black SN850X NVMe drives what slots can i use them in that will not have an effect on the graphics card. 1 will be used for the operating system and the other 2 will be used for gaming. i will also be installing 3 regular SSD drives into the system i dont belieave there should be any issues but please correct me if im wrong.

Thank You in Advance.

[JohnAb]

Hi,

I don't think you should worry too much, but if you want to install 3x Gen 4 drives then I think your GPU will be reduced to x8, whichever slots you use.

I (think) that your mobo has 20 lanes. So, I suggests the easiest way to be sure is install your drives to M.2_1 - M.2_3 inclusive and then try M.2_2 - M.2_4 inclusive. If you pick a drive and do a basic install of Windows to test the config in each case (let's say M.2_2), then it doesn't take very long to find out using something like GPU-Z. You should be all done in 90 mins or less easily. The only pain is potentially removing the GPU to get easy access to the M.2 slots (I don't have you mobo, so not certain if that's an issue). Just don't forget to backup any important files if you are going to be wiping drives and reinstalling Windows!

Anyway, the interesting thing here is that the GPU performance difference you get between x8 (worst case) and x16 is pretty small. What I'm saying is that even if you do get x8, it won't be very noticeable. For example, see the testing undertaken here:

https://www.gamersnexus.net/guides/2488-pci-e-3-x8-vs-x16-performance-impact-on-gpus#:~:text=That%20....

[Fear4u2envy]

JohnAb wrote:
Hi,

I don't think you should worry too much, but if you want to install 3x Gen 4 drives then I think your GPU will be reduced to x8, whichever slots you use.

I (think) that your mobo has 20 lanes. So, I suggests the easiest way to be sure is install your drives to M.2_1 - M.2_3 inclusive and then try M.2_2 - M.2_4 inclusive. If you pick a drive and do a basic install of Windows to test the config in each case (let's say M.2_2), then it doesn't take very long to find out using something like GPU-Z. You should be all done in 90 mins or less easily. The only pain is potentially removing the GPU to get easy access to the M.2 slots (I don't have you mobo, so not certain if that's an issue). Just don't forget to backup any important files if you are going to be wiping drives and reinstalling Windows!

Anyway, the interesting thing here is that the GPU performance difference you get between x8 (worst case) and x16 is pretty small. What I'm saying is that even if you do get x8, it won't be very noticeable. For example, see the testing undertaken here:

https://www.gamersnexus.net/guides/2488-pci-e-3-x8-vs-x16-performance-impact-on-gpus#:~:text=That%20....

thank you for the response. I really appreciate it.

[JohnAb]

I was just thinking that you might get away with setting your M.2 drives to gen 3 bus speed in BIOS. But it won't work - you will still use 3 x 3 =9 lanes, leaving only 11 lanes for the GPU resulting in x8. Also, you will probably get more benefit by having faster drives as opposed to a x16 GPU for occasional gaming, but you know better than me what the best compromise is going to be for you.

Let us know what results you get. With M.2 drives becoming more popular by the day, I think somebody else will benefit from your experience.

In summary, since your mobo looks like it has 20 lanes, then I'm reasonably sure that you're not going to be able to have more than a single Gen 4 drive if x16 is important to you. Please correct me if I'm wrong, but looks like you can have 4x Gen 3 drives or 3x Gen 4 drives to leave enough bandwidth for the GPU on x8.

[NickA]

I would just go down the line in order. M_1, _2, _3. All will be at full speed. Pretty sure there are 4x pci-e from cpu and 12x from pch. Anyways, hope this helps.

[Fear4u2envy]

NickA wrote:
I would just go down the line in order. M_1, _2, _3. All will be at full speed. Pretty sure there are 4x pci-e from cpu and 12x from pch. Anyways, hope this helps.

Thank you for the info, im just going to get the nvme drives and see what happens. Do you have the same motherboard as me? What did you use to get that info about the drives?

[NickA]

Hey I use the strix 690-a which looks to be the same board with ddr4. I don't think you have anything to worry about even if you load all 4 M2 slots.
The app in the screenshot is hwinfo (free)
https://www.hwinfo.com/

[Fear4u2envy]

NickA wrote:
Hey I use the strix 690-a which looks to be the same board with ddr4. I don't think you have anything to worry about even if you load all 4 M2 slots.
The app in the screenshot is hwinfo (free)
https://www.hwinfo.com/

Awesome thank you so much for the info. I can now make the purchase of the NVME drives.

[NickA]

No problem. I have no doubt you'll be happy with your board & drives

[bodocolt]

Hi. What version bios have?