samsung 960 evo m.2 running at gen 2 speeds

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winkiface

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Jan 10, 2018
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my Samsung 960 evo m.2 SSD is running at gen 2 speeds iv tried to set the speeds to gen 3 but only gen 1-2 are available but my motherboard says "PCEI 3.0" I honestly don't know anything about ssds. it also says M.2 slot is empty? iv tried to enable it in bios but nothing is there anywhere in my bios about M.2.. but for some reason I can see it my boot options and boot from it with no problem but only at gen 2 speeds. iv tried a couple things from reading different posts as updating bios.chipsets,installing windows ufei,unplugging the other sata cables. does anybody have any other ideas?

motherboard: asus Z97-P
cpu: I7 4790
gpu: msi 970 4gb
ssd: samsung 960 evo m.2
OS: windows 10 ufei

 
Solution
mazboy
If I read your motherboard specs correctly (https://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/Z97PRO/specifications/) your m.2 slot is SATAe, which runs at 2Gb/s (https://www.naplestech.com/compare-msata--m.2-sata--sata-express.html), which means you grossly over-spent for an NVMe m.2 device that isn't specifically supported, but is backwards-compatible, with your motherboard m.2 slot. Ouch. On the other hand, when you eventually upgrade the motherboard, you'll have a killer boot drive. Just make sure that it specifically supports boot of the NVMe, and has the proper PCIe 3.0x4 port.
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USAFRet

USAFRet

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Mar 16, 2013
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"PCEI 3.0" refers to your actual PCIe slots. Not the m.2 port.

Unknown exactly what performance your m.2 slot gives. But the Z97 boards were built and sold before PCIe drives were a thing. So it may well not give the Samsung 960 performance you were expecting.
I know my ASRock Z97 wouldn't.
 
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panathas

panathas

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Feb 12, 2014
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A friend of mine has that board and its M2 slot is wired to 2x PCIe 2.0 lanes. That board is pretty old and has only one PCIe 3.0 slot for GPUs, all the other slots are PCIe 2.0. Now all modern boards use 4x PCIe 3.0 slots for M2 drives. The performance difference between a 2x PCIe 2.0 slot and a 4x PCIe 3.0 is pretty big and as you can see your 960 evo will never reach its maximum performance in that board. I'm sorry.
 
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panathas

panathas

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Feb 12, 2014
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Yes. It will never reach its full performance potential in that board.The limiting factor is the CPU platform not your board. You can't just get a new motherboard. If you want to upgrade you have to get a new CPU, motherboard and RAM.
 
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mazboy

mazboy

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Dec 28, 2017
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If I read your motherboard specs correctly (https://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/Z97PRO/specifications/) your m.2 slot is SATAe, which runs at 2Gb/s (https://www.naplestech.com/compare-msata--m.2-sata--sata-express.html), which means you grossly over-spent for an NVMe m.2 device that isn't specifically supported, but is backwards-compatible, with your motherboard m.2 slot. Ouch. On the other hand, when you eventually upgrade the motherboard, you'll have a killer boot drive. Just make sure that it specifically supports boot of the NVMe, and has the proper PCIe 3.0x4 port.
 
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winkiface

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Jan 10, 2018
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yeah I know most newer motherboards wont support the older gen CPUs and ram so ill probably start upgrading everything. I mean as of right now its running at 800 write and read witch isn't the worst. for now it will work till I can upgrade! but hey thanks for the help at least I know there isn't anything I did wrong and now I know the problem! thanks
 
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winkiface

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Jan 10, 2018
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yeah I learned that the hard way but on the bright side it was on sale when I bought it from a local store in my city so didn't pay full prize !
 
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