Asus B350 Plus - Slow USB 3.1

h3llr4iser

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Mar 12, 2012
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18,510
Hey folks, wanted to pick your brains / check your experience about this weird thing I'm observing with the USB 3.1 ports on my Asus B350 Plus.

Quick and easy version: the "teal" coloured ports, that the manual says are USB 3.1 Gen 2, are reporting slower transfer rates in CrystalDiskMark than the 4 "blue" ones, that are supposedly USB 3.0.

"Bit more information" version: I've got the need to use the same SSD between my desktop and my laptop when I'm on the move; I've got an USB 3.1 Gen2 enclosure for it, and it's underperforming on the desktop PC - for the sake of simplicity, I'll report the maximum "sequential" transfer rate measured with CrystalDiskMark 6:

Asus B350 Plus, USB 3.0 ~400 MB/s;
Asus B350 Plus, USB 3.1 ~360 MB/s;
Laptop (Dell G3) USB 3.1 ~550 MB/s;

By the laptop test, it's clear the enclosure (an A-Data XPG EX500) can perform at USB 3.1 speeds...so what the heck could be the issue with my desktop? I've looked everywhere for drivers, BIOS updates etc but nothing seems to improve the woeful performance (again, with USB 3.1 ports being SLOWER than the 3.0).

Thanks.
 
up to date AMD chipset drivers installed? www.amd.com

Are you using windows 10? Latest version?

BIOS version is 4207?

updating the firmware of the ADATA could improve compatibility, but couldn´t find an update for it

Which processor are you using on the B350 board?

Any PCIe cards additionally installed? (besides the GPU)
 

h3llr4iser

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Mar 12, 2012
14
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18,510
Sorry about replying to this so late - we're borderline zombie here :)

To answer your questions helpstar, everything is updated to the latest version - I've been doing a bit of additional testing this morning, as I really can't stand this issue. So yeah, BIos 4207, lastest Windows 10 update; I had AMD 18.50 something drivers, downloaded and installed 19.10...and go figure, they cause the SSD drive to actually hang the entire system when tested through CrystalDiskMark (the test runs fine multiple times when connected via SATA, or when drivers are reverted to either the Microsoft ones or an older version of the AMD ones).

The CPU shouldn't be an issue - it's a Ryzen 7 1700, running stable at 3.8 Ghz on all cores (been running like that since I built this system in 2017, it can run OCCT / Prime 95 indefinitely with no issues). It's watercooled with a CoolerMaster AIO and the highest temperature you'll see, after about an hour of Small FFT Prime 95 testing is in the high 50s/low 60s, depending on room temps (59c this morning with a room temperature of 20c).

Lastly, I have no extra PCIe cards, except obviously for a GTX 1070.

Now, chances are I'm going to do an upgrade when Ryzen 3rd gen comes out if there's enough of a performance differential, but still...I'd really like to see these USB ports work properly, it's almost a matter of principle now :)