[SOLVED] How to determine SATA link speed (SATA II or SATA III) ?

[brokeBuilder2019]

(Relevant) System specs for PC borrowed from uncle (and he doesn't know the answer):

Dell Optiplex 3046
OS: Win 10 Pro
Onboard SATA connectors (2):
1 - For main drive (and main drive bay fits a 3.5 " HDD)
2 - For optical drive (with a narrower power connector than #1)

I have taken out the optical drive and installed a caddy with a 2TB Seagate Hybrid (i.e. SSHD) drive that is (theoretically) capable of running at SATA III speeds. However, I'm unsure if the SATA connector it's using supports SATA III (6 Gbps).

I looked in System Information but could not find any indication of SATA link speed (i.e. 3 Gbps or 6 Gbps)

I have not run a CrystalDiskMark speed test to estimate this, but I would rather just get a direct indication through software - SATA 2 or 3.

Any way to find out for sure ?

P.S. I have already looked at the Dell owner's manual and it does not provide this detail.

 

[TJ Hooker]

Can use something like HWiNFO to check. But I doubt there'd be any performance difference between SATA 2 or 3 with that drive anyway.

 

[cin19]

Your computer has the H110 chipset, the SATA ports will be the SATAIII (6gb/s). You can check the info from dell site.
https://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/04/product-support/product/optiplex-3046-desktop/docs

For the HDD, like other member said, you will not notice the peformance difference between II and III.

 

[LWFG001]

Next to the SATA-connectors on the motherboard there should be information about their bandwidth. You can see whether each SATA connector is a SATA 2 or SATA 3 connector. 6G is SATA 3 and 3G is SATA 2.

Example:

Another way would be to download and install the free HWINFO software and run it. On the left in the device selection panel go to the Motherboard section. The right side of the window will show which SATA ports are available.

If 6 Gb / s is written near the port, it means that it is SATA 3 standard.
If 3 Gb /s is written near the port, it means that it is SATA 2 standard.

Source: https://okeygeek.com/how-to-determine-whether-your-hard-drive-ssd-works-through-sata-2-or-sata-3/

 

[gasaraki]

Just looking at the model number it's obvious that it's SATA3 cause it will have to be very old to be SATA2. Plus like others said, that drive is not saturating the link.

 

[brokeBuilder2019]

Thank you to everyone ! HWInfo is awesome ... dunno why I never used it before

Yes, I'm aware that the Seagate drive will not be able to actually run at SATA III (or even II) speeds. I'm actually more interested in the connector than the drive, because I will likely put an SSD in that same bay someday.

I think my confusion arose from my belief that Dell uses a slower SATA link for the optical drive bay since it is a slow medium. Since I am putting a disk drive (or SSD) in that bay, I wanted to know if it is capable of SATA III.

Thanks again !