Question Installed new TX401 to my seconday B250m mortar x16 Slot (up to x4 speed) and the connection is only x1, how to make it work at x4?

[DPalouG]

Good morning,

So I have a situation where I only receive about 1Gb internet connection, I have symmetric 10Gb (up to 8Gb real) with my ISP and yesterday they came to check if the line was correct and they got the highest speed, so the problem seems to be in my PC, the specs are:

MSI B250m mortar Motherboard
Intel i7-7700K
16Gb Ram (2 x Crucial 8GB DDR4 2133 MT/s (PC4-17000) SR x8 DIMM 288-Pin - CT8G4DFS8213)
1xSATA 240Gb kingston SSD with the OS W10Pro 64bit
4xSATA 3Tb hardrives
1xSATA optical CD reader/burner
1x external fan controller
1x GPU Asus 1070 Turbo 8Gb in PCIe (Slot 1 x16 at x16speed, it hides PCIe x1 slot 2)
1 PCIe size x4 gen3 10Gb Ethernet card TP-Link TX401 on Slot 4 (a PCIe x16 slot with Max speed x4)

and the problem is as follows:

After installing the TX401 from TP link, I connect the card to the 10Gb port from my router with a Cat8 cables which works (already tested by ISP service) showin the 10Gb link and going to Speedtest the max speeds are about 1000 Mbps so we thought some program or service was capping the speed.

-I tried safe mode with internet, same speed
-I tried disabling all services (except microsoft ones), same speed
-I used to have a wireless PCIe x1 in slot 3 x1, removed it and disable on board ethernet, same speed
- touched here and there the propeties of the TX401 on device manager(forced 10Gb, jumbo packets...), same speed

So my only though was, maybe something physical?

So before removing it, I check the On board monitor from the BIOS and I got surprised by this:

The Slot 4 which is a PCIe x16 slots(Max speed x4) where I had the TP-link connected was showing a x1 Speed in the system.

Now, should this be enough as 1 line should move 8Gb/s ? seems like is 1Gb/s as it is the same speed I download/upload at.
Is there a way to change the speed? in BIOS I forced Gen 3 but, same speed
Could be that I have too many SATA connectad? I have them all
Is the GPU causing the ethernet to come down to x1 speed as GPU is at x16?

I thinks I have the nail located but need a special hammer to solve this, any ideas? what should I try next?

Kind Regards,

 

[Fix_that_Glitch]

If I am understanding things correctly, your cpu only supports up to 16 pcie lanes, this is used up by your gpu Pcie x16 at 16. There are no more pcie lanes left for your second x16 slot for x4 use. If your bios allows it you can try setting the gpu to x8 and free up the second pcie slot for x4.

 

[DPalouG]

I have no idea if I can do this:

you can try setting the gpu to x8 and free up the second pcie slot for x4.

I can only set up Gen 1, Gen 2, Gen3 or Auto, but the used lines will be x16 for GPU:

"" (from user manual)
Advanced

>PCI Subsystem Settings
Sets PCI, PCI express interface protocol and latency timer. Press Enter to enter the sub-menu.

>PEG X - Max Link Speed [Auto]
Sets PCI Express protocol of PCIe x16 slots for matching different installed devices.
[Auto] This item will be configured automatically by BIOS.
[Gen1] Enables PCIe Gen1 support only.
[Gen2] Enables PCIe Gen2 support only.
[Gen3] Enables PCIe Gen3 support only.

>PCI Latency Timer [32]
Sets latency timer of PCI interface device. [Options: 32, 64, 96, 128, 160, 192, 224, 248 PCI Bus clocks]

>Above 4G Decoding [Disabled]
Enables or disables 64-bit capable devices to be decoded in above 4G address space. It is only available if the system supports 64-bit PCI decoding.
""

 

[Fix_that_Glitch]

Try removing the gpu, then see what happens with the ethernet card to see if it goes to x4.

 

[DPalouG]

I was thinking about it last night,will try today.

I thought about two possible options which are:

Option A: change GPU to secondary slot and ethernet to primary, downfall? yes, GPU max speed will be 4x (will this be enough for a 8gb GPU?)

Option B: return the ethernet card, and save 75€

If there is not a way to change speed connection of the GPU PCIe then it might not compensate...

Depending on the options I should downgrade my router and fiber speed to 1Gb or maintain it... that will be a hard decision.

Thank you for your replies!

 

[DPalouG]

Ok, so yesterday I had some spare time to make some trials and it was not as expected:

First o all I tried to remove completly the GPU from the first slot, which should have forced the slot 4 to get enough bandwidth, but, it didn´t, it stayed at the same speed x1 so I made a guess (that I think is incorrect but please tell me if it could be or not) that is the slot is a X16 size and x4 speed and my ethernet card y size x4 and gettin a x1 it complies with the ratio 4 to 1 ( probably this is incorrect but have no idea)

So after that trial, I decided to move the card to the slot 1 which I know it worked at x16 speed and with my ratio theory 1 to 1, it should have worked, but, i didn´t! the card stayed at x1 speed.

so this is making me think
- the card might be faulty?
- firmware problem? the card vendor shows as anonymous, when it should be tp-link or marwell (The GPU shows NVIDIA corp correctly)
- my motherboard or CPU is not detecting is able to run at x4 so it always puts it at x1.

this give me hope that I can make the GPU run at x16 and the ethernet card at x4 as I saw the block diagram from de B250 boards and it has cpu graphic usage for x16 but the motherboard has x12 lanes available.

Can this be a problem with having to many SATA conected?

 

[Fix_that_Glitch]

Ok, so yesterday I had some spare time to make some trials and it was not as expected:

First o all I tried to remove completly the GPU from the first slot, which should have forced the slot 4 to get enough bandwidth, but, it didn´t, it stayed at the same speed x1 so I made a guess (that I think is incorrect but please tell me if it could be or not) that is the slot is a X16 size and x4 speed and my ethernet card y size x4 and gettin a x1 it complies with the ratio 4 to 1 ( probably this is incorrect but have no idea)

So after that trial, I decided to move the card to the slot 1 which I know it worked at x16 speed and with my ratio theory 1 to 1, it should have worked, but, i didn´t! the card stayed at x1 speed.

so this is making me think
- the card might be faulty?
- firmware problem? the card vendor shows as anonymous, when it should be tp-link or marwell (The GPU shows NVIDIA corp correctly)
- my motherboard or CPU is not detecting is able to run at x4 so it always puts it at x1.

this give me hope that I can make the GPU run at x16 and the ethernet card at x4 as I saw the block diagram from de B250 boards and it has cpu graphic usage for x16 but the motherboard has x12 lanes available.

Can this be a problem with having to many SATA conected?

Sata and pcie are two different protocols one shouldn't affect the other. Just a side note, you may want to enable the Above 4G Decoding in your bios. It helps your gpu and memory a bit. If your ethernet card does not show up as x4 in any pci lane, and especially with the gpu removed there is a problem with the card I think. Here is the driver page maybe it will help. https://www.tp-link.com/us/support/download/tx401/

 

[DPalouG]

I will just return it, seems like my motherboard does not recognize it as x4 speed...