Question Where to install PCIE to M.2 adapter

[skunkone]

I just purchased a PCI-e 3.0 4x to M.2 Adapter Card, the problem is I just realized my motherboard only has the following PCI slots available and I need more SATA3 slots to install more mechanical storage drives. I need to know which slot to install the adapter card into, and where to install the PCI to SATA3 ports card (feel free to recommend a card you have used that has a fair price and positive reviews on Newegg or Amazon).

My thoughts are that since the PCI-e 3.0 4x to M.2 Adapter Card is Gen 3 X4 then, the X8 slot (slot 1) should be more than sufficient and therefore leave the (slot 4) open for the SATA3 ports card. I get the feeling that if I do this the Silicon Power 256GB M.2 will not perform at max 8GB/s>16GB/s.


PCI:

SLOT1 PCI Express 3.0 x8, 8 GB/s PCI-e 3.0 4x to M.2 Adapter Card here?
SLOT2 PCI Express 3.0 x16, 16 GB/s used for GPU at the moment
SLOT3 PCI Express 2.0 x1, 0.5 GB/s
SLOT4 PCI Express 3.0 x16, 16 GB/s PCI-e 3.0 to SATA3 Ports Card here?
SLOT5 PCI Express 2.0 x4, 2 GB/s
SLOT6 PCI 2.3 (32 bit, 33 MHz), 133 MB/s

Storage (HDD/SSD):

SATA3-HDD0 Intel AHCI SATA 3.0, 6 Gbps used for mechanical data drive
SATA3-HDD1 Intel AHCI SATA 3.0, 6 Gbps used for mechanical data drive
SATA2-HDD2 Intel ACHI SATA 2.0, 3 Gbps
SATA2-HDD3 Intel ACHI SATA 2.0, 3 Gbps

Storage (ODD):

SATA2-ODD0 Intel AHCI SATA 2.0, 3 Gbps
SATA2-ODD1 Intel AHCI SATA 2.0, 3 Gbps

 

[popatim]

I would put the PCIE/M2 card in slot 4. Slot 1 is likely sharing lanes with slot 2 so installing anything in 1 would drop slot2 to x8 mode and this is probably where your GPU is. Consult your motherboard manual to be sure please.

I would put the PCIE/Sata card in slot 5. pcie2 x4 is plenty fast enough for even 8 HDD's.

 

[TJ Hooker]

What motherboard and cpu do you have?

 

[skunkone]

well, unfortunately, my idea of going pcie to m.2 didn't work out because the motherboard won't boot an m.2 drive due to not supporting it in the bios. It's a Dell Precision T5610. So instead I'm going to use a Dell H310 6Gbps SAS HBA w/ LSI 9211-8i P20 IT Mode card and some breakout cables to still use my SATA3 hard drives and not lose data on them since I won't have to format them since I won't be using raid at all. This also gives me the ability to add a lot more drives in the case or in an expander.