Question XPG S11 Pro slow Read speed ...

[AliUnique]

Hi all,
i just bought a NVMe M.2 SSD XPG gammix S11 pro .. it has average of 3500 MB Read and 3000 MB Write speed acccording to manufacture.. my Laptop is Lenovo L340 Gaming .. when i installed the SSD and installed OS just ran a CrystalDiskMark Test and i found it gives me ~1500 MB Read and ~2000 MB Write in best case scenario.. ! i dont know why maybe laptop manufacture capped the speed or what ?

- i found a setting in BIOS under Storage section called "Controller mode" that has 2 options to choice : AHCI mode and RST mode..
it is on AHCI now .. is it better to switch on RST so i get better speeds or doesnt matter ?
(im not planning to use any sort of RAID or sth else but speed)

 

[Gam3r01]

What are you doing with the drive that will take advantage of the 3500/3000 speeds?
While not the rated specs, those tested speeds are still far greater than 95% of users will ever benefit from.

 

[AliUnique]

What are you doing with the drive that will take advantage of the 3500/3000 speeds?
While not the rated specs, those tested speeds are still far greater than 95% of users will ever benefit from.

mostly rendering .. sometime hardware simulations and gaming.. i know the 3500/3000 is in best scenario and it depends on many factors but my main question was why Read speed is less than Write .. actually Read is more than Write in storages..
and my other question was about intel RST more .. i may dont need that speeds but im curious to know which gives better performance when i have both

 

[Maxxify]

You're being limited to x2 PCIe 3.0. It's common in many laptops to throttle that way (e.g. Dell). Check the transfer mode in CrystalDiskInfo, also.

 

[AliUnique]

You're being limited to x2 PCIe 3.0. It's common in many laptops to throttle that way (e.g. Dell). Check the transfer mode in CrystalDiskInfo, also.

https://imgur.com/a/bVhDv0e

View: https://imgur.com/a/bVhDv0e

 

[Maxxify]

https://imgur.com/a/bVhDv0e

View: https://imgur.com/a/bVhDv0e

Thanks. Yeah, I looked up your model before I posted and saw it had a x4 PCIe 3.0 M.2 socket (the 2280 one), so I figured it wasn't that, but wanted to be sure. Unfortunately, even if it says x4 negotiated (first number) the laptop can throttle to x2. However, I don't see evidence of that when searching that model. It might be a compatibility issue with the drive, as I've seen some users on here have a similar issue with the Kingston A2000 (which uses different hardware, but a similar SMI controller). In some cases it's possible to use a different NVMe driver - you can force Intel's (selecting 760p for the S11 Pro) or SMI's - but I don't think that would help.

 

[AliUnique]

Thanks. Yeah, I looked up your model before I posted and saw it had a x4 PCIe 3.0 M.2 socket (the 2280 one), so I figured it wasn't that, but wanted to be sure. Unfortunately, even if it says x4 negotiated (first number) the laptop can throttle to x2. However, I don't see evidence of that when searching that model. It might be a compatibility issue with the drive, as I've seen some users on here have a similar issue with the Kingston A2000 (which uses different hardware, but a similar SMI controller). In some cases it's possible to use a different NVMe driver - you can force Intel's (selecting 760p for the S11 Pro) or SMI's - but I don't think that would help.

can u help me how to do this ?

 

[Maxxify]

can u help me how to do this ?

You can get Intel's Client NVMe drivers from their site. The Intel 760p has the same basic hardware as the S11 Pro, so that choice in the driver would work. You can get SMI's drivers multiple places - for example, google for 'vlo smi' (without parentheses) and you'll find a site with SMI's drivers. Both drivers have to be forced via Device Manager in Windows under 'Storage controllers' (to replace the Standard NVM Express Controller for that drive). I don't recommend doing this since I don't think it will solve your problem; it's more likely either power throttling (I doubt, but try maximum power modes) or a compatibility issue (requires a different drive without a SMI NVMe controller). Be aware, lower sequential performance is not that big of a deal. Also be aware, at 512GB you are not going to reach the maximum write performance for this drive anyway, there's not enough flash dies.

 

[AliUnique]

You can get Intel's Client NVMe drivers from their site. The Intel 760p has the same basic hardware as the S11 Pro, so that choice in the driver would work. You can get SMI's drivers multiple places - for example, google for 'vlo smi' (without parentheses) and you'll find a site with SMI's drivers. Both drivers have to be forced via Device Manager in Windows under 'Storage controllers' (to replace the Standard NVM Express Controller for that drive). I don't recommend doing this since I don't think it will solve your problem; it's more likely either power throttling (I doubt, but try maximum power modes) or a compatibility issue (requires a different drive without a SMI NVMe controller). Be aware, lower sequential performance is not that big of a deal. Also be aware, at 512GB you are not going to reach the maximum write performance for this drive anyway, there's not enough flash dies.

ty for helping mate ..
installed the 760p after reboot ran the test and i get exactly same results ! nothing changed ..
ive doubt trying SMI .. just wanna use the SSD and enjoy anyways thx for helps <3

 

[Maxxify]

ty for helping mate ..
installed the 760p after reboot ran the test and i get exactly same results ! nothing changed ..
ive doubt trying SMI .. just wanna use the SSD and enjoy anyways thx for helps <3

Was worth a shot! I do think it's a compatibility issue. I have a few drives using that same controller and performance declines when going over the chipset on my X570 motherboard, for example. I also know many people had similar performance results to yours when running some SMI drives on their laptops. Luckily, this mostly impacts sequential performance which is not critical for daily use.

 

[AliUnique]

Hi again guys ..
glad u doin well @Maxxify i installed SMI driver today and unfortunately (or better say luckily) my windows boot broked and i couldnt boot the OS ...
this forced me to install windows again .. (clean install from boot) right after the new installation is complete i ran the test and i get this results (~2.5GB Read)!

https://imgur.com/a/fF7vGvg

View: https://imgur.com/a/fF7vGvg


its was OK ! so i kept going to installing the drivers from windows update .. after windows update installed all drivers it needed and after 3-4 reboots i ran the test again and VOLLA .. previous results (~1.5 GB Read)! some retard drivers causes this .. at least i foundout this .. but i dont know which one or for what causes this ?
it was interesting just wanted to share

 

[Maxxify]

You can always fall back to the stock NVMe driver to fix booting issues, but you should make a system restore point first anyway (my bad for not suggesting that as a backup option).

Anyway, that is odd, it could be software interference of some sort but I still think it's a compatibility issue. You can rule out Windows by benchmarking elsewhere, but I don't want to give you too many ways to break stuff. But in case you're curious: you can use Safe Mode to test with minimal drivers. Another option is bootable (Live, not permanent) Linux to test, but that is more involved.