Possibly stupid SATA question

Nanostronghold · 31 Mar 2017 at 23:31

Hey peeps,
So Im no expert when it comes to building a system but I do my best. I have an SSD and was aware that it was being reported by the SanDisk SSD Dashboard as being SATA 6Gb/s compatible, but was only running at 3Gb/s as it was in a SATA 2 port. I dismissed this as my mobo is a few years old and not top of the range and i assumed I didnt have any SATA 3 ports. I today noticed that I actually do. Mobo is a gigabyte x58a-ud3r. I had everything plugged into the blue ports but today moved them to the white ports. https://images.bit-tech.net/content...x58a-ud3r-motherboard-review/gigabyteud3c.jpg
SanDisk SSD Dashboard is now reporting my SSDs interface speed at only 1.5Gb/s. Can anyone shed some light onto what Ive overlooked/done wrong please?

** Do Not Hotlink images **

Thank you muchly!

Edit: Whilst I still havent figured out my goof, I think that, confusingly to me, the two white SATAs on the end might actually be SATA 2s and its just the 2nd white pair that are SATA 3s. I plugged my ssd into the end set, so that may be my issue. Any clever person with info to impart is still very much appreciated until i get time to re-wire.

steve258 · 1 Apr 2017 at 03:28

Just had a look at the motherboard manual and it has the most complicated SATA layout I've ever seen. As you have rightly pointed out yourself, it is actually only the 2 white GSATA3_6/7 ports on the right provided by the Marvell 9128 chip that have SATA3 support. Make sure you go into the BIOS and under Integrated Peripherals, go to GSATA3_6/7 and make sure they are enabled and that AHCI is selected instead of the default IDE, you may also want set SATA3 firmware selection to AUTO so that it updates the firmware automatically.

Disco_P · 1 Apr 2017 at 19:48

Intel sata 2 will be better for an OS drive than marvell sata 3. Sequential reads and writes mean almost nothing for anything but sequential reading and writing which you probably rarely do.

d_brennen · 1 Apr 2017 at 19:49

Disco_P said:
Intel sata 2 will be better for an OS drive than marvell sata 3. Sequential reads and writes mean almost nothing for anything but sequential reading and writing which you probably rarely do.

This

Nanostronghold · 2 Apr 2017 at 13:00

Thanks guys for your help. Will there be a significant performance drop putting it onto SATA 3? I do usually have 1 or 2 higher end games installed on there too for better performance than HDD, and I use it for video rendering also. Would SATA 3 be more helpful for that then?

Thank you again everyone!

keybaud · 8 Apr 2017 at 21:23

Remember, the standard a disk is compliant with isn't the speed it transfer data at. I can take my moped on a dual carriageway that has a 70MPH speed limit, so it is 70MPH compliant, but it still only goes at 35MPH. Same for HDDs and SDDs.

errata · 9 Apr 2017 at 21:50

a recent ssd should better on sata 3. Marvel sata used to be slower than intel but 2 to 3 is a big hike and I would have to be convinced by a recent test NOT to use the faster sata

Disco_P · 10 Apr 2017 at 01:58

I don't have any experience of the Marvel Sata cause I have always been told to avoid it but I accidentally used Sata 2 ports for my SSDs for over 6 months without noticing any difference in speed. Bandwidth isn't very relevant in most OS tasks, latency is.

steve258 · 10 Apr 2017 at 03:29

keybaud said:
Remember, the standard a disk is compliant with isn't the speed it transfer data at. I can take my moped on a dual carriageway that has a 70MPH speed limit, so it is 70MPH compliant, but it still only goes at 35MPH. Same for HDDs and SDDs.

But surely in this case it's the opposite, it would be an 200 mile an hour car on a 70mph motorway.

keybaud · 10 Apr 2017 at 22:38

steve258 said:
But surely in this case it's the opposite, it would be an 200 mile an hour car on a 70mph motorway.

Aah, I was mistakenly under the impression that SATA interface speed was the transfer rate, but it isn't, it's 10% of the interface speed.

SATA I (revision 1.x) interface, formally known as SATA 1.5Gb/s, is the first generation SATA interface running at 1.5 Gb/s. The bandwidth throughput, which is supported by the interface, is up to 150MB/s.

SATA II (revision 2.x) interface, formally known as SATA 3Gb/s, is a second generation SATA interface running at 3.0 Gb/s. The bandwidth throughput, which is supported by the interface, is up to 300MB/s.

SATA III (revision 3.x) interface, formally known as SATA 6Gb/s, is a third generation SATA interface running at 6.0Gb/s. The bandwidth throughput, which is supported by the interface, is up to 600MB/s. This interface is backwards compatible with SATA 3 Gb/s interface.