Humour me, I'm being thick haha!

[keef247]

So, spec in my sig, if I'm using a sata ssd and an nvme ssd, on this b450i pcie3.0 motherboard... Does that mean the RX 6800 is actually running in 8x pcie3.0 mode? Due to sata also using pcie lanes?
I know if you run 2 pcie cards it makes a pcie4.0 gpu/nvme on a b550m run everything at pcie3.0 doesn't it, or pcie4.0 8x which is the same right?

In games like COD MW3, I get high fps when playing MP online, and it doesn't struggle in any games at 1440p... Makes me think it's still running at 16x pcie3.0?

 

[Edhawk]

Does that mean the RX 6800 is actually running in 8x pcie3.0 mode?

No it doesn't mean your GPU is running with a lower PCIe standard or speed. The top x16 slot will have dedicated PCIe lanes, which might be shared with a second x16 PCIE slot, if two GPUs were installed. The M.2 NVMe and the SATA SSD will have separate PCIe lanes from the GPU slot.

If the x16 slot is PCIe 4.0 standard and the GPU can use that standard then there is no reason for a single GPU to run at a lower standard or speed.

In Windows, where I assume you do most of your gaming, you can download GPU-Z and that will tell you which standard your GPU is using. You can have it open while gaming to see if anything changes.

 

[keef247]

No it doesn't mean your GPU is running with a lower PCIe standard or speed. The Xx16 slot will have dedicated PCIe lanes, which might be shared with a second x16 PCIE slot, if two GPUs were installed. The M.2 NVMe and the SATA SSD will have separate PCIe lanes from the GPU slot.

If the x16 slot is PCIe 4.0 standard and the GPU can use that standard then there is no reason for a single GPU to run at a lower standard or speed.

In Windows, where I assume you do most of your gaming, you can download GPU-Z and that will tell you which standard your GPU is using. You can have it open while gaming to see if anything changes.

Thank you my brother!
Interesting, I'd heard that sat and m.2 nvme both use the same lanes, so on that basis, if you have 1 of each, they'd be running at pcie3.0 on a pcie4.0 board, I know that to be fact, as with my tv gaming rig, which is a b550m, that is the case if I were to use the 2nd nvme a pcie3.0 slot, it makes the pcie4.0 slot above the gpu run at pcie3.0 speed, that definitely is true for b550m anyway.

But yeah my hackintosh is pcie3.0, being that it's b450i not b550m.

Ah I totally hadn't thought of trying that, I'll give that a go when I'm next playing COD or CS2 on the hackintosh in Windows, I literally only use windows for that for MP competitive gaming online, and MacOS for everything else, then I have a B550M/5800X/32GB ram/4070 for SP games with a controller under my tv.

Me right now:

 

[Edhawk]

Some motherboards disable one or two SATA ports, if two M.2 NVMe drives are installed in the dedicated M.2 connectors. As the second M.2 connector and the two highest numbered SATA ports might be sharing 2 x PCIe lanes.

If the 2nd M.2 connector is not used, all the SATA ports will be available. If the 2nd M.2 connector is in use, it will either work with 2 x PCIe lanes and all the SATA ports will be available, or it will work with 4 x PCIe lanes and one or two SATA ports might be disabled. This will usually be controlled via a setting in the BIOS, but really all depends on how the manufacturer has configured the motherboard.

Not all motherboards do this. Some just provide a lesser number of SATA ports, instead of the 6 x SATA ports you would expect to see, there might only be 4 or 5 ports so the second M.2 connector can run with 4 x PCIe lanes and at x4 speed.

 

[keef247]

Some motherboards disable one or two SATA ports, if two M.2 NVMe drives are installed in the dedicated M.2 connectors. As the second M.2 connector and the two highest numbered SATA ports might be sharing 2 x PCIe lanes.

If the 2nd M.2 connector is not used, all the SATA ports will be available. If the 2nd M.2 connector is in use, it will either work with 2 x PCIe lanes and all the SATA ports will be available, or it will work with 4 x PCIe lanes and one or two SATA ports might be disabled. This will usually be controlled via a setting in the BIOS, but really all depends on how the manufacturer has configured the motherboard.

Not all motherboards do this. Some just provide a lesser number of SATA ports, instead of the 6 x SATA ports you would expect to see, there might only be 4 or 5 ports so the second M.2 connector can run with 4 x PCIe lanes and at x4 speed.

Cheers mate, I did think to myself, if I'm getting stupid good fps/high settings in COD MW3 in MP online at 1440P then I doubt anything is being throttled/running slower than I think it is etc.

Winning!