Question MSI B450M Pro-A Max and 5600 XT only running at PCIE-3 not PCIE-4

ubern00b1

Member
Jul 6, 2017
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Specs:

MSI B450m Pro-A Max
Ryzen 1600AF@4ghz
TeamGroup 16GB DDR4 3400 (2x8GB)
XFX Thicc II Pro 5600XT (flashed to MSI vBIOS for unlocked OC)
EVGA 650w PSU

Drives:
WD Blue SN550 1TB PCIE-3 NVME - OS Drive
2TB Seagate Barracuda SATA3 HDD
Western Digital 500GB SATA3 HDD
BraveEagle 240GB SATA3 SSD

I know both my board and the 5600XT supports PCIE-4 however the GPU is always running at PCIE-3, I know that with some cheaper boards with NVME drives, the PCIE lanes can be shared, or run at lower gen, so perhaps that is why I can't run my GPU at PCIE-4 speeds as I also have a NVME drive using some lanes?

Any help/advice as to if this is all I can expect or if there might be anything I can try to get full PCIE-4 bandwidth would be appreciated
 

blckgrffn

Diamond Member
May 1, 2003
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www.teamjuchems.com
Specs:

MSI B450m Pro-A Max
Ryzen 1600AF@4ghz
TeamGroup 16GB DDR4 3400 (2x8GB)
XFX Thicc II Pro 5600XT (flashed to MSI vBIOS for unlocked OC)
EVGA 650w PSU

Drives:
WD Blue SN550 1TB PCIE-3 NVME - OS Drive
2TB Seagate Barracuda SATA3 HDD
Western Digital 500GB SATA3 HDD
BraveEagle 240GB SATA3 SSD

I know both my board and the 5600XT supports PCIE-4 however the GPU is always running at PCIE-3, I know that with some cheaper boards with NVME drives, the PCIE lanes can be shared, or run at lower gen, so perhaps that is why I can't run my GPU at PCIE-4 speeds as I also have a NVME drive using some lanes?

Any help/advice as to if this is all I can expect or if there might be anything I can try to get full PCIE-4 bandwidth would be appreciated

Buy a Ryzen 3xxx or 5xxx CPU without integrated graphics.

Buy a 570 or 550 chipset motherboard.

Install them in place of your current CPU and motherboard.

Then you will have PCIe4 and bonus W11 compatibility. Currently your CPU and motherboard are PCIe 3 only and your CPU will not be supported by W11 (pretty sure no matter what’s under the hood on the AF the 2xxx Ryzen requirement will stand).

Jumping from a 1600AF to 5600x would be a big jump imo even on your current board. The early ryzens are still bringing a lot of value too so this might even be a good time.
 

ubern00b1

Member
Jul 6, 2017
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91
Is this a troll? Neither one of those items supports PCI-E 4.0.
No it wasn't a troll, I have realised my motherboard is only PCIE3 and not 4 so that is my bad. Though even with a Ryzen 1600AF and a b550 motherboard would you not get PCIE4 lanes from the motherboard and PCIE3 from the CPU?

Buy a Ryzen 3xxx or 5xxx CPU without integrated graphics.

Buy a 570 or 550 chipset motherboard.

Install them in place of your current CPU and motherboard.

Then you will have PCIe4 and bonus W11 compatibility. Currently your CPU and motherboard are PCIe 3 only and your CPU will not be supported by W11 (pretty sure no matter what’s under the hood on the AF the 2xxx Ryzen requirement will stand).

Jumping from a 1600AF to 5600x would be a big jump imo even on your current board. The early ryzens are still bringing a lot of value too so this might even be a good time.
1600AF is actually fully supported under Windows 11 as it is a Ryzen 2nd gen CPU, pretty much a lower clocked 2600, the issue is my motherboard isn't PCIE4 whereas I thought it was, so that was my mistake. I'm not looking to upgrade CPU right now but would be a 3600/5600x if I did, I'm aware of the IPC increase, that's not what my post was about.
 
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kschendel

Senior member
Aug 1, 2018
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Though even with a Ryzen 1600AF and a b550 motherboard would you not get PCIE4 lanes from the motherboard and PCIE3 from the CPU?

No. The B550 chipset doesn't do PCIe 4.0. X570 is the only AMD chipset that does PCIe 4.0. I doubt that the chipset will run at 4.0 speed if the CPU doesn't, although I don't know that for 100% sure. It wouldn't make a lot of sense, because transfers have to go through the CPU lanes to get to memory even for DMA, so you'd be limited to 3.0 speed overall anyway.
 

Insert_Nickname

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May 6, 2012
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your CPU will not be supported by W11 (pretty sure no matter what’s under the hood on the AF the 2xxx Ryzen requirement will stand).

My 1700 runs 11 just fine. I've even got HVCI working on it, and TPM2. So it's not a hard requirement. Just annoying.

I have a sneaking suspicion that the reason 1000-series Ryzens are excluded from 11 is because you can run 7 on them. Can't have anything compatible with multiple OS generations anymore. Unlike my old Athlon X3 445 (XP, Vista, 7, 8, 8.1 and even 10 if you can stand the updates. With as many Linux distributions as you could ever want)...
 
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fralexandr

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Apr 26, 2007
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All of this is moot unless you're planning on upgrading to a pcie4 nvme drive. Pcie3 will have almost no performance impact

B550 does support pcie4, it just gets fewer pcie4 lanes (all from the cpu) and runs a pcie3 cpu-chipset interconnect, making x570 superior, since it has more lanes and some of the lanes aren't cpu dependent. Both require a pcie4 cpu for the gpu to run as pcie4 however.

 

blckgrffn

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May 1, 2003
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Thank you for the education on W11, sorry I was referencing old and wrong information from pre-launch.

I am glad they work and it will make me evaluate the value of first gen Ryzen parts differently.
 

Insert_Nickname

Diamond Member
May 6, 2012
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Thank you for the education on W11, sorry I was referencing old and wrong information from pre-launch.

I am glad they work and it will make me evaluate the value of first gen Ryzen parts differently.

I should quantify that they only work unofficially, so MS could pull support at their leisure. That said, I haven't run into any trouble yet other then the usual workarounds are required for upgrading from 10. The official updater will flag as non-compatible*. Clean install works fine.

*ONLY the CPU model get flagged. Everything else lists as compatible. Which makes me mighty suspicious.
 
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ubern00b1

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I should quantify that they only work unofficially, so MS could pull support at their leisure. That said, I haven't run into any trouble yet other then the usual workarounds are required for upgrading from 10. The official updater will flag as non-compatible*. Clean install works fine.

*ONLY the CPU model get flagged. Everything else lists as compatible. Which makes me mighty suspicious.
In the case of actual 1st gen 14nm Ryzen yes they get flagged, 1600AF was released after the 2nd gen Ryzen 2600/x and is built on the same 12nm process as the 2600 and is the same in essence apart from a 200mhz difference in clocks and it doesn't get flagged as neither does the 2600, though apart from being 12nm vs 14nm there are no differences in the instruction sets that I know of that would mean the 2000 series are Windows 11 compatible and the 1000 series aren't... but this is MS we are talking about soooo :rolleyes:
 

Insert_Nickname

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In the case of actual 1st gen 14nm Ryzen yes they get flagged, 1600AF was released after the 2nd gen Ryzen 2600/x and is built on the same 12nm process as the 2600 and is the same in essence apart from a 200mhz difference in clocks and it doesn't get flagged as neither does the 2600, though apart from being 12nm vs 14nm there are no differences in the instruction sets that I know of that would mean the 2000 series are Windows 11 compatible and the 1000 series aren't... but this is MS we are talking about soooo :rolleyes:

There are no differences between the first and second generation Ryzens apart from the die shrink. First gen Ryzens even have fully functional fTPM 2.0 with later AGESAs.

Again, the only functional difference is that one supports Windows 7 and the other supports 11. It makes no sense from a technical perspective.
 

Shmee

Memory & Storage, Graphics Cards Mod Elite Member
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There are no differences between the first and second generation Ryzens apart from the die shrink. First gen Ryzens even have fully functional fTPM 2.0 with later AGESAs.

Again, the only functional difference is that one supports Windows 7 and the other supports 11. It makes no sense from a technical perspective.
2nd Gen Ryzens generally have higher default clocks. Neither 1st or 2nd gen Ryzen CPUs support PCIe gen 4. As mentioned, A Ryzen 3000 series (Zen 2) or newer CPU is needed, since the PCIe controller is on the CPU.

If you feel like upgrading, I would recommend a 5800X, and possibly a new B550 or X570 board to go with it. You likely could use the 5800X with your B450 board as well, but you might need a BIOS update for Zen 3 compatibility, and you would not get PCIe gen 4.
 
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