SATA II vs. PCIe for SSDs?

Is it better to connect an SSD via SATA II or through a card plugged into a PCIe 1.0 x slot?

I've been running some tests—results look a little off to me—so if anyone could give me a quick take, I'd appreciate it.

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p.s. The image shows four test runs: the top ones are on SATA II, while the bottom ones are using the card in the PCIe 1.0 x slot. Which is superior?

Are you thinking SATA III? Just leave it in SATA.

You didn't mention which SATA version is on the card? Is it 1, 2, or 3?
The newer standard—it offers higher bandwidth.
http://kb.sandisk.com/app/answers/de...i-and-sata-iii

The card supposedly features SATA III and USB 3.0
—but since PCIe 1.0 x is significantly slower than SATA III, I don't think that's even a factor here. I've attached some benchmark screenshots below; I'm curious to see which one actually performs better.🍿

Ronald Garcia37 said:Supposedly, the card features SATA3 and USB 3.0.
But then again, PCIe 1.0 x is pretty slow compared to SATA3—so I guess that doesn't really matter much. I've attached some screenshots of the test results below, so I'm wondering which one actually performs better.🍿

If you're certain you're working with PCIe 1.0—the first generation of the interface—then yeah, it's going to be slower than SATA3. You won't be able to hit those full SATA3 speeds, I guess.
The evolution of PCIe standards—it’s a lot to digest if you really dive into the history. Looking through the specs, you can see how much everything has shifted from those early versions to what we use today. It’s kind of wild how quickly the bandwidth requirements scaled up. I guess it makes sense, though—with everything moving toward higher resolutions and faster data transfers, the old lanes just couldn't keep up. Just a lot of technical milestones to keep track of, really.

I realize I won't get full SATA3 speeds here—I bought this card because my motherboard only has two SATA ports available, so I'm just running some tests now.

The results show two SATA2 slots are fast, one row is mediocre, and in another row, the PCIe lane is actually throttling the SATA2 speed.

What I really need to know is which connection method is better for my system SSD—sticking with SATA2 or using this expansion card?
I’d prefer to run the SSD on the faster interface and leave the secondary drives on the slower ones.

The motherboard is a P5KPL-AM SE—it lists
1 x PCIe x16
1 x PCIe x1. I've got the card hooked up to both the SATA and USB 3.0 ports here.
1 x PCI

Running an E8500 processor with G.Skill DDR2 RAM.

As I’ve already pointed out, you should really just leave that SSD connected via a SATA cable.

Are you talking about plugging directly into a SATA2 port on the motherboard?

I'd rather not mess around with extra cards—too much hassle.

Exactly. The only thing you'll actually notice being faster in that PCIe 1.0 x slot is the 4K Q32T1 random read speeds, but let’s be honest—does an average user running standard hardware even need that kind of performance?

Also, can you actually boot the OS from the card itself?

If the controller manages to get itself installed right at the start of the boot sequence, then technically, anything is possible. 😁

Booting from the card is possible—it displays the controller before the OS kicks in.
It’s a little weird, though—when I have the SSD on the card, it shows up as SATA3, but when I swap in the terabyte drive, it drops to SATA2. :d

The bottom line is that everything works.😉

Thanks for the info.

It’s likely because that HDD is running on SATA II, so it just doesn't recognize SATA III interfaces.