PCIe vs. M.2: Which is better for adding more SATA ports?

Could someone lend me some guidance regarding a bit of a dilemma? I'm trying to figure out the most efficient way to expand the number of SATA ports available on my PC.

Naturally, I am looking for the sweet spot—maximizing the port count without sacrificing data transfer speeds across the board.

So far, I have been weighing these specific options:
https://www.amazon.com/IO-Crest-Cont...g=hardfocom-20

Alternatively, there is this:

https://www.amazon.com/Internal-Non-...et_feature_div

Is there perhaps a third path I haven't considered yet? If not, which of these two would you recommend as the superior choice?

Option 2 definitely wins on pure speed—we’re looking at 1700 MB/s compared to just 600 MB/s with option one. That said, for your day-to-day tasks, you probably won't actually feel the difference unless you're moving massive amounts of data around. Both setups have one rather annoying catch, though: since these SSDs are running through adapters or PCIe cards instead of plugging directly into the motherboard, most BIOS versions won't let you use them as boot drives, so they'll just act as extra storage.

driftingcanyon2 said:Option two is definitely the superior choice if you're looking at raw speed—we're talking 1700 MB/s compared to just 600 MB/s with option one. That said, in any day-to-day scenario, you probably won't even notice the difference unless you're moving massive amounts of data all at once. There is, however, a significant catch with both setups: because these SSDs are sitting on adapters or PCIe cards rather than being plugged directly into the motherboard ports, most BIOS configurations simply won't recognize them as bootable drives. They’ll function perfectly fine as secondary storage, but don't expect to run an OS from them.

I'm not planning on putting my OS on an SSD anyway; I'm sticking with a 7200 RPM hard drive for that. I'm just trying to figure out which setup makes more sense for my needs. So, based on what you're saying, you think the M.2 card is the way to go for this specific build?

Ryan Gonzalez4 said:I'm not really worried about the OS side of things and I won't be using an SSD, just a 7200 RPM Hard Drive. I'm honestly just weighing which option makes more sense here. So, are you suggesting that an M.2 card would be the better way to go for my specific setup?

Hmm... if you're absolutely certain that you won't find a use for an M.2 NVMe drive down the road, then perhaps. But since most motherboards usually come with extra PCI-e slots that you might never actually end up needing, wouldn't it make more sense to just go with one of those instead?

Ryan Gonzalez4 said:I don't really care about the OS and I'm not going the SSD route; I'm sticking strictly to 7200 RPM Hard Drives. I'm just trying to figure out which setup makes more sense. So, are you suggesting an M.2 card for what I've got here?

If you're planning on running nothing but Hard Drive Corp units, then you probably don't need to bother with an M.2 adapter. Honestly, modern SATA3 Hard Drives usually top out at around 200 MB/s for sequential read/write speeds, so a PCIe card—which handles up to 600 MB/s under the SATA3 standard—is already three times faster than what those drives can actually pull. Besides, how many free SATA ports are left on your motherboard? Surely they aren't all taken up, since most boards come with at least four.

I guess the guy probably just wants to mine chiu

What’s the actual strategy here if you aren't going with a fast Chiu 1 x M.2 NVMe paired with several mechanical hard drives? If that isn't the plan, then you really shouldn't be tying up that M.2 slot, should you?

driftingcanyon2 said:If you're strictly planning on installing just Hard Drive Corp units, then honestly, you don't really need an M.2 adapter option. Modern SATA3 Hard Drives generally top out at around 200 MB/s for sequential read/write speeds, which means a simple PCIe card is more than enough since the SATA3 standard caps out at 600 MB/s—three times what those drives can actually pull. Besides, what’s the issue with your motherboard's available SATA ports? I assume they aren't all spoken for; most boards come with at least four ports by default, right?

Technically, I have six, but I've got another ten 14TB Hard Drive Corp units coming my way, and I simply don't have enough ports left to accommodate them—I'm down to my last two.

fadedorca66 said:The guy probably just wants to farm some Chiu 1 x

It's about farming, not mining 😛 👍
I consider myself quite an environmentalist, haha.

wanderingbison9 said:If you aren't planning on running a Chiu 1 x fast M.2 NVMe alongside a massive array of mechanical Hard Drive Corp units, then honestly, there’s really no reason to be worrying about occupying that M.2 slot.

Look, having one solid NVMe drive is plenty; you still have to account for your RAM and CPU, which are much more likely to become your actual bottlenecks.
The real headache is that once I run a plot, everything needs to be connected back to the Hard Drive Corp units. That means I'm going to run out of SATA ports. Right now, I've got ten Hard Drives lined up, leaving me with only two available ports. So, I'm just sitting here trying to figure out the most efficient way to tackle that problem. 🤔

Ryan Gonzalez4 said:One solid NVMe drive should be plenty, especially since you still have to worry about your RAM and CPU potentially causing a bottleneck.
The real issue is that when I go to render a plot, the system still needs to be connected to the Hard Drive Corp. This means I’m going to run out of SATA ports. Right now, I have ten Hard Drives in the mix, leaving me with only two available ports. So, I'm just trying to figure out the most efficient way to handle that. 🤔

So, if the motherboard has two M.2 slots, wouldn't we need to be careful about which one is wired directly to the CPU and which one runs through the chipset? It might make sense to plug a SATA adapter into the one controlled by the chipset instead.

Is there actually any point to this whole hard drive "mining" thing? I can't help but wonder what the monthly take would look like for a little 140 TB Farmati setup like that.

I’ve got some k=32 plots up for grabs. If anyone’s actually looking to pick these up, shoot me a DM and we can talk details. Just a heads-up: I'm selling the plots alone—no HDD included. Located near Cleveland, OH.