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Asus Maximus Xi Extreme + i9 9900K, M.2 Nvme Drives

NOR_W0LF
Level 7
Hello Lads!

I'm new to the forum but not as an Asus user 😃 I have a little bit of an issue and hope some of you could help me sort it out.

I'm going from an X299 platform to an 1151 for the first time, i've only used X platforms as long as i can remember, the thing is this "problem" with the Pci-Lanes on the Z390 Chipset and the i9 9900K. I wish to use the following hardware, but i'm not sure if i will bottleneck something.

Asus Maximus XI Extreme
Intel i9 9900K
Evga 2080Ti FTW3
4 x Samsung 970 EVO Plus 1Tb in an Asus X16 Pci-express card

Will i bottleneck the Gpu to x4 / x8 or will both units run fine in x16.

Thanks in advance 😄
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3 REPLIES 3

OutSider420
Level 9
NOR_W0LF wrote:
Hello Lads!

I'm new to the forum but not as an Asus user 😃 I have a little bit of an issue and hope some of you could help me sort it out.

I'm going from an X299 platform to an 1151 for the first time, i've only used X platforms as long as i can remember, the thing is this "problem" with the Pci-Lanes on the Z390 Chipset and the i9 9900K. I wish to use the following hardware, but i'm not sure if i will bottleneck something.

Asus Maximus XI Extreme
Intel i9 9900K
Evga 2080Ti FTW3
4 x Samsung 970 EVO Plus 1Tb in an Asus X16 Pci-express card

Will i bottleneck the Gpu to x4 / x8 or will both units run fine in x16.

Thanks in advance 😄


First all with that chipset you can only use 2 drives on that card as the GPU needs 8 lanes. Even without the GPU you can only use 3 drives as it defaults to a 8x4x4 layout.

To use all 4 of the drives you’ll have to use the onboard NVME slots as I think those should use the PCH lanes. Not sure on your MB

I have the Apex and ran into the same issues

OutSider420 wrote:
First all with that chipset you can only use 2 drives on that card as the GPU needs 8 lanes. Even without the GPU you can only use 3 drives as it defaults to a 8x4x4 layout.

To use all 4 of the drives you’ll have to use the onboard NVME slots as I think those should use the PCH lanes. Not sure on your MB

I have the Apex and ran into the same issues


Thanks for the quick reply, i have considered the Apex also, i do alot of OCing so maybe the Apex would be better?
I guess i can live with only two Nvme Drives 🙂

NOR_W0LF wrote:
Thanks for the quick reply, i have considered the Apex also, i do alot of OCing so maybe the Apex would be better?
I guess i can live with only two Nvme Drives 🙂


I have the XI Apex and 2 m.2 Samsung 970 Pro's. it's very fast. I also have the i9-9900k. I have mine clocked and 5.2ghz and it seems to run fine. Most people only run 5.1ghz but either way that is super good performance for this chipset 🙂
InWin 909 Silver RGB build
i9-10900k
ROG Maximus XII Apex
ROG Matrix 2080 ti
Gskill Trident Royal 4400 16g

Everything overclocked and love it.
ROG Awesomeness !!!!