P5800X Performance x2 vs x4

[skeenan]

Hello, I am trying to create very fast storage to get the most out of a poorly written application. I have a Dell PowerEdge T550 with a PERC H755N RAID controller and 2 x 400GB P5800X Optane SSDs (RAID1). The RAID controller has a Broadcom RAID-on-chip SAS3916 chipset and is PCIe 4.0 x2 while the SSDs are PCIe 4.0 x4, so in my head the controller is the bottleneck. I have asked Dell about connecting the drives directly to the MB, or upgrading the RAID controller to x4, but Dell won't quote or support either of these configurations.

Before I start testing the SSDs in a different system, I was wondering if anyone had any experience with connecting these drives on a x2 card vs a x4 card? These drives are capable of 7200MB/s sequential read, 1500000 IOPS random read, 4800MB/s sequential write and 1150000 IOPS random write. Which of these specs should I expect to suffer with the x2 card?

Do you have any other suggestions on how to improve my storage performance?

[BrusC_Intel]

Hello, skeenan.

Thank you for posting on the Intel Community Support forums.

I received your thread regarding the P5800X, and I will bee reviewing this with you.

We do not have any official documentation involving tests with this drive in configurations other than PCIe 4.0 x4, so it would be necessary to perform your own tests to see how using it in a x2 configuration will impact its performance in that particular system.

I can keep the ticket open in case other community users would like to offer any suggestions or comments, and I will follow up on January 23rd just in case.

Regards,

Bruce C.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[BrusC_Intel]

Hello, skeenan.

Good day,

I wanted to follow up on this thread to check if we can help you with other questions.

If that is not the case, and other interactions do not take place, I will close the thread on January 26th.

Regards,

Bruce C.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[BrusC_Intel]

Hello, skeenan.

This post is to inform you about the thread closure.

We previously shared that there is no official documentation involving tests with this drive in configurations other than PCIe 4.0 x4, so it would be necessary to perform your own tests to see how using it in a x2 configuration will impact its performance in that particular system.

The thread will be closed right now and it will no longer be monitored by Intel support. If you require any type of assistance from Intel in the future, please open a new thread, or contact us using any of the available support methods:

- https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/contact-intel.html

Best regards,

Bruce C.

Intel Customer Support Technician