In the review of the ASUS Pro TRX50 Sage Wendel mentions that the SlimSAS port could be used for PCIE or SATA. I was expecting to find an option in the bios to switch the port, but can’t seem to find it. Does anyone have a hint on how I could use this port to connect a few remaining SATA drives (in have 6 in total, so the first 4 are on the SATA ports).
Thank you
Igor
Thank you! I have tried using the cable below, that connects mechanically, but the discs are not detected. I am thinking this is because the port only speaks PCIE and not SATA?
I asked myself similar questions. Specifically, if the ASUS WRX90 board could do SATA on the two SlimSAS ports.
From what I could learn, it’s not possible because the SlimSAS ports are connected to the chipset, which doesn’t support SATA on it’s PCIe lanes.
Only the CPU can (optionally) provide SATA instead of PCIe on certain lanes. Because of that (?), the ASRock WRX90 board has 1 SlimSAS port (PCIe 4 only) directly connected to the CPU. The MCIO ports also support SATA mode because they’re connected to the right lanes on the CPU. It would’ve been better if they just added 3 MCIO ports and only 1 SlimSAS port connected to the chipset. They waste 4 PCIe 5.0 lanes that way.
I think the ASUS board could support SATA in 2 of the M2 slots if I understand the block diagram correctly (it’s full of typos and the USB4 chip is missing…). But that probably would require a M2 to MCIO/SlimSAS adapter and an updated BIOS.
It’s annoying! Why couldn’t they just add 4 MCIO connectors and 2 M.2 slots (2 shared).
Now I have to decide if I should get the ASUS board and at least 2 M.2 to MCIO adapters, which are not yet available, or the ASRock with too many fans and 4 PCIe 5 lanes “less”.
Maybe I’m overthinking this 
Hey, I wonder if the ASRock board is still usable with just two fans…
Regarding the SlimSAS ports on the WRX90, will a drive like this Micron NVME SSD connect to them, with the appropriate cable?
i was just thinking about this no sata ports on the sage so this is on my wish list
Yes, the SlimSAS port will work just fine with a U.2/U.3 NVMe drive. You will need a readily available SlimSAS 4i to U.2 (SFF-8639) cable, which includes a SATA power pigtail for the drive.
Cabling will be a nightmare for 20 SATA drives with a SATA PCIe card. I’d go for a SAS HBA in IT mode, along with an expander (or, if affordable, a DAS enclosure with built-in expander so you need just one SAS cable from your case to the DAS).
