How to fix storage throughput lag on ASRock Z370M Pro4?
Whenever I stepped into complex areas like the Sumeru rainforest, the screen would just freeze for a fraction of a second, which is an absolute nightmare in an open-world game. I noticed the M.2 interface on the ASRock Z370M Pro4 was struggling with high-frequency random reads, with response times swinging wildly between 25ms - 62ms. My first instinct was to bump the virtual memory up to 32GB, but that was a total waste of time; it actually added more background read/write pressure and left me scratching my head. I eventually dove into the BIOS, switched the PCIe link speed from 'Auto' to 'Gen3' forced mode, and slammed the latest chipset drivers. In CrystalDiskMark 4K random read tests, the numbers jumped from 38MB/s to a much steadier 62MB/s - 68MB/s. Funnily enough, the system had a brief identification delay at the boot screen right after the tweak, which only cleared up once I disabled Fast Boot. The southbridge temperature stayed chill at 42℃ - 50℃. Checking the performance panel now, the data flow is rock steady and the interface protocol is locked in.
