Hi everyone. I’ll try to explain my situation and what I’m trying to achieve, and hopefully someone has some suggestions or advice!
Aim: To have Windows installed on 2 separate SSD’s that I can choose to boot between as and when I like, without entering the BIOS all the time. The reason is that I have my primary drive for general use, and I want to use a secondary drive to boot into LaunchBox and turn it into a games console. I was going to buy a separate PC but decided to save money and try and incorporate my current PC as it is a decent spec.
Current attempt: I have my primary SSD installed internally as normal. I bought an external enclosure case for the secondary SSD to be connected and booted via USB. This case has a physical switch on it to turn the drive on and off. So my plan was to set the set the secondary drive as #1 boot priority and primary as #2 priority. I would switch the secondary on so it boots straight into it, then when I wanted to use my computer as normal and use the other drive I would switch the secondary off so it boots into primary.
Problem: My plan sort of works. It does boot from USB no problem, and when I shut the PC down and switch the drive off, it then does boot to the primary as I hoped. HOWEVER, now the bios doesn’t seem to save the boot priority because when I turn the secondary drive back on, it STILL boots into the primary, and I have to go into the bios and set up the boot order all over again.
So my questions are, is the BIOS boot order resetting itself once the secondary drive is switched off? Does the fact I’m booting from USB automatically give it the lowest priority? My BIOS doesn’t seem to allow me to choose “boot from USB” in general as a priority, rather it makes me pick the drive specifically, which disappears once it’s turned off.
OR, am I looking at this set up completely wrong and is there a simpler way to achieve what I’m aiming for. I just want an easy way to chose which drive to boot from, preferably by some physical switch rather than entering bios and choosing the hard drive. Because I will be swapping between the two white frequently and the idea is to flip a switch, jump on the couch and pick my up controller without having to walk over to my desk and use my keyboard/mouse to select the drive via bios.
I hope this all makes sense, and any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Aim: To have Windows installed on 2 separate SSD’s that I can choose to boot between as and when I like, without entering the BIOS all the time. The reason is that I have my primary drive for general use, and I want to use a secondary drive to boot into LaunchBox and turn it into a games console. I was going to buy a separate PC but decided to save money and try and incorporate my current PC as it is a decent spec.
Current attempt: I have my primary SSD installed internally as normal. I bought an external enclosure case for the secondary SSD to be connected and booted via USB. This case has a physical switch on it to turn the drive on and off. So my plan was to set the set the secondary drive as #1 boot priority and primary as #2 priority. I would switch the secondary on so it boots straight into it, then when I wanted to use my computer as normal and use the other drive I would switch the secondary off so it boots into primary.
Problem: My plan sort of works. It does boot from USB no problem, and when I shut the PC down and switch the drive off, it then does boot to the primary as I hoped. HOWEVER, now the bios doesn’t seem to save the boot priority because when I turn the secondary drive back on, it STILL boots into the primary, and I have to go into the bios and set up the boot order all over again.
So my questions are, is the BIOS boot order resetting itself once the secondary drive is switched off? Does the fact I’m booting from USB automatically give it the lowest priority? My BIOS doesn’t seem to allow me to choose “boot from USB” in general as a priority, rather it makes me pick the drive specifically, which disappears once it’s turned off.
OR, am I looking at this set up completely wrong and is there a simpler way to achieve what I’m aiming for. I just want an easy way to chose which drive to boot from, preferably by some physical switch rather than entering bios and choosing the hard drive. Because I will be swapping between the two white frequently and the idea is to flip a switch, jump on the couch and pick my up controller without having to walk over to my desk and use my keyboard/mouse to select the drive via bios.
I hope this all makes sense, and any advice would be greatly appreciated!
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