[SOLVED] Cannot figure out which component makes it unable to boot up windows 10

[PeachyKireen]

Hi,

I’m new to building pc, and I thought I’d give it a try. I visited pcpartpicker to check the compatibility of each components so I wouldn’t run into any unexpected issues. Unfortunately, if I’m here today, is because I ran into some issues. It all comes down to booting up windows 10. Once I was done building the pc with the following specs:

• Case: NZXT H510 - CA H510B
• RAM: Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB DDR4 3200Mhz
• SSD: Samsung 970 EVO Plus 1TB - M.2 (2280)
• Motherboard: ASUS ROG Strix B450-F Gaming II AMD AM4
• Power supply: EVGA SuperNOVA 650 Ga, 80 plus gold 650w
• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 5600G - Series Cezanne (Zen 3)

I chose to go with a APU since the market is crazy at the moment and I thought it’d be alright to start a build with that. Anyways, I’m able to POST it, enter the BIOS and stay within it, change settings and all that. However, as soon as I reset it to boot up windows 10, it either way freezes to a black screen, loads the “press any keys to boot up CD/DVD” line then goes to the windows logo then freezes. I never get the same pattern, so I thought it was a RAM problem. Ended up returning the aforementioned RAM, and bought the same model yesterday, thinking it could have been a defect with the component.

Then, I decided to download windows 10 on flash drive thinking it was the CD that made the whole thing freeze. Made sure that the USB (and CD too) were the first thing to run from the BIOS menu. Tried to research if I had to have special settings on from the BIOS, tweaked around with Legacy or UEFI setting, still nothing.

Additionally, I tried downloading Linux Mint with a flash drive, got to booting menu. After pressing “start install”, it either would restart the pc or just go to a black screen and do nothing.

At this point, I am a little lost since I don’t really know what to do. I’m not sure whether the motherboard is defective, or even the SSD. Always stuck on a boot loop, sometimes get the blinking white cursor over black screen.

If anyone ever encountered this type of issue, I would really appreciate their feedback on how they dealt with it. If you need more information, I’ll be happy to share. Thank you for your time!

 

[JohnBonhamsGhost]

if you have altered any BIOS settings, choose to 'Load Optimized Defaults'.
and then try booting into the OS one more time afterwards.

I thought it was a RAM problem

have you verified that this RAM kit is supported by your specific motherboard?
you would need to check the motherboard QVL on it's manufacturer support webpage.

even though PCPartPicker may show it as a compatible component it does not mean that this specific motherboard actually supports it.
just that in general it is a DDR4 kit that will fit in the board.

I’m not sure whether the motherboard is defective, or even the SSD

search around for an old drive to troubleshoot with.

also if you can load the Windows 10 USB installer try to enter it's troubleshooting options, run a CMD prompt, and run CHKDSK to see if the SSD may be faulty.

 

[PeachyKireen]

if you have altered any BIOS settings, choose to 'Load Optimized Defaults'.
and then try booting into the OS one more time afterwards.

have you verified that this RAM kit is supported by your specific motherboard?
you would need to check the motherboard QVL on it's manufacturer support webpage.

even though PCPartPicker may show it as a compatible component it does not mean that this specific motherboard actually supports it.
just that in general it is a DDR4 kit that will fit in the board.

search around for an old drive to troubleshoot with.

also if you can load the Windows 10 USB installer try to enter it's troubleshooting options, run a CMD prompt, and run CHKDSK to see if the SSD may be faulty.

I genuinely appreciate your thoughtful feedback, like I said I’m new to this all pc building and I thought that there wasn’t such thing as SSD incompatibility. I was wrong, my SSD wasn’t supported by my motherboard. I’ll try to return my current mobo and buy a more recent one. Thanks again !

 

[JohnBonhamsGhost]

I thought that there wasn’t such thing as SSD incompatibility...
my SSD wasn’t supported by my motherboard.

the compatibility is usually determined by your CPU & motherboard.
certain CPUs don't support certain types of NVMe M.2 even if the motherboard may have a proper slot.
sometimes certain slots will be disabled or just won't run at rated speeds.
but this B450-F Gaming II does support PCIe 3.0 x4 2280 drives with 1st, 2nd, & 3rd gen Ryzen.

how did you determine this motherboard was incompatible with your current drive?

 

[PeachyKireen]

how did you determine this motherboard was incompatible with your current drive?

To be completely honest, I just gave a look to the ROG STRIX B450-F Gaming II Device QVL that you recommended and the only SSD supported by that mobo are the following:

• Samsung 860 pro 256GB
• Samsung 850 EVO 1TB
• Samsung 750 EVO 120
  
  And it looks like the one I have isn’t supported :/ I’ll probably come back here once the new motherboard arrives.

 

[JohnBonhamsGhost]

it looks like the one I have isn’t supported

have you tried the drive installed in both M.2 slots?
only one of them supports 2280 devices.
the manual should report which slot is necessary to use for this type of drive.