GA-P35-DS3L: How to always check for bootable USB flash drive?

[Blick]

MoBo: Gigabyte P35-DS3L with Award BIOS (v6.xx I think) current release F9
I have a 4 GB USB flash drive that is bootable. It is set to "Boot as HDD (C: 2PTNS)". I assume 2PTNS means "two partitions". I used RMPrepUSB v2.1.1 to do this. In the board's BIOS I changed "First Boot Device" to "USB-HDD" and the second to "Hard Disk". Then I changed "Hard Disk Boot Priority" to: 1) USB-HDD0 : SanDisk U3 Cruzer and 2) CH0 M. : Intel SSD. It boots from the flash drive fine this way, but when I take the flash drive out and restart, it resets the boot priority putting the SSD on SATA channel 0 back to first . I have to go into BIOS, change the settings again, save, and reboot. It's very annoying to do this every time I want to boot into one of my ISO's on there. How do I make the BIOS always look for a removable USB HDD and give it priority if found? It's easy with my optical drive, but I guess that is because it is never removed. My ThinkPad T60 can also easily do what I'm asking here. Is there hope for my desktop? Thanks for reading this.

 

[Blick]

Nobody has any ideas?

 

[steve6375]

Nobody has any ideas?

I have seen many BIOSes behave like this. It can't be fixed unless you can update the BIOS to one that has been fixed.
The best you can do is configure the BIOS so that you get a Boot Menu (usually called BBS or BIOS Boot Selection menu) and then choose the USB device.
Another thing to watch out for is that if you format the USB device as a USB-HDD and then boot it, then reformat it as a USB-FDD and then try to boot it, the BIOS will still think it is a USB-HDD device!

i.e.
1. format as USB-HDD
2. Boot from it
3. Switch off PC
4. reformat USB drive as USB-FDD in another system
5. connect USb drive to PC
6. Switch in PC --> BIOS still thinks the USb device is a USB-HDD device
7. Switch off PC
8. Remove USB device
9. Switch on PC
10. allow to boot (or try to boot)
11. Switch off PC
12. connect USB drive and set boot order in BIOS --> BIOS now sees it as USB-FDD!


i.e. the BIOS does not detect the USB device 'type' unless it is detected as a 'new' device.