Gigabyte z170 issues?

[Ve1ocity08]

Gigabyte z170 gaming 7 motherboard giving me all sorts of problems. First I was having troubles getting Windows 10 to recognize my m.2 ssds. Initially the motherboard posted just fine and it was able to recognize both ssds and i was also able to put them in RAID 0 as I intended within the BIOS. Like most I had some issues with getting Windows to recognize a bootable RAID 0 m.2 SSD. I was able to overcome this and install Windows 10 Pro on M.2 ssds in RAID 0. I was able to install all the latest drivers utilities onto the motherboard / windows and even was able to play some games prior to the following incident. I was on the home screen of the desktop and was about to restart the PC when I noticed it froze. I simply hit the reset switch on my case. The PC reset but would not post. At this point I was able to still get into the BIOS this is also where I noticed the motherboard was all the sudden not seeing the m.2 ssds. Not wanting to take any chances I decided to load the defaults of the BIOS this is when I received an a0 error code which states according to the motherboards manual "IDE initialization started" as of right now my keyboard lights up since I have LEDs on it and I confirm that it is not frozen and able to turn off the num lock indicated by the LED however I cannot enter the BIOS by pressing the Del key or the boot menu the screen is stuck at the opening of the motherboards logo. So I feel I have 2 errors 1. my m.2 ssds or not being read 2. I can't access the BIOS and attempts to fix my first issue. I've tried clearing CMOS, reseating the ssds. This is a new-build and my specs are as follows... CPU 6700k Skylake. 32gb veil Evo x DDR 4. Pny gtx 1070 . Samsung 960 Evo 250gb raid 0 . Right now I'm at the point of possibly RMA the motherboard it is the only thing I can think of that is causing me problems. But what perplexes me is I was able to install Windows play games as if it was a nothing wrong.

 

[kanewolf]

M.2 SSD in RAID 0 is such a waste of effort and risk to your data for no real world benefit. Why not simplify your life by putting in ONE SSD. Make that SSD your C: drive and get your computer to work. Just because something is possible doesn't mean it is a good idea -- like RAID 0 for M.2 SSDs....

 

[Ve1ocity08]

I'm going to try one SSD today obviously I'll have to reformat if I can even get that far. my plan today is drain Loop start disconnecting everything one at a time and trying to get the motherboard to post. If I can get it to post I will seriously consider using only one m.2 SSD.

 

[Ve1ocity08]

I was able to narrow it down to the m.2 ssds or the actual m.2 connectors. I was able to swap one out with the other an attempt to get into the BIOS neither had an effect, I also tried them both in different connectors. So the issue is definitely derived from the m.2 ssds. I haven't ruled out a driver issue I will attempt reinstall drivers, but I may need to reinstall windows to do so.

 

[jay_rogers]

Have you bent the CPU pins on the motherboard? I had the same issue because of this mistake.

 

[Ve1ocity08]

No CPU pins bent I checked that previously when this issue started and I just double checked it today when I had some time I went over it with a flashlight and truly check for any slight Bend. I previously saw your issue and read through it and that was one of the first things I checked however I neglected to mention this prior. Furthermore the motherboard will post with just regular hard drives in it but when I put any one of the 960 ssds into the m.2 connector the motherboard will not post I have since RMA both 960s. And I should be getting Replacements back relatively soon.