[SOLVED] Having an issue where a new m.2 SSD is causing a boot loop

[OscarCTango]

So, my girlfriend recently decided to upgrade her laptop (Acer Nitro AN515-55) with some better storage. She bought a 4TB Samsung 990 Evo Plus on my recommendation and once the thing is installed her computer will just sit in a boot loop not even taking her to trouble shooting or safe mode. When windows does report the error it lists KERNEL SECURITY CHECK FAILURE and then begins the loop again. In an effort to try and get this fixed we have:

1 Downloaded the drivers for the new SSD
2 Downloaded the Samsung Magic program the drive recommends
3 Tried reinstalling the drive a few times just in case
4 Checked her bios for problems but its a fairly limited one so she can't manually enable drives or the like
5 Assumed the drive was dead and got a replacement

So today with the replacement, same thing. Clearly not the drive... probably. I guess she could just be that unlucky. I started wondering if it was the port so we went and moved the original drive from port 1 to 2 and that worked fine. She had to safe boot initially but everything ran no loop or anything. Just guessing at this point we put the new drive in slot 1 and it worked! Except drive management couldn't detect the drive so I sent her to BIOS to see about needing to manually activate it and bam, back to the boot loop. We're at our wits end here, I've never had this kind of an issue with new drives before, I'm wondering if anyone here is some kind of wizard who can diagnose and fix this issue?

 

[Lutfij]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

Did you make sure to update the BIOS for your laptop before dropping in the new SSD?

 

[OscarCTango]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

Did you make sure to update the BIOS for your laptop before dropping in the new SSD?

We did not. I know BIOS updates can cause problems sometimes so I've been saving that as a last resort. Guess we're getting there though.

 

[evermorex76]

Just quick reading and 1TB was the max with that laptop and they may have BIOS limitations going beyond that. Crucial recommends up to 4TB drives but they also quote the spec of max 1TB (way to be clear and helpful). Usually those specs are just because that's all the company bothered to test up to and offer as options, but it could also be a true limitation. There could be something lame like a BIOS address space limitation that shouldn't exist these days. Could have like a 2TB limit.

 

[OscarCTango]

Just quick reading and 1TB was the max with that laptop and they may have BIOS limitations going beyond that. Crucial recommends up to 4TB drives but they also quote the spec of max 1TB (way to be clear and helpful). Usually those specs are just because that's all the company bothered to test up to and offer as options, but it could also be a true limitation. There could be something lame like a BIOS address space limitation that shouldn't exist these days. Could have like a 2TB limit.

Oh damn, that's an interesting spec to find out about. Might have been a contributing factor for sure but we got the 4TB working just now!

 

[OscarCTango]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

Did you make sure to update the BIOS for your laptop before dropping in the new SSD?

So, after a BIOS update and then finding several hidden options in her BIOS that were hidden by the manufacturer this is the solution! Turns out she was on 1.0 BIOS and they were up to like 2.3 lol. Thank you for the suggestion, it gave us the push to update her BIOS and get this done!