[SOLVED] Long Running Issue with SSD's not Booting Inconsistently

[paulstringini]

Nearly three years ago I put together a machine around a Gigabyte 990FXA-UD3 R5 motherboard. The build included a pair of Samsung 850 EVO SSD's and a pair of good old-fashioned HDD's.

From the beginning the SSD's were a problem. I had to plug and unplug the wires and put them in different configurations and eventually the motherboard would notice they were there. This problem occurs ALMOST every time I shut the computer down (but not USUALLY during a reboot) So I basically leave the machine on all the time, only shutting it off rarely.

The other day, I finished a big project and wanted to swap out one of my HDD's for a bigger one. I copied all the data using my external drive mount and then I shut down the computer so I could install the drive.

Now I can't get the thing to boot, no matter what configuration I put the drives in, it won't boot. I usually win after rebooting 10-20 times, but this time I just can't get it to boot the drive. The bios recognizes the drive, I tell it to boot the drive, but it just keeps telling me to select the proper boot device or insert boot media.

The drive is fine, I plugged it into my external drive mount and checked it on another machine. Everything is A-OK. Like I said, I've been dealing with this for three years, I'm not sure what the difference now is. I disconnected the new drive, I disconnected all drives other than the boot drive (which is marked and confirmed as the boot disk)

I already have the most recent version of the BIOS installed, I've wanted to solve this for three years, and I've been trying. Someone with a similar issue on a similar motherboard said they had to upgrade to BIOS version F8, but on Gigabyte's site it stops at F2 the version I already have.

I'm just about ready to give up. I've ordered a couple of HDD's to clone my SSD's and see if it is an issue with the motherboard. I've looked around the boards and I'm not finding anything useful. Any ideas?

 

[Damago]

There is some problem with Gigabyte boards and SSD and Windows Boot Manager. I have a Gigabyte intel based gaming-5 series motherboard with 2 ssd disks, one is M.2 type 970 EVO Samsung series PCI-e interface disk and another is 840 series Samsung SSD (with firmware upgraded!) and it:

• sometimes sees the same bootloader twice (in BIOS when you are choosing boot priority you are presented with the same boot manager listed twice)
• very often does not see one of the SSD disks (not presented in boot menu at all)
• often when you choose the correct windows bootloader from menu it still cannot boot (a message on black screen that the boot device does not contain correct boot sector)
• sometimes when I enter the boot menu (F12 key) I can correct it somehow but not from the main bios menu.
• I have manager to boot properly when I have chosen the EMPTY slot in boot menu (F12key menu)!!!!!!
• very often when 2 SSDs are present I cannot select the UEFI USB device to boot from (does not see appriopriate entry) but once I have managed to boot from UEFI USB device when I have chosen .... windows bootloader from menu.

It seems like the information in BIOS menu is somehow random and does not reflect what the BIOS internally thinks, and the order of disks in menu is irrelevant to some internal bios structures and the choices on what to boot are taken somewhere outside BIOS menu.