Question M.2 SSD is not bootable on two seperate motherboards ?

May 10, 2024
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System:
Asus Rog Strix B550-xe mobo into a Asus Rog Strix B550-f
Amd ryzen 9 5900x (no oc'ing of this, ram or GPU)
Corsair Vengeance 32g 3200mhz DDR4 Ram
GeForce 2070rtx
Samsung 980 Pro 2TB M.2 NVMe SSD
Windows 10 Pro

I'll be as succinct as possible: Custom built PC that, one day upon returning home, was in the BIOS. The mobo had an A9 error, and my nvme was not listed as a bootable drive although the BIOS could see it.
There was nothing preceding this that indicated any problem.

I tried a number of different things, including swapping slots, changing boot options (CSM etc), and running a self test in BIOS. This would always result in hanging. The longest I left it for was about 15 minutes before restarting.

Eventually after some more fiddling, the computer wouldn't post after a D0 error. After some slot and ram swapping, it eventually posted right back into A9 again. This led me to believe it was a motherboard issue, so I got a tech around to have a look. He tried some of the same things and, after also trying to flash the bios in which nothing would happen (no error, just went back to the previous screen), and trying to see if the disk could be read through a windows recovery USB (it could, it detected the w10 installation), he said it's more than likely the mobo.

Thus, enter the new mobo with the same issue (the ram is fine with this board, though). The nvme SSD is detected but is not selectable from boot options. I can access the directories through the BIOS flash utility, so the file system seems intact. It still hangs the BIOS during self test. The only difference was I got the fTPM warning during boot (it said it detected a new CPU). Initially I selected no, it then restarted and kicked me back to BIOS once more. Disabling and re-enabling fTPM does nothing, and I also tried selecting yes to the same result.

So aside from just getting a new drive to see if that works, is there anything else I could try? Could this also possibly be a CPU problem (the tech floated the possibility)? Any help much appreciated 🙏
 
my nvme was not listed as a bootable drive although the BIOS could see it.
So aside from just getting a new drive to see if that works, is there anything else I could try?
Is "Samsung 980 Pro 2TB M.2 NVMe SSD" - the only drive in system?
If you have other drives also, then bootloader may be located on some other drive.
Bootable is only drive with bootloader on it (not necessary the same drive with windows installed on).
 
May 10, 2024
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Is "Samsung 980 pro 2tb nvme m2 SSD" - the only drive in system?
If you have other drives also, then bootloader may be located on some other drive.
Bootable is only drive with bootloader on it (not necessary the same drive with windows installed on).
Yes it's the only drive. I have a seperate HDD hub that is disconnected as to not cause any potential issues.
 
May 10, 2024
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Can you boot from windows installation media,
open command prompt (press Shift+F10),
execute following commands and show screenshot?
diskpart
list disk
select disk 0
list partition
detail disk

Ok so I can't seem to find a way to attach a photo from my phone on here. Embarassing I know.

I did as you asked and the drive is detected and listed. It bizarrely says it only has 1024kb of free space, though.

It has four partitions: System 100MB
Reserved 16MB
Primary 1862MB
Recovery 509MB

For detail disk, it says: Status is online
Path/target 0
Current read-only state: Yes
Read-only: No
Boot disk: No
Pagefile disk: No
All the rest: No

Has three volumes:
0 / C / NTFS / PARTITION / 1862MB / HEALTHY/ -
1 / - / FAT32 / PARTITION / 100MB / HEALTHY/ HIDDEN
2 / - / NTFS / PARTITION / 509MB / HEALTHY / HIDDEN

Will the upgrade option on the recovery disk delete my data? Don't think it will but just wanted to be sure. Probably moot anyway as I don't think it's going to find the disk.

Thanks champ
 
Ok so I can't seem to find a way to attach a photo from my phone on here. Embarassing I know.
You upload screenshot to imgur.com and post link to it.
Press <New Post> in imgur.com page - upper left corner.
For detail disk, it says: Status is online
Current read-only state: Yes
Drive has gone into read only mode.
This means - critical SMART parameter has been tripped and drive has locked itself to preserve data.

You get a new drive and recover data from old drive. All should be recoverable.
If you still have warranty, then RMA old drive. Unless you have sensitive personal data on it. You can't erase it.
 
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May 10, 2024
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You upload screenshot to imgur.com and post link to it.
Press <New Post> in imgur.com page - upper left corner.

Drive has gone into read only mode.
This means - critical SMART parameter has been tripped and drive has locked itself to preserve data.

You get a new drive and recover data from old drive. All should be recoverable.
If you still have warranty, then RMA old drive. Unless you have sensitive personal data on it. You can't erase it.

Legend. That was it. New drive worked, and all is working again.

When I was installing the new drive, I thought about just re-adding the locked drive to see if I could get it fixed in windows. Would that work, or would it require specialist tools to unlock etc?

Thanks again for your help.
 
No, it's not fixable. When the drive does this it means it's pretty much toast, and it's a way of trying to preserve your data so you can lift it from the drive.

As said, if it's in warranty and you're not paranoid about sending it back to the seller, RMA it; otherwise write it off.
 
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May 10, 2024
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Drive was dead and data irretrievable. Only lasted two and a half years out of the 5 year warranty. Got a full refund though which was nice.

Thanks one and all for the help.