M.2 SSD recognized, but not showing up

[argeru]

Sandisk 120gb SSD (OS) / 2TB HDD (MS)
Rest of my build is in the corner \/

Just got a brand new 250Gb M.2 Samsung 850 Pro for some extra solid state storage...
Threw it into my mobo and screwed it in place, then booted up the uefi.
It was showing up in the correct bios locations as a usable drive, and I made sure every applicable option was set accordingly.
Started up Windows (7) and checked My Computer...no drive. Checked Device Manager and it showed up under disk drives. Opened Disk Manager and it asked me to "initialize drive 0" so I clicked yes. After that nothing happened, disk manager showed no additional disk, just the sandisk and the hdd.

I went into the uefi and double checked everything, then I flashed my bios to the latest version, made sure drivers/windows etc. were up to date.

So basically my motherboard sees that it's installed, but disk manager doesn't, so I can't format it or use it at all?

 

[Boogieman_WD]

Hey there, argeru.

Basically it sounds like you did everything right. It's normal not to show up in Windows Explorer (My Computer, This PC) as you should initialize all the new drives you install to your computer. After that you should be able to partition and format the drive's capacity as you see fit. But it seems you never got to do that part as it disappeared. I'd suggest that you try the SSD with a different port if you have another one available, to see if the same thing happens, or even better - with a different computer. If it shows up in Disk Management or Device Manager, you could try testing it with a diagnostic tool, to see if everything's OK with it.

Hope that helps. Please let me know how it goes.
Boogieman_WD

 

[Shaun o]

Click on start.

Click on your search box and type: Disk man.

Select from the search options results, create and format hard disk partitions.

Click on the tab option in the new box that opens Action, Rescan Disks.

Locate your M2 drive in the listings.

Format it again by right clicking on the drive on the right window where the capacity is displayed.
Once done right click again and select mark partition as active/ set to online.
The left grayed out box should now say Online for the disk status mode.

It should then show up in my computer or explorer.

 

[argeru]

Hey there, argeru.

Basically it sounds like you did everything right. It's normal not to show up in Windows Explorer (My Computer, This PC) as you should initialize all the new drives you install to your computer. After that you should be able to partition and format the drive's capacity as you see fit. But it seems you never got to do that part as it disappeared. I'd suggest that you try the SSD with a different port if you have another one available, to see if the same thing happens, or even better - with a different computer. If it shows up in Disk Management or Device Manager, you could try testing it with a diagnostic tool, to see if everything's OK with it.

Hope that helps. Please let me know how it goes.
Boogieman_WD

This board only has one M.2 slot, and of course this is my only pc.
I'm putting together a friends new build when we get the parts in later this week, I can try it out on that as I'm putting it together.
But for now, what kind of diagnostic tools are you thinking?
My only hesitation is that since it's not formatted or partitioned it might not bee seen by any software.

 

[argeru]

Click on start.

Click on your search box and type: Disk man.

Select from the search options results, create and format hard disk partitions.

Click on the tab option in the new box that opens Action, Rescan Disks.

Locate your M2 drive in the listings.

Format it again by right clicking on the drive on the right window where the capacity is displayed.
Once done right click again and select mark partition as active/ set to online.
The left grayed out box should now say Online for the disk status mode.

It should then show up in my computer or explorer.

Shaun, I tried that. It's not unallocated, it's simply not showing in disk manager at all.

 

[Boogieman_WD]

This board only has one M.2 slot, and of course this is my only pc.
I'm putting together a friends new build when we get the parts in later this week, I can try it out on that as I'm putting it together.
But for now, what kind of diagnostic tools are you thinking?
My only hesitation is that since it's not formatted or partitioned it might not bee seen by any software.

It is possible for the diagnostic tool/utility not to be able to recognize the drive if the OS does not "see" it, but it's worth the try if you have no other options.
As for the tool/utility, usually the drive manufacturers offer such diagnostic programs for their devices, but in case you don't find one on the SSD manufacturer's website, you could check those links and try a couple of the suggested programs, to see if you have any luck with them: http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/answers/id-1926483/ssd-diagnostic-tools.html & http://pcsupport.about.com/od/toolsofthetrade/tp/tophddiag.htm.

Please keep us posted.

 

[argeru]

So I booted up my pc the other morning and all of a sudden disk manager listed it as a usable drive, I formatted it and now it is good to go...
Not sure what happened, Windows updated before I logged on that might have something to do with it.

First thing I did was benchmark it of course, 1197 with AS SSD.
This thing is very fast for a sata drive.

 

[Boogieman_WD]

I guess so. It's possible for some sort of incompatibility issue to cause similar problems. Sometimes updating the BIOS/UEFI might fix it, sometimes updating the drive's firmware is a good idea and sometimes (like in your case) a simple OS update might do the trick.
Anyway, I'd suggest that you check the drive with a diagnostic tool (not just with the benchmark tool) to make sure that there are no errors whatsoever. And always keep a backup of your most important files, just to be on the safe side.

Cheers!