Move M.2 NVME to new Motherboard...

[drea.drechsler]

I've a 960 EVO NVME and I want to move it to a new motherboard. Of course, it's initialized, partitioned and formatted with Windows 10.

My concern is: will there be any issue with the new MoBo recognizing the drive? I can understand it may not boot to the Windows10 installation, or if it does Windows may not operate correctly necessitating repair or re-install. But my concern is will the BIOS identify the drive in it's the M.2 / PCIEx4 slot at least so that I COULD re-install Windows?

Do I have to do anything to it before removing from the old system before it will be recognized? Like maybe initializing it again?

Or...what?

Any ideas or suggestions welcome! Thanks.

 

[rgd1101]

the old and the new motherboard is?

 

[drea.drechsler]

the old and the new motherboard is?

Old Motherboard : MSI AB350M Mortar

New Motherboard: I don't know! Maybe an ASUS B350M TUF, maybe a B450M TUF. And maybe a Gigabyte B450 AORUS M. I'm still up in the air, waiting on some test reviews of the new crop of B450's instead of speculations with nothing more than pictures to go on.

But I don't think this should be a mobo-specific answer should it? Of course, there will always be examples of piss-poor BIOS but in general shouldn't it be something a BIOS either SHOULD do...or maybe something impossible because of how PCIex4 NVME works?

 

[karenjoly]

It depends on whether you install the m.2 into a high end or low end board. The former will use it like any other drive , the latter will require switches and settings and a special mystical invocation.

 

[drea.drechsler]

It depends on whether you install the m.2 into a high end or low end board. The former will use it like any other drive , the latter will require switches and settings and a special mystical invocation.

Well...being B350 and B450 mATX boards these certainly aren't high end, but also being of 'latest design' for Ryzen they are advertised and specc'd to natively support NVME, PCIe-x4 as the boot drive else I wouldn't even consider them. I disagree it works like any other drive upon plug-in, however. That's because the M.2 slot shares it's bandwidth with the two processor SATA ports with Ryzen processors; when I plug in an NVME it should disable the two SATA ports. So SOME magic does have to happen, i'm just not sure if there is any intervention to help it along on my part.

My current motherboard's manual offers not one smidgen of advice on this, which isn't a surprise at all.

I'd have highest confidence putting a 'new from mfr.' NVME in the board would go well, with the BIOS recognizing it so that a Win10 install could proceed. My only concern is only whether moving an NVME, which has already been initialized, partitioned and formatted, to another motherboard should work smoothly.

I'm gathering there is not a lot of people experienced at transferring an NVME to a new motherboard!

 

[USAFRet]

Anytime you try to move a drive...any drive...with the OS on it brings a possibility of complete fail.
A clean install is strongly recommended, if not required.


There should be no issue (pursuant to the motherboard directions) with the new hardware simply seeing the actual drive. Just like it was the first time with the old motherboard.