[SOLVED] NVMe takes too long to POST + Problems

[naabjenia]

Hello, everyone!

First of all, I'm sorry if this is the wrong section, as I am not completely sure it's a storage problem or a motherboard problem.

Anyway, I have recently bought new PC parts and I used them with an old SATA 3 SSD (a Kingston A400 of 480 GB) as my main drive, and I had no problems with it.
However, as time went by, I needed more storage, so I got a new SSD that could make use of what my motherboard offers: a NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD.
First problem I encountered was that, when installing it on the PCIe 4.0 M.2 slot, I could not get the computer to POST at all. The fans would spin up at 100% indefinitely. Note that I did not have this problem at all if I put the SSD on the Gen 3 M.2 slot.
So I updated the BIOS to the latest version then (F7) and I actually got it to work on the Gen 4 slot.
The problem is that, more often than not, the computer will have a boot failure when I start it up. If the computer sleeps and I turn it on again, it is very likely I will have that problem.
Another thing is that it actually takes longer to post than when I used the old SATA SSD as my main drive, sometimes it takes like 10 seconds to actually post before it boots (after that, it is quick).
What could be causing this?

Here are my PC specs:
CPU: Intel i5 11400
Mobo: Aorus Elite B560M
RAM: 2x Crucial Ballistix Sport LT 8 GB 3200 MHz
GPU: GTX 1060 6 GB
SSD: WD Black SN850 (WDS500G1X0E) <--- this is the new SSD
OS: Windows 11 Pro

P.S.: it is quite annoying, because until it posts, the fans spin at 100% for like 10 seconds, and I think it could be bad for them. Also, I have not tried this with Windows 10 or other OS, only Windows 11.

Thanks a lot!

 

[dwd999]

Hello, everyone!

First of all, I'm sorry if this is the wrong section, as I am not completely sure it's a storage problem or a motherboard problem.

Anyway, I have recently bought new PC parts and I used them with an old SATA 3 SSD (a Kingston A400 of 480 GB) as my main drive, and I had no problems with it.
However, as time went by, I needed more storage, so I got a new SSD that could make use of what my motherboard offers: a NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD.
First problem I encountered was that, when installing it on the PCIe 4.0 M.2 slot, I could not get the computer to POST at all. The fans would spin up at 100% indefinitely. Note that I did not have this problem at all if I put the SSD on the Gen 3 M.2 slot.
So I updated the BIOS to the latest version then (F7) and I actually got it to work on the Gen 4 slot.
The problem is that, more often than not, the computer will have a boot failure when I start it up. If the computer sleeps and I turn it on again, it is very likely I will have that problem.
Another thing is that it actually takes longer to post than when I used the old SATA SSD as my main drive, sometimes it takes like 10 seconds to actually post before it boots (after that, it is quick).
What could be causing this?

Here are my PC specs:
CPU: Intel i5 11400
Mobo: Aorus Elite B560M
RAM: 2x Crucial Ballistix Sport LT 8 GB 3200 MHz
GPU: GTX 1060 6 GB
SSD: WD Black SN850 (WDS500G1X0E) <--- this is the new SSD
OS: Windows 11 Pro

P.S.: it is quite annoying, because until it posts, the fans spin at 100% for like 10 seconds, and I think it could be bad for them. Also, I have not tried this with Windows 10 or other OS, only Windows 11.

Thanks a lot!

Tell us more about how you loaded Windows 11 onto the WD m.2. Was this a fresh install with only 1 drive connected at install time? Or did you clone your old Kingston ssd (perhaps improperly)?

 

[naabjenia]

Tell us more about how you loaded Windows 11 onto the WD m.2. Was this a fresh install with only 1 drive connected at install time? Or did you clone your old Kingston ssd (perhaps improperly)?

Hey, thanks for the quick reply.
So, it was actually a fresh Windows 11 install from a pen-drive made with Microsoft's USB tool. The old SSD had Windows 10 in it.

I do not recall if all the other drives were disconnected when I installed Windows 11, but I'm almost sure they were connected because, if I recall correctly, I erased all the partitions in the old SSD in the Win 11 installing process (when choosing partitions, etc). Currently, the old SSD is connected but only used for storage.

 

[Karadjgne]

You have 2 ssds set up as a boot drive. The new Win11 drive will be flagged as boot, but also the old Win10 drive is still flagged as boot. To complicate matters both were installed at the time of Win11, so to Windows it views the old ssd as an extension of C drive, not as a seperate storage drive, regardless of physical labels. Windows now owns both drives.

Unplug all drives except the Primary and do a complete full install from scratch on just the single drive. Finish any updates completely. Then install the second drive and use 'diskpart' to 'clean all' the old drive.

That'll leave you with windows fully on the primary drive and secondary drive as seperate storage.

How to Diskpart Erase/Clean a Drive Through the Command Prompt | Support Seagate US

This article explains the Microsoft Diskpart Erase utility. The command that erases the drive during this process is "Clean". In this article "Clean" and erase are used interchangeably. Cleaning or erasing a storage device removes all data and partitions from the drive.

www.seagate.com

 

[naabjenia]

You have 2 ssds set up as a boot drive. The new Win11 drive will be flagged as boot, but also the old Win10 drive is still flagged as boot. To complicate matters both were installed at the time of Win11, so to Windows it views the old ssd as an extension of C drive, not as a seperate storage drive, regardless of physical labels. Windows now owns both drives.

Unplug all drives except the Primary and do a complete full install from scratch on just the single drive. Finish any updates completely. Then install the second drive and use 'diskpart' to 'clean all' the old drive.

That'll leave you with windows fully on the primary drive and secondary drive as seperate storage.

How to Diskpart Erase/Clean a Drive Through the Command Prompt | Support Seagate US

This article explains the Microsoft Diskpart Erase utility. The command that erases the drive during this process is "Clean". In this article "Clean" and erase are used interchangeably. Cleaning or erasing a storage device removes all data and partitions from the drive.

www.seagate.com

Very interesting! I had no idea this could happen, since I erased and formatted the old SSD when installing Windows 11. I will definitely try your suggestion this weekend, thank you very much.
I know this might be subjective, but while we're at it: would you technically recommend rolling back to Win 10 or is Win 11 fine?

Thanks!

 

[Karadjgne]

Win11 is based on Win10 code. They are intrinsically the same OS with a couple of changes to the way it looks and Tpm2 use. So it really doesn't matter much currently, both are still supported and games can't take full advantage of TPM until Win7-Win10 are no longer a consideration. Ppl will not buy or spend money on games that are Win11 only as that will mean a possible/probable hardware upgrade, OS upgrade etc just to meet the TPM requirements.

I prefer Win10, it's a mature OS, pretty much all the real bugs are worked out, there's still some that are affecting Win11, especially concerning scheduling, but that's mainly an Alder lake issue. If I had a 12th gen intel, I'd prolly move to Win11 as the scheduling has advantages, but with a Ryzen, that's a moot point, so I'm sticking with Win10 until it's done. By that time Win12 will probably be out.. 😂

 

[naabjenia]

Win11 is based on Win10 code. They are intrinsically the same OS with a couple of changes to the way it looks and Tpm2 use. So it really doesn't matter much currently, both are still supported and games can't take full advantage of TPM until Win7-Win10 are no longer a consideration. Ppl will not buy or spend money on games that are Win11 only as that will mean a possible/probable hardware upgrade, OS upgrade etc just to meet the TPM requirements.

I prefer Win10, it's a mature OS, pretty much all the real bugs are worked out, there's still some that are affecting Win11, especially concerning scheduling, but that's mainly an Alder lake issue. If I had a 12th gen intel, I'd prolly move to Win11 as the scheduling has advantages, but with a Ryzen, that's a moot point, so I'm sticking with Win10 until it's done. By that time Win12 will probably be out.. 😂

I don't know about Intel 11th gen, but I am considering returning to Windows 10, because I miss the option of being able to not combine taskbar buttons... however, I'll miss the dark themed notepad!

 

[Karadjgne]

There's dark in Win10 too. Get a free program called winaero (winaero tweaker). It's basically nothing more than a menu of a ton of switches for windows. Can turn off windows store, cortana, change light-dark themes, whole bunch of stuff that's hidden so deep in obscure menus you never knew they were there. Some are even hidden switches or those Microsoft didn't want the public to access, like turning off the Microsoft store lol.

 

[naabjenia]

Hey!
I have reinstalled Windows and cleaned the drives according to the instructions. It's been almost a week and I've had no problems so far, so I've highlighted the best answer.
Thank you all for your help!