PC freezes and on reboot cannot detect SSD (re-plugging helped but happened again)

[JohnD13]

First of all, my specs:
Intel i5 3570K
8GB RAM
PSU SUPER FLOWER GOLDEN GREEN HX SERIES 650W
SSD Kingston 240GB HyperX Savage SHSS37A/240G
HDD 1TB
Windows 10 64bit installed on the SSD

I was doing some work on my PC one night and then it suddenly froze. Couldn't click on anything, though mouse was moving and Ctrl+Alt+Delete was useless as well. So I restarted but then it would get stuck on motherboard brand screen and after a while it said:

"Reboot and select proper Boot device or Insert Boot Media in selected Boot device and press a key". I also got an File: \Boot\BCD error at some point.

So I went into the BIOS and found out that my SSD was nowhere to be found in the boot order, basically not detected at all. Hard Drive and DVD Drive were recognized just fine. I powered off the PC and unplugged the SSD from the motherboard and PSU, re-plugged it and then everything worked fine. Same thing happened twice and I fixed it similarly. Now it's working fine again.

So, is my SSD telling me that it's slowly failing? Or is it a software issue (BCD related maybe)? Could it be a result of me doing some programming work all day?

Any help would be much apprieciated!

 

[JohnD13]

Well I was once again doing a somewhat intensive task and the problem occured again after 3 days. Unplugging and replugging didn't work at first but eventually it did...

Anyone can help? At least I hope it's the SSD failing and not a PSU thing.

 

[DRagor]

It may be just a data SATA cable. Switch data cables between SSD and HDD. If the problem then goes to HDD, you will know you need new data cable.

 

[JohnD13]

It may be just a data SATA cable. Switch data cables between SSD and HDD. If the problem then goes to HDD, you will know you need new data cable.

That's a good idea. I should also mention that I ran CrystalDiskInfo according to which both SSD and HDD are fine, so maybe it is indeed the cable.

 

[JohnD13]

So I changed SATA cables between my SSD and HDD, and everything seemed to be working perfectly for these past days. I even had an enormous increase in execution time of a program I've been working on, leading me to conclude that it was indeed the cable's fault.

Just now though I came back to my PC and saw a blue screen - the problem occured again. After a couple of restarts, the computer booted properly again and CrystalDiskInfo now shows 3 reallocated sectors as opposed to the previous value of 1... So I guess I'm still open to more ideas.

 

[DRagor]

Seems like re-plugging cables alone gave you those few days of uninterrupted work. However this gives no clue what's wrong. I would rather not consider this software problem. Most likely it's hardware problem, but hard to tell if it's SSD failing or motherboard failing.
The only thing left to try, if you haven't yet, is to use different SATA ports on motherboard. Leave HDD as it is, and plug SSD to previously never used SATA port. This might help if that's motherboard issue, but won't do much if the SSD is the problem.

 

[JohnD13]

Seems like re-plugging cables alone gave you those few days of uninterrupted work. However this gives no clue what's wrong. I would rather not consider this software problem. Most likely it's hardware problem, but hard to tell if it's SSD failing or motherboard failing.
The only thing left to try, if you haven't yet, is to use different SATA ports on motherboard. Leave HDD as it is, and plug SSD to previously never used SATA port. This might help if that's motherboard issue, but won't do much if the SSD is the problem.

Thanks for the reply. I will try switching SATA port for my SSD and see if the problem occurs again.