PC won't detect boot device randomly

[derik72090]

The error message ("A disk read error occured") randomly appears sometimes when I turn on my PC. It is so extremely random that I have no idea what's causing it because the PC could be booting up fine for a couple days, then the next morning it won't boot and an error message will display. Sometimes it's a different error message such as "Cannot find boot device" or something along those lines. Sometimes BIOS won't post and just be stuck on a blank screen with the error code A2 at the bottom right corner of the screen. I've already infinitely checked the cables as well as BIOS settings. Nothing I've done seems to work. This has all been an issue ever since I switched from AMD to an Intel motherboard and processor. YES I already did a fresh install and cleared my CMOS. I'm still having this issue (along with other issues, such as keyboard not being detected on boot) and feel like another fresh install won't do the trick. Another thing is that when it does boot up successfully, I can do everything I normally do without issue. What to do?

Reminder that the OS is installed on an SSD and I have a 1TB HDD as secondary.

 

[Boogieman_WD]

Hey there, Derik.

I guess if you've already performed a fresh install and everything, that you've backed up your data (from both drives), but if you haven't done so already, please do it now, just to be on the safe side.
Since you've already gone through the BIOS reset and different SATA ports and cables option, I'd recommend that you try booting to Windows without having the HDD connected to the motherboard. I'm asking you to do this, as sometimes a faulty secondary storage drive could cause such issues with your system.
You should also download each drive respective manufacturer's diagnostic tool so that you can test them for errors and/or bad sectors and see if anything alarming pops-up.

Make sure that all the drivers are up to data, especially the ones associated with your motherboard (chipset, USB controller, etc.)

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

 

[derik72090]

Hey there, Derik.

I guess if you've already performed a fresh install and everything, that you've backed up your data (from both drives), but if you haven't done so already, please do it now, just to be on the safe side.
Since you've already gone through the BIOS reset and different SATA ports and cables option, I'd recommend that you try booting to Windows without having the HDD connected to the motherboard. I'm asking you to do this, as sometimes a faulty secondary storage drive could cause such issues with your system.
You should also download each drive respective manufacturer's diagnostic tool so that you can test them for errors and/or bad sectors and see if anything alarming pops-up.

Make sure that all the drivers are up to data, especially the ones associated with your motherboard (chipset, USB controller, etc.)

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

Thank you very much for your reply, Boogieman_WD. I will try booting up without the HDD connected next time I get an error booting up. I didn't have any issues booting up succesfully today. That said, my most recent boot just a few minutes ago, my keyboard was not detected and I had to reconnect it. So I'm still worried about this motherboard.

I also put in an RMA request for my motherboard, which was accepted today. I have 30 days to return it, so do you think it's worth doing at this point? I can live without the PC for a few weeks and I don't have anything really that important on both my disk drives anyway, since I did a fresh install only a few weeks ago. Do you think I should do it or wait until I get another error message?

 

[derik72090]

Hey there, Derik.

I guess if you've already performed a fresh install and everything, that you've backed up your data (from both drives), but if you haven't done so already, please do it now, just to be on the safe side.
Since you've already gone through the BIOS reset and different SATA ports and cables option, I'd recommend that you try booting to Windows without having the HDD connected to the motherboard. I'm asking you to do this, as sometimes a faulty secondary storage drive could cause such issues with your system.
You should also download each drive respective manufacturer's diagnostic tool so that you can test them for errors and/or bad sectors and see if anything alarming pops-up.

Make sure that all the drivers are up to data, especially the ones associated with your motherboard (chipset, USB controller, etc.)

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

Well I had another problem booting up and Windows was wanting me to "repair" it. I said screw it, and reinstalled Win10 without the secondary HDD. I am no longer getting that A2 error/diagnostic code in the bottom right corner. I am updating Windows again along with motherboard drivers and such. After all of this, should I consider replugging my HDD or not? I never formatted it so some of my games are still on it. I was thinking about formatting it and going to purchase a new one (maybe even another SSD). Or maybe I should be patient and test out my computer for another 3-4 days. I am just doing everything I can before sending in my motherboard.

 

[Boogieman_WD]

And you're definitely doing great with the troubleshooting. If you have no issues with the fresh OS install and the installed and updated drivers (keyboard included), it would probably mean that the mobo is OK and that it was probably an OS issue or a driver problem.
As for your HDD, yes, connect it to see if your system will behave any differently. I'd still recommend that you download the HDD manufacturer's diagnostic tool and test it, just to see if there are any errors, because as already mentioned, it's possible for it to be causing problems with the whole system if there's something wrong with it.

 

[derik72090]

And you're definitely doing great with the troubleshooting. If you have no issues with the fresh OS install and the installed and updated drivers (keyboard included), it would probably mean that the mobo is OK and that it was probably an OS issue or a driver problem.
As for your HDD, yes, connect it to see if you system will behave any differently. I'd still recommend that you download the HDD manufacturer's diagnostic tool and test it, just to see if there are any errors, because as already mentioned, it's possible for it to be causing problems with the whole system if there's something wrong with it.

After the fresh install on my SSD, I decided to reconnect my HDD. Did a quick format, but that didn't remove the 500mb system reserved volume on the HDD, and I had this weird issue where I would have to "reactivate" the HDD in disk management. Checking for errors didn't find anything. But I decided I will do a full format and see if it fixes any issues with the HDD. Then I'll check for errors again and start using it again.

That said, I haven't had any issues booting up and it seems like the keyboard is turning on every startup and restart. I'll give it another 5 days before choosing your answer as a solution, but everything looks good so far!

 

[Boogieman_WD]

Good job!

As for formatting the HDD, if you've preformed quick format on a particular partition that formatted only the specific partition and not the entire drive. You could perform a low level format on the HDD and I guarantee that there won't be any trace of any files or partitions left on it.
1. Open CMD (Command Prompt) as administrator.
2. type diskpart and press "enter"
3. type list disk and press "enter", you'll see all the storage devices connected to your computer and you should be able to recognize the drive you wish to format by its size.
4. type select disk X and press "enter", where X is the number of the drive you wish to format, so make sure that you've selected the correct one - e.g. if the drive you wish to format is disk 1, type "select disk 1"
5. type clean and press "enter", then wait for the process to finish. You should see a message along the lines of "Diskpart succeeded in cleaning the disk".

Note that this is a data destructive process and you should be 100% sure that you've selected the proper drive, so that you don't reformat a different one and lose data.

Once a low level format has been performed, you'd need to initialize the drive as if it was a brand new internal HDD: How to initialize or write a signature to a secondary hard drive or Solid State drive in Windows and after that you can format it and use it as a fresh secondary storage drive: How to partition and format a WD drive on Windows and macOS.

Cheers!

 

[derik72090]

Good job!

As for formatting the HDD, if you've preformed quick format on a particular partition that formatted only the specific partition and not the entire drive. You could perform a low level format on the HDD and I guarantee that there won't be any trace of any files or partitions left on it.
1. Open CMD (Command Prompt) as administrator.
2. type diskpart and press "enter"
3. type list disk and press "enter", you'll see all the storage devices connected to your computer and you should be able to recognize the drive you wish to format by its size.
4. type select disk X and press "enter", where X is the number of the drive you wish to format, so make sure that you've selected the correct one - e.g. if the drive you wish to format is disk 1, type "select disk 1"
5. type clean and press "enter", then wait for the process to finish. You should see a message along the lines of "Diskpart succeeded in cleaning the disk".

Note that this is a data destructive process and you should be 100% sure that you've selected the proper drive, so that you don't reformat a different one and lose data.

Once a low level format has been performed, you'd need to initialize the drive as if it was a brand new internal HDD: How to initialize or write a signature to a secondary hard drive or Solid State drive in Windows and after that you can format it and use it as a fresh secondary storage drive: How to partition and format a WD drive on Windows and macOS.

Cheers!

Yea, so I don't know. Been having issues with the PC since the last fresh install. Keyboard quite often isn't detected coming out of shutdown or sleep. PC sometimes freezes up coming out of sleep. Have had a few BSOD's (Process Initialization failed, Store Exception) in the past few days for no reason. Sometimes it freezes up for no apparent reason. Turning on the Wake-Up event in BIOS to wake up by USB..that causes the PC to restart automatically right after trying to shut down. I'm probably missing a few more things but it's just a hassle.

So I'm going to format my secondary HDD and install the OS onto it instead of the SSD. I never had these issues with it on the HDD with my AMD chipset. If there are still issues, will have no choice but to RMA the motherboard.

 

[Boogieman_WD]

Yup it sounds like it could be at fault judging by everything you've been through so far. Please let me know how it works when you have Windows installed on your HDD.
I think that the only thing you've left to try is a BIOS update + driver updates if I'm not mistaken.

Please let me know if this helps.