Question Single hard drive shows up as two different physical drives

[Pleasehelp1542]

Hello Community,

I recently tinkered a bit with a USB Stick because I wanted to format it. The usual method didn't work so I went on to use diskpart, but I seem to have gotten something wrong. Now my boot drive is split into a ~475GB and a ~27GB drive, which show up in disk manager as two separate devices but have the same Bus address and hardware names. Also in disk manager they are not next to but above each other, so I can't simply delete one partition and then extend the main one.
Is there any way to fix this mess?

Thanks in advance

 

[Lutfij]

Can you parse an image of what you're seeing in Disk Manager? Chances are your OS might've not liked what you did to the pen drive using Diskpart. Which Windows are you on? If Windows 10, include the OS version(not edition).

 

[Pleasehelp1542]

I do have a screenshot but I have to admit I don't know how to include an image here
Windows version would be:

Version 10.0.19043 Build 19043

According to Systeminfo

 

[twowheelstom]

1 hdd with 2 partitions on it

 

[punkncat]

I do have a screenshot but I have to admit I don't know how to include an image here
Windows version would be:

Version 10.0.19043 Build 19043

According to Systeminfo

I believe that Imgur still does free hosting.

 

[USAFRet]

I do have a screenshot but I have to admit I don't know how to include an image here
Windows version would be:

Version 10.0.19043 Build 19043

According to Systeminfo

Upload the pic to imgur.com, post the link here.

 

[Pleasehelp1542]

https://imgur.com/a/4vbAHuy

Don't know if the embedding works so here is the link itself:

https://imgur.com/a/4vbAHuy

View: https://imgur.com/a/4vbAHuy


Disk 0 and disk 1 are the same physical drive.

 

[USAFRet]

Make/model of the C drive, Disk 1?

What "tinkering" did you do?

 

[SkyNetRising]

Disk 0 and disk 1 are the same physical drive.

They are not.
Disk 0 most likely is 32GB ssd cache drive. Probably M.2.

Can you show screenshot from Device Manager (disk drives section expanded) ?

 

[USAFRet]

Disk 0 most likely is 32GB ssd cache drive. Probably M.2.

Exactly my thought.

Or possibly a 32GB cache space on a SSHD.

 

[Pleasehelp1542]

https://imgur.com/fiBq7h3

View: https://imgur.com/fiBq7h3


Hmm that does sound a bit problematic, I guess normally you shouldn't format your SSD's cache?
And it indeed is a M.2 512GB SSD

 

[SkyNetRising]

Hmm that does sound a bit problematic, I guess normally you shouldn't format your SSD's cache?
And it indeed is a M.2 512GB SSD

hbrpeknx0202a
Intel® Optane™ Memory 32GB + Intel® QLC 3D NAND SSD 512GB, M.2 80mm PCIe 3.0

Install Intel RST driver for Optane memory.

https://www.intel.com/content/www/u...nd-ssd-512gb-m-2-80mm-pcie-3-0/downloads.html

 

[Pleasehelp1542]

hbrpeknx0202a
Intel® Optane™ Memory 32GB + Intel® QLC 3D NAND SSD 512GB, M.2 80mm PCIe 3.0

Install Intel RST driver for Optane memory.

https://www.intel.com/content/www/u...nd-ssd-512gb-m-2-80mm-pcie-3-0/downloads.html

I tried that now, but the installer aborts stating "You're trying to install this software on an unsupported platform"

 

[SkyNetRising]

There are different driver versions depending on cpu/platform used.
What is model name of your cpu?
You can find it with CPU-Z.

 

[Pleasehelp1542]

There are different driver versions depending on cpu/platform used.
What is model name of your cpu?
You can find it with CPU-Z.

Intel Core i7-10510U (is that the model you wanted to know?)

 

[Forge64]

You need to remove all partitions/data on drive E:, use "clean" in diskpart. Once the 32GB Optane cache is cleared, try installing the Optane software again. If that fails, you may need to wipe the main QLC and the Optane cache and start fresh.

 

[fzabkar]

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000055140/memory-and-storage.html#:~:text=Data in the Intel® Optane™ memory

Intel® Optane™ memory is a device that pairs with a SATA drive and accelerates it. This means that the module itself must not have any partitions or volumes in it. The entire module's space should be unallocated before enabling it.

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000055140/memory-and-storage.html

 

[Forge64]

Yes, that's what I said. Thanks for linking.

 

[fzabkar]

Yes, that's what I said. Thanks for linking.

AIUI, the OP has messed with the Optane cache (Disk 0). Assuming this was originally caching the 512GB SSD (Disk 1), does this now mean that the data on the SSD is potentially corrupt? How can we be sure that the data in the Optane cache was already committed to the SSD's main storage prior to the OP's meddling?

If the OP chooses to partition and format the cache, does this now become a separate 32GB SSD with no connection to the 512GB SSD? That is, is the total usable capacity now 544GB?

 

[Forge64]

Optane cached drives are supposed to be write-through. The main disk's data should be correct, but there are no guarantees, since what OP did is entirely unsupported.

If you keep the drive double-formatted like that, yes, you have two independent disks with no caching, so you have 1 or 2 disks, depending on where you're counting from.

 

[fzabkar]

Optane cached drives are supposed to be write-through. The main disk's data should be correct, but there are no guarantees, since what OP did is entirely unsupported.

If you keep the drive double-formatted like that, yes, you have two independent disks with no caching, so you have 1 or 2 disks, depending on where you're counting from.

Thanks again. I have about one hundred questions, but I can't seem to find a good resource. Do you know of any?

Basically I'd like to know how two SSDs can appear on the same PCIe bus. Is there a PCIe port multiplier on the device?

What happens if you install this hybrid SSD in an "unsupported" environment? Does is appear as two SSDs, or a single cache-less SSD, or a single hybrid SSD with a transparent, drive managed, 32GB Optane cache? In fact I don't understand why Intel didn't just use the latter configuration, like most, if not all, other vendors of hybrid storage products.

Who manages the Optane cache? Is this the job of the OS/driver?

What does the BIOS do, and why is this platform dependent on specific BIOS features, chipsets and CPUs?

Can a disc editor be used to view (or edit?) the cache, or does the OS protect this area?

 

[USAFRet]

Basically I'd like to know how two SSDs can appear on the same PCIe bus. Is there a PCIe port multiplier on the device?

I'm 99% sure the motherboard and BIOS handles that.

In an unsupported environment, it would appear as two individual drives.
It is two physical devices.
A small 16 or 32GB, and a large whatever.

 

[fzabkar]

This review explains how the Optane hybrid SSD works:

https://www.anandtech.com/show/14249/the-intel-optane-memory-h10-review-two-ssds-in-one

As already mentioned, the device is actually two distinct SSDs in one package, with separate NAND and Optane controllers. Each controller takes 2 of the device's 4 PCIe lanes. Most mainboards and BIOS-es at the time of the review (2019) associated all 4 lanes with a single SSD. They either saw the NAND SSD or the Optane SSD. Only a few platforms saw both. I would expect that today's situation has improved.

The Optane Memory H10 does not introduce any new ASICs or any hardware to make the Optane and QLC portions of the drive appear as a single device. The caching is managed entirely in software, and the host system accesses the Optane and QLC sides of the H10 independently. Each half of the drive has two PCIe lanes dedicated to it.