Question System not booting when PCIe SSD is installed

[jayfrin]

I'm running a system off a SATA SSD and SATA HDD. I boot off the SSD. I wanted to upgrade to a PCIe m.2 SSD. Using an USB enclosure I initiated and formatted the drive to GPT. Then using DiskGenius I cloned the SATA SSD over to the m.2 SSD. However, when the m.2 SSD is installed, the booting gets stuck on the motherboard logo screen. It won't boot OR BIOS, it just sits on motherboard logo. Even if the boot is set to boot to the SATA, just having the m.2 in the slot causes it to fail to boot and won't enter BIOS. Boots fine to SATA when m2 SSD is not installed.

This is the system:
MOBO: Asus Tuf Gaming 570x plus
SSD: WD Blue SN580 2TB
CPU: AMD Ryzen 7
RAM: 16x2 Corsair

Things I've Tried:
Secure boot on/off
Fast boot on/off
Making NVMe only enabled boot option
Completely disabling anything other than SATA boot option
CSM on/off

It seems like the PC doesn't read the NVMe when it's installed but also doesn't read the SATA when the NVMe is installed as well. Not even being able to enter BIOs is really weird and confusing.

 

[SkyNetRising]

It seems like the PC doesn't read the NVMe when it's installed but also doesn't read the SATA when the NVMe is installed as well. Not even being able to enter BIOs is really weird and confusing.

1st There's no need to use any USB M.2 enclosures. Why are you using it exactly?

2nd Make sure:
Secure boot disabled,
Fast Boot disabled,
SATA controller is set to AHCI.
No NVME raid, no Storemi, no some other weird storage configuration.

Your motherboard has two M.2 slots.
Put NVME drive into other M.2 slot.

First boot from cloned drive has to be done with old drive physically disconnected. This step is not optional.
If you fail to do this and boot with old drive connected, then drive letters get messed up and you'll have to redo cloning.

 

[jayfrin]

1st There's no need to use any USB M.2 enclosures. Why are you using it exactly?

2nd Make sure:
Secure boot disabled,
Fast Boot disabled,
SATA controller is set to AHCI.
No NVME raid, no Storemi, no some other weird storage configuration.

Your motherboard has two M.2 slots.
Put NVME drive into other M.2 slot.

First boot from cloned drive has to be done with old drive disconnected. This step is not optional.
If you fail to do this and boot with old drive connected, then drive letters get messed up and you'll have to redo cloning.

I was only using the USB enclosure to ensure the drive was initialized/formatted correctly and to clone it because it wasn't being recognized by windows. The computer only recognizes the NVMe when I use it via a USB port.

Secure boot option is locked in my BIOS, it's greyed out and for some reason I can't turn it off.

Other than that I tried these, Fast boot disabled, SATA set to AHCI, NVMe RAID turned off.

I tried bother M.2 slots and neither worked.

Still, when the NMVe is installed, does not boot and won't go to BIOS when I fit F2/Del. It just sits at the MOBO logo page.

 

[SkyNetRising]

I was only using the USB enclosure to ensure the drive was initialized/formatted correctly and to clone it because it wasn't being recognized by windows.

This means, you do not have proper nvme drivers installed.
System without nvme drivers installed, can not boot into windows from an nvme drive.

Put NVME drive into M.2 slot.
Boot into windows and
install NVME drivers, so NVME drive is fully detected before doing any cloning.

Secure boot option is locked in my BIOS, it's greyed out and for some reason I can't turn it off.

Try enabling CSM mode.
That should switch off secure boot.

Still, when the NMVe is installed, does not boot and won't go to BIOS when I fit F2/Del. It just sits at the MOBO logo page.

Try other M.2 slot on motherboard.

 

[jayfrin]

Try enabling CSM mode.
That should switch off secure boot.

Try other M.2 slot on motherboard.

These didn't change anything.

This means, you do not have proper nvme drivers installed.
System without nvme drivers installed, can not boot into windows from an nvme drive.

This actually helped a lot.

So I figured it must be a driver problem based on this advice. I checked windows, the motherboard, and the ssd and all drivers were up to date. So I flashed the BIOS and that actually worked, the computer now recognizes the NVMe SSD! Thank you for the help!

I re-cloned it properly. I can boot to it, but the boot fails because of corrupted windows files. So I'm currently on the original SATA boot with the NVMe as an installed drive (but not booted to it). Is there any way I can scan/repair with windows files on the drive that's not booted? Or do I have to download recovery tools to a USB and boot to the corrupted versio and repair it that way?

 

[SkyNetRising]

I re-cloned it properly. I can boot to it, but the boot fails because of corrupted windows files.

Can you show a photo of error message?
(upload to imgur.com and post link)

I'm not entirely sure, you're interpreting error message properly.

Pay attention to this quote. This is important:

First boot from cloned drive has to be done with old drive physically disconnected. This step is not optional.

 

[jayfrin]

Can you show a photo of error message?
(upload to imgur.com and post link)

I'm not entirely sure, you're interpreting error message properly.

Pay attention to this quote. This is important:

Link here:

https://imgur.com/a/oQX90xO

View: https://imgur.com/a/oQX90xO


All drives other than the SSD I was trying to boot to were disconnected for first boot attempt.

 

[SkyNetRising]

And where exactly in that error message did you see anything about corruption?
It says, it can't find winload.efi file.
Probably bcd store configuration is wrong.

Please show screenshot from Disk Management with all drives connected (clone source and clone target).

 

[jayfrin]

And where exactly in that error message did you see anything about corruption?
It says, it can't find winload.efi file.
Probably bcd store configuration is wrong.

Please show screenshot from Disk Management with all drives connected (clone source and clone target).

The window's help page said the error code 0xc000000e is usually due to corruption.

In the image the cloned source is Disk 1 (C: ) and the target is Disk 2 (D: )

Link:

https://imgur.com/a/w4rMyEg

View: https://imgur.com/a/w4rMyEg

 

[SkyNetRising]

There's something wrong with your clone.
Cloned drive D: has more data on it than on source drive C: .

Also with 95MB of free space you're unlikely to be able to boot into windows.
Windows log files will fill that space instantly and windows will crash in loading phase.

1. Redo cloning.
2. Expand/increase drive D: after cloning is done.
3. After that fix bootloader.
Execute from elevated command prompt. Regular command prompt will give error on last step.
There should be no errors. If you get any errors, then stop immediately and show screenshot with command output.

diskpart​

list disk​

select disk 2​

(select 1863GB disk)​

select partition 2​

(select 100MB EFI system partition on 1863GB disk)​

assign letter=H​

exit​

bcdboot d:\windows /s H: /f UEFI​

Last message should be "Boot files created successfully".
4. Shutdown and physically disconnect 120GB drive.
5. Adjust boot priority in BIOS, set Windows Boot Manager on 2TB drive as first in boot order.
6. Should be able to boot into windows after this.

 

[jayfrin]

I recloned the drive (in DiskGenius), except this time used "migrate" rather than "clone" system. Then extended the size of the partition like you said.

I tested this boot before going to the command prompt and it actually worked at this point. I'm not own the NVME SSD cloned OS. Booted fine, I made sure the SATA one was unplugged.

Thanks for all the help!