[SOLVED] Why did this happen after inserting M.2 NVMe SSD?

[JayX_]

Posting this on behalf of friend

My friend and I just ordered an M.2 SSD for our PCs, his arrived today. His intention was to insert it but boot from his HDD and clone Windows 10 to the SSD and then reboot to the SSD. However, when he booted up after inserting the SSD this happened and we don't know why.. (apologies for image quality - he took it to show me)

From what we can see the SSD isn't recognized in the BIOS, we have tried switching his HDD to another SATA port and set detection to legacy+uefi in the BIOS, however, then it just says it can't find a boot device. Our knowledge is limited so help would be greatly appreciated.

Things to note:

• We checked compatibility with motherboard prior to purchase and there should be no issues
• His SSD is a WD Blue SN550 250GB M.2 PCIe NVMe
• His motherboard is an MSI Z97 Gaming-3

If you require more info let me know - Tysm!

 

[USAFRet]

https://us.msi.com/Motherboard/Z97-GAMING-3/Specification

1. Use of a drive in the M.2 port disables SATA ports 5 & 6.
2. The M.2 port is only PCIe 2...vastly hampering the performance of an NVMe drive.
3. Cloning from SATA to NVMe can be problematic in the best of conditions.

Personally, I wouldn't waste money on an NVMe drive as a boot drive in a system of that age. (and I have one...)

 

[Monkinator37]

Okay, so that looks like a UEFI shell. Make sure the SSD and HDD are set as a legacy drive and not a UEFI drive.

Edit: If you have any questions on how to do so ask me, and if I cannot answer check online.

 

[USAFRet]

Okay, so that looks like a UEFI shell. Make sure the SSD and HDD are set as a legacy drive and not a UEFI drive.

ANd in that motherboard, booting from the M.2 port as Legacy is not supported.
"M.2 PCIe interface only supports UEFI option ROM, NOT support legacy option ROM. "

 

[JayX_]

https://us.msi.com/Motherboard/Z97-GAMING-3/Specification

1. Use of a drive in the M.2 port disables SATA ports 5 & 6.
2. The M.2 port is only PCIe 2...vastly hampering the performance of an NVMe drive.
3. Cloning from SATA to NVMe can be problematic in the best of conditions.

Personally, I wouldn't waste money on an NVMe drive as a boot drive in a system of that age. (and I have one...)

Thanks, what would you suggest? Is it possible he can keep Windows on the HDD and use the SSD as additional storage for games etc? The issue is still getting it to boot with the SSD inserted, I'll get him to try switching to a different port again.

 

[USAFRet]

Thanks, what would you suggest? Is it possible he can keep Windows on the HDD and use the SSD as additional storage for games etc? The issue is still getting it to boot with the SSD inserted, I'll get him to try switching to a different port again.

Assuming you can get it to boot, sure you can use that as secondary.
Even if not, an adapter for a PCIe slot is relatively cheap.

I also have a Z97 board and an NVMe drive. I put the 660p in one of these adapters.
Works just great.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07GFDVXVJ

 

[JayX_]

Assuming you can get it to boot, sure you can use that as secondary.
Even if not, an adapter for a PCIe slot is relatively cheap.

I also have a Z97 board and an NVMe drive. I put the 660p in one of these adapters.
Works just great.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07GFDVXVJ

Happy to inform that he got it to boot simply by switching the HDD to a different sata port. He’s just going to use it as a secondary to install games etc on.

Thank you for your help!