Question Windows 10 NVMe and SSD question

[Kalik212]

I'm confused and need help...I have 2 hard drives...one is a Samsung 970 Evo Plus 1TB NVMe M.2 and the other is a Samsung 860 EVO 1TB 2.5 inch SATA III...the SATA drive is plugged into the SATA port 2 on my motherboard...did a clean install last night with my NVMe and everything went fine...today I decided to plug my 2.5 inch SATA drive to get Windows 11 installed as a completely separate install (not as a secondary drive)

but the BIOS doesn't list the 860 EVO as a boot drive...when I load into Windows it shows me both drives in Disk Management as well as in 'This PC'...how do I get Windows to recognize the 860 EVO as a separate drive so I can do a clean install of Windows 11 (while still keeping the 970 EVO with Windows 10)...why can't I just boot up with a Windows 11 USB stick and have Windows show me both drives and let me choose where I want to have the new OS installed

I attached a pic of the drives being recognized within Windows on my NVMe install (which is showing as Drive C):

 

[logainofhades]

You have to do it via bios, or a Function key that will allow you to choose boot options. What are your full system specs?

 

[Kalik212]

You have to do it via bios, or a Function key that will allow you to choose boot options. What are your full system specs?

AMD 5800X
MSI MAG X570 Tomahawk
G.SKILL Trident Z Neo 32GB (2 x 16GB)
Corsair RM850x
Samsung 970 Evo Plus 1TB NVMe M.2
Samsung 860 EVO 1TB 2.5 Inch SATA III

in the BIOS it only shows my NVMe as a boot drive option...

 

[logainofhades]

You may need to consult your manual.
https://download.msi.com/archive/mnu_exe/mb/E7C84v1.1.pdf

From said manual
▶ FIXED BOOT ORDER Priorities Sets device priority for system boot.
▶ Boot Option Priorities These items are used to prioritize the installed boot devices.

 

[Kalik212]

it's not being listed in my BIOS under Fixed Boot Order...it looks like my NVMe is GPT while my other drive is MBR which might be the issue

 

[dwd999]

It is unfortunate that the advent of m.2 drives makes drive separation difficult and even worse that the Windows installer really has a problem if you have more than one drive connected. Personally I do it the hard, but safe, way. I use Macrium to back up my Windows 10 m.2; then I use the Gparted partitioning app to remove all of the partitions on both my m.2 and ssd. Then I install Windows11 on the ssd and restore the image for Windows 10 to my m.2. My way means everything is separate and safe, plus I have a backup of my Windows 10 that I update weekly.