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Attempting to boot Windows on new SSD without success.

Xenocrates
Go to solution Solved by Xenocrates,

Solved. Super rusty on solving these types of problems so I left out what was probably the biggest clue. Cloning the one drive to the other was one of the first things I tried, but the software I tried (from memory, Acronis, Macrium and Easus To-Do) failed because the bytes/sector were incompatible (512 on old vs 4096 on the new) - and I assumed that problem was insurmountable. Then I go spend 15 hours trying to tackle the problem in different ways. No luck from all of the above attempts. Then I realize it the cloning isn't insurmountable, so I find a free software called HDClone that advertised itself as being able to clone in spite of the byte/sector issue. After about 3 hours the cloning was complete. Tested it a few different ways - once without the original SSD, then with the original SSD but a new file on the desktop - but this nightmare is finally over. I'd still be curious for a deeper "why" simply installing Windows itself wasn't working, but I'm content with this, even if I have a lot of cleaning to do.

Hey guys. I'll try to be thorough but concise.

My lone goal is to boot windows 10 off a new SSD. I have a currently working older SSD that runs windows fine (Crucial BX100).

Important specs -

SSD: Crucial MX500 2 TB

MOBO: Sabertooth Z87

CPU: Intel i7-4790k

As far as I can see, they should be compatible.

I have installed Windows 10 to two separate flash drives. One using the Windows 10 Media Creation tool by itself, the other using Rufus.

The SSD seems to work fine in every way except for booting. I can see it in BIOS, device manager, disk manager and even file explorer. I have tested it by installing several programs to it, trying them, then uninstalling them. I can move files to the drive and access them. I can "see" the windows installation on the SSD. But can't boot to it.

Going slightly insane trying to get this to work. Here's what I've tried so far as far as I can remember.

  1. 2 different installations of Windows. See the rufus/media creation comment.

  2. Multiple cables/sata ports.

  3. Trying with all other drives unplugged, then again with them back in, then without them etc.

  4. Rolling back to previous bios version, testing, then updating to most recent bios version and testing. Read that bios can be "corrupted" and this worked for at least one person.

  5. Resetting CMOS by pin connections.

  6. Running the Windows repair tool on the flash drives.

  7. Setting new SSD as boot drive in priorities.
  8. Converting the drive to MBR/GPT, and using Rufus for the respective installation.

  9. Alternating legacy/uefi boot settings in the bios. 

I'll leave this as is-for now and try to edit things in as I go. There have been a lot more attempts, but they've blurred together a bit.

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20 minutes ago, Xenocrates said:

Hey guys. I'll try to be thorough but concise.

My lone goal is to boot windows 10 off a new SSD. I have a currently working older SSD that runs windows fine (Crucial BX100).

Important specs -

SSD: Crucial MX500 2 TB

MOBO: Sabertooth Z87

CPU: Intel i7-4790k

As far as I can see, they should be compatible.

I have installed Windows 10 to two separate flash drives. One using the Windows 10 Media Creation tool by itself, the other using Rufus.

The SSD seems to work fine in every way except for booting. I can see it in BIOS, device manager, disk manager and even file explorer. I have tested it by installing several programs to it, trying them, then uninstalling them. I can move files to the drive and access them. I can "see" the windows installation on the SSD. But can't boot to it.

Going slightly insane trying to get this to work. Here's what I've tried so far as far as I can remember.

  1. 2 different installations of Windows. See the rufus/media creation comment.

  2. Multiple cables/sata ports.

  3. Trying with all other drives unplugged, then again with them back in, then without them etc.

  4. Rolling back to previous bios version, testing, then updating to most recent bios version and testing. Read that bios can be "corrupted" and this worked for at least one person.

  5. Resetting CMOS by pin connections.

  6. Running the Windows repair tool on the flash drives.

  7. Setting new SSD as boot drive in priorities. 

I'll leave this as is-for now and try to edit things in as I go. There have been a lot more attempts, but they've blurred together a bit.

What happens when you try and boot it..? Do you get some sort of error, just a black screen......?

 

Try and edit boot settings in BIOS, possibly from legacy to UEFI or something. 

Rig: i7 13700k - - Asus Z790-P Wifi - - RTX 4080 - - 4x16GB 6000MHz - - Samsung 990 Pro 2TB NVMe Boot + Main Programs - - Assorted SATA SSD's for Photo Work - - Corsair RM850x - - Sound BlasterX EA-5 - - Corsair XC8 JTC Edition - - Corsair GPU Full Cover GPU Block - - XT45 X-Flow 420 + UT60 280 rads - - EK XRES RGB PWM - - Fractal Define S2 - - Acer Predator X34 -- Logitech G502 - - Logitech G710+ - - Logitech Z5500 - - LTT Deskpad

 

Headphones/amp/dac: Schiit Lyr 3 - - Fostex TR-X00 - - Sennheiser HD 6xx

 

Homelab/ Media Server: Proxmox VE host - - 512 NVMe Samsung 980 RAID Z1 for VM's/Proxmox boot - - Xeon e5 2660 V4- - Supermicro X10SRF-i - - 128 GB ECC 2133 - - 10x4 TB WD Red RAID Z2 - - Corsair 750D - - Corsair RM650i - - Dell H310 6Gbps SAS HBA - - Intel RES2SC240 SAS Expander - - TreuNAS + many other VM’s

 

iPhone 14 Pro - 2018 MacBook Air

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On 9/19/2020 at 8:49 PM, LIGISTX said:

What happens when you try and boot it..? Do you get some sort of error, just a black screen......?

 

Try and edit boot settings in BIOS, possibly from legacy to UEFI or something. 

Sorry, should have added more details. I have gone back and forth between legacy/uefi settings. I'll edit that in in a moment. 

 

No error codes are shown. No error codes, I'll briefly see a black screen then I'm sent right back into the bios. 

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9 minutes ago, Xenocrates said:

Sorry, should have added more details. I have gone back and forth between legacy/uefi settings. I'll edit that in in a moment. 

 

No error codes are shown. No error codes, I'll briefly see a black screen then I'm sent right back into the bios. 

I genuinely have no idea... sounds like you have tried everything I would think of. Hmmmmmm

 

I am not entirely sure, so your able to go through the format process, it formats the drive, but then once its formated and you pull the USB drive with the windows installer out, it just won't actually boot?

 

You said you tried a different SATA port... hmm. Really not sure man, thats a weird one.

Rig: i7 13700k - - Asus Z790-P Wifi - - RTX 4080 - - 4x16GB 6000MHz - - Samsung 990 Pro 2TB NVMe Boot + Main Programs - - Assorted SATA SSD's for Photo Work - - Corsair RM850x - - Sound BlasterX EA-5 - - Corsair XC8 JTC Edition - - Corsair GPU Full Cover GPU Block - - XT45 X-Flow 420 + UT60 280 rads - - EK XRES RGB PWM - - Fractal Define S2 - - Acer Predator X34 -- Logitech G502 - - Logitech G710+ - - Logitech Z5500 - - LTT Deskpad

 

Headphones/amp/dac: Schiit Lyr 3 - - Fostex TR-X00 - - Sennheiser HD 6xx

 

Homelab/ Media Server: Proxmox VE host - - 512 NVMe Samsung 980 RAID Z1 for VM's/Proxmox boot - - Xeon e5 2660 V4- - Supermicro X10SRF-i - - 128 GB ECC 2133 - - 10x4 TB WD Red RAID Z2 - - Corsair 750D - - Corsair RM650i - - Dell H310 6Gbps SAS HBA - - Intel RES2SC240 SAS Expander - - TreuNAS + many other VM’s

 

iPhone 14 Pro - 2018 MacBook Air

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Just now, LIGISTX said:

I genuinely have no idea... sounds like you have tried everything I would think of. Hmmmmmm

 

I am not entirely sure, so your able to go through the format process, it formats the drive, but then once its formated and you pull the USB drive with the windows installer out, it just won't actually boot?

 

You said you tried a different SATA port... hmm. Really not sure man, thats a weird one.

That's pretty much the gist of it. I did find a decent write up here 

 - but had no luck as the issue seemed similar (that is, Windows might have detected the original drive during some installations, and that was screwing me up) but doing it properly didn't result in a win. I wonder if I need to just return it. 

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Have you tried cloning the old SSD?  If that works, just use the old settings, and the use Recovery in Windows to Reset the PC.

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31 minutes ago, Mope El Two said:

Have you tried cloning the old SSD?  If that works, just use the old settings, and the use Recovery in Windows to Reset the PC.

Started attempting that recently, it'll take about two hours so here's hoping!

 

It was one of the first things I tried, but the bytes/sector sizes are different (512 vs 4096), so most software was failing me because of that but I'm in the process of one that says it can surmount that problem. Won't know for sure until it completes, but fingers crossed! 

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1 hour ago, Xenocrates said:

That's pretty much the gist of it. I did find a decent write up here 

 - but had no luck as the issue seemed similar (that is, Windows might have detected the original drive during some installations, and that was screwing me up) but doing it properly didn't result in a win. I wonder if I need to just return it. 

Did you unplug the original drive when you formated?

Rig: i7 13700k - - Asus Z790-P Wifi - - RTX 4080 - - 4x16GB 6000MHz - - Samsung 990 Pro 2TB NVMe Boot + Main Programs - - Assorted SATA SSD's for Photo Work - - Corsair RM850x - - Sound BlasterX EA-5 - - Corsair XC8 JTC Edition - - Corsair GPU Full Cover GPU Block - - XT45 X-Flow 420 + UT60 280 rads - - EK XRES RGB PWM - - Fractal Define S2 - - Acer Predator X34 -- Logitech G502 - - Logitech G710+ - - Logitech Z5500 - - LTT Deskpad

 

Headphones/amp/dac: Schiit Lyr 3 - - Fostex TR-X00 - - Sennheiser HD 6xx

 

Homelab/ Media Server: Proxmox VE host - - 512 NVMe Samsung 980 RAID Z1 for VM's/Proxmox boot - - Xeon e5 2660 V4- - Supermicro X10SRF-i - - 128 GB ECC 2133 - - 10x4 TB WD Red RAID Z2 - - Corsair 750D - - Corsair RM650i - - Dell H310 6Gbps SAS HBA - - Intel RES2SC240 SAS Expander - - TreuNAS + many other VM’s

 

iPhone 14 Pro - 2018 MacBook Air

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Solved. Super rusty on solving these types of problems so I left out what was probably the biggest clue. Cloning the one drive to the other was one of the first things I tried, but the software I tried (from memory, Acronis, Macrium and Easus To-Do) failed because the bytes/sector were incompatible (512 on old vs 4096 on the new) - and I assumed that problem was insurmountable. Then I go spend 15 hours trying to tackle the problem in different ways. No luck from all of the above attempts. Then I realize it the cloning isn't insurmountable, so I find a free software called HDClone that advertised itself as being able to clone in spite of the byte/sector issue. After about 3 hours the cloning was complete. Tested it a few different ways - once without the original SSD, then with the original SSD but a new file on the desktop - but this nightmare is finally over. I'd still be curious for a deeper "why" simply installing Windows itself wasn't working, but I'm content with this, even if I have a lot of cleaning to do.

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