Samsung 850 Evo SSD

[lanceX]

Hello, I'm new to this forum. I started my first Gaming PC build back in early 2017. My build has changed dramatically in less than 2 years from air cooling to custom watercooling. Unfortunately, on Wednesday I was running some tasks and my computer just froze. At first I was able to use my mouse and click options but with no response. I reset my pc but it wouldn't boot anymore all I got was an error code A2 and eventually 99 and 9C. I finally was able to go into BIOS settings and went under advance boot settings and saw that my SSD was not showing as a boot drive. Went into storage settings and also didn't list my SSD as a storage device. The only ones that showed were my other 2 Seagate HDD. This left me to believe that my SSD failed. I contacted Samsung and they approved for me to send it in and get it repaired. I basically need advice on what to do. All my games were saved on my other drives but I didn't want to start windows all over again. If I buy another SSD can I use the repair function to restore windows image into the new drive and have it boot up? Or would I have to initialize Windows all over again into the new drive? Any input would be appreciated. 

 

My Specs

MSI Z390 Godlike 

Intel 8700k 

1080ti in SLI 

32 GB of Ram 

 

[kb5zue]

Sorry but the best thing you can do when installing a "new" drive in the system is to do a complete, fresh install of Windows.

[captain_aggravated]

If the drive is broke, the drive is broke.  Send it to Samsung for repairs.  Yes, you'll have to reinstall Windows.

[Enderman]

There's very little chance of it being a defective SSD.

Double check all the power and data connections or try plugging it into a different sata port.

 

Is your SSD showing up at all in BIOS or is it just not showing up as a boot option?

[lanceX]

Thank you all for the quick response. I really appreciate the feedback. It's just that I've been stressing this out too much since I like to sit down and play games after a long day of work. Plus it's the first issue I've had. I know I didn't get attacked by a virus since I stay away from websites and downloads that can potentially have viruses. To answer Enderman's question I did swap SATA cables and Power Cables around to confirm that it wasn't a secondary issue. I did do a lttile research before I came here so no need to bash me with the "do some research" line lol. All jokes aside when I put in the Windows USB thumb stick with suspected bad SSD I can't get into the setup menu, but once I disconnect the SSD I can go into windows menu and access the repair computer option. So it looks like I will have to start all over with Windows setup. 

[lanceX]

Update, I installed a clean version of Windows 10, prior to this I had shorted the BIOS thinking this would solve my issue of not being able to boot. Now that I did a fresh install everything boots up normal but I can't setup internet connections or chose wifi. I tried a LAN cable from my router to computer and still can't get access. Does it have something to do with the bios being reverted to default? My motherboard is an MSI Z390.