HDD's not visible after SSD instal

[RanDomDan]

So Ill start off by clearly stating i am a novice at this

 

Anyway!

I i installed an M.2 SSD into my PC as i wanted to upgrade from my old HDD setup.

 

After physically installing it my PC would no longer boot.

It would load up the BIOS then upon exit just restart then return to BIOS.

I tried selecting the correct boot device but it didn't make any difference.

 

At this point i though screw it, and loaded a windows installer onto a flash drive using my laptop and set about installing windows.

Before installing windows i unplugged both HDD's (1 2TB drive with windows and mostly storage and 1 1TB drive which was just storage)

Windows installed without any issues.

I created a partition to separate windows from everything else that i install, windows has about 100GB of space to itself.

 

Anyway despite everything my old drives are still invisible.

Im happy to just format the 2TB drive as i have backed everything up (hopefully!)

the 1TB drive is the one where everything is backed up, this may turn up to be a mistake (lol)

 

Basically its not the end of the world if i cant save anything on either drive but i would like to rescue what is on the 1TB drive if i can.

 

Any advice on how to fix my predicament would be greatly appreciated

Feel free to make fun if you like cus y'know, forum life.

 

[RanDomDan]

It is Windows 10 which i imagine is fairly obvious but i didnt actually state as much

[Oshino Shinobu]

What motherboard and what SSD? 

 

M.2 drives often disable certain SATA ports

[mariushm]

Check the manual of your motherboard.

On some motherboards, SOME sata ports get disabled when you install a M.2 SSD.  Simply moving the SATA cable into another port on the motherboard.

[RanDomDan]

17 minutes ago, Oshino Shinobu said:

What motherboard and what SSD? 

 

M.2 drives often disable certain SATA ports

 

Its a Asus Z97-K and a WD Black SN750.

 

Im not sure what you mean with the second part though!

 

3 minutes ago, mariushm said:

Check the manual of your motherboard.

On some motherboards, SOME sata ports get disabled when you install a M.2 SSD.  Simply moving the SATA cable into another port on the motherboard.

 

I still have the manual so Ill have a look, thanks.

[Oshino Shinobu]

17 minutes ago, RanDomDan said:

 

Its a Asus Z97-K and a WD Black SN750.

 

Im not sure what you mean with the second part though!

 

 

I still have the manual so Ill have a look, thanks.

SATA ports 5 and 6 are disabled when using an M.2 drive on that board. 

 

Try moving your drives to different SATA ports. 

[RanDomDan]

5 minutes ago, Oshino Shinobu said:

SATA ports 5 and 6 are disabled when using an M.2 drive on that board. 

 

Try moving your drives to different SATA ports. 

 

All working now!

Thanks for the help.

 

Why is that the case anyway? (assuming you have insider ASUS knowledge)

[Oshino Shinobu]

Just now, RanDomDan said:

 

All working now!

Thanks for the help.

 

Why is that the case anyway? (assuming you have insider ASUS knowledge)

It's typically because the M.2 slot and SATA ports share bandwidth, at least on older/lower end boards. 

 

On the new platforms with PCIe 4.0 and top end boards, you can often have multiple M.2 NVMe drives without disabling any SATA ports or affecting the bandwidth of PCIe slots. 

 

No insider knowledge, it's written in the board's specifications on ASUS's website and it will be in your manual.