Trying to install Windows on M.2 caused PC to not even post. Permanently.

[BelgianDutchman]

This is a continuation of a problem I already posted about, so I'll summarise what happened before:

 

I bought a 500GB WD Black SN750 NVME M.2 drive for my old PC. Windows was already installed on an old SATA SSD (120GB Samsung 840 SSD) but I wanted a fresh installation on the M.2.

I installed the new SSD on my motherboard and checked if I could access it from the existing Windows installation. I turned the PC off, and I downloaded the Windows ISO from here, and then followed this guide to create a recovery medium on a USB drive from my Macbook. In hindsight I could have used the PC with the existing Windows installation to do it, but it's so cluttered and slow so I couldn't be bothered.

I booted into the recovery medium, went through the installation process and formatted all drives (m.2 SSD and SATA SSD) and removed all partitions, and let the installer run. It said a reboot was required to continue the installation, but after rebooting it just brought me to the beginning of the process on the recovery medium. No matter what I did, Windows did not want to install on the m.2

I've tried:

• Checking if both drives are recognised in the BIOS (they are)
• Changing my boot order in the BIOS 
• Unplugging the USB drive, but that just took me to the BIOS every time
• Installing Windows on the Samsung SSD (the one that originally had Windows installed), but suddenly that lead to the exact same results
• Updating the BIOS firmware
• Disabling Secure Boot (which wasn't actually possible, so I just removed the secure boot keys)
• disabling CSM
• Running the startup repair from the recovery volume. It just said it couldn't be fixed and produced a log file saying "a recently serviced boot binary is damaged" with the 0x825 error code

 

Now I found this thread and I though my problem was solved. I decided to start from scratch and follow the solution in the thread. By starting from scratch, I figured I should also reset the BIOS settings to the default, but apparently that was a big mistake. Now it doesn't even post anymore... It turns on, the fans work and the LED is lit, but I'm getting nothing on my screen. I've tried:

• Reseating RAM
• Moving the GPU to a different slot
• Checking cable connections and fan activity
• Unplugging the PSU and removing the CMOS battery, and then holding the power button to drain capacitors (assuming that works...)
• Unplugging all storage drives (including the M.2)
• Plugging in only the original SATA SSD with the M.2 unplugged
• Testing my monitor with a different PC

I doubted that most of these would work since it worked perfectly before and I hadn't messed with the insides, but I figured it was worth trying.

 

Here are my specs (it's an older PC from 2014):

• CPU: Intel Xeon E3-1231v3
• MoBo: Asus H97-PLUS
• RAM: 8GB (2x 4096MB) Corsair Vengeance Black DDR3
• PSU: 650 Watt Seasonic G Series
• GPU: 3072MB Gigabyte GeForce GTX 780 WindForce 3X OC Rev. 2.0
• SATA SSD: 120GB Samsung 840 Evo SATA
• M.2 SSD: 500GB WD Black SN750 NVME M.2

 

[WhitetailAni]

Install Windows with only the M.2 SSD in.

Windows can get touchy with multiple empty drives.

[BelgianDutchman]

2 minutes ago, FakeKGB said:

Install Windows with only the M.2 SSD in.

Windows can get touchy with multiple empty drives.

I wish I could, but it won't even boot from the recovery volume anymore...

[googleuser3212]

1 minute ago, BelgianDutchman said:

I wish I could, but it won't even boot from the recovery volume anymore...

Do you have a windows installation boot drive

[WhitetailAni]

Just now, BelgianDutchman said:

I wish I could, but it won't even boot from the recovery volume anymore...

Do you have another PC that you can make a bootable Windows 10 USB with?

If so, remake the USB. Use the Windows Media Creation Tool if you can.

[BelgianDutchman]

Just now, fiddleslessless said:

Do you have a windows installation disk?

Nope, only the USB drive I made from the .iso

I'm afraid the Windows installation disk is long gone

[googleuser3212]

Just now, FakeKGB said:

Do you have another PC that you can make a bootable Windows 10 USB with?

If so, remake the USB. Use the Windows Media Creation Tool if you can.

If they already have one, do they need to recreate it tho?

[WhitetailAni]

Just now, fiddleslessless said:

If they already have one, do they need to recreate it tho?

He said that he had one, but it wasn't working.

My thought is that because of the 2 free SSDs, the Windows installer got confused and split the install across 3 drives (SATA SSD, M.2 SSD, and USB flash drive), corrupting the media.

[googleuser3212]

Just now, BelgianDutchman said:

Nope, only the USB drive I made from the .iso

I'm afraid the Windows installation disk is long gone

Then follow what fakekgb said if you have a second pc

[Useless Soveriegn]

Damn man that rough. Im kinda at a loss as where to go as you covered everything I'd do. The only thing i can think of is disassemblying the lot, clear cmos and trying again. If at that stage you still cant post your gonna have to verify your compenants see if you can figure out which one is cock this up for you.

[Useless Soveriegn]

2 minutes ago, FakeKGB said:

He said that he had one, but it wasn't working.

My thought is that because of the 2 free SSDs, the Windows installer got confused and split the install across 3 drives, corrupting the media.

He cant post, so  lets get him to post then worry about installing os but i think you maybe on to the right idea there

[BelgianDutchman]

Just now, FakeKGB said:

He said that he had one, but it wasn't working.

My thought is that because of the 2 free SSDs, the Windows installer got confused and split the install across 3 drives, corrupting the media.

Well, the drive was working, I could go through the installation process and everything. The problem happened when it wants to reboot to continue the installation, it just returns to the beginning.

Anyway, the drive is working, but I can't boot from it because the PC is not posting. I'm not sure remaking the drive that worked will solve the problem if I can't even get into the BIOS?

[zogthegreat]

Hi @BelgianDutchman,

 

I know that this is probably a stupid question, but did you check the boot order in your BIOS? I've had problems like this before and it turned out that my BIOS was trying to boot off of my data drive instead of the boot drive.

[BelgianDutchman]

4 minutes ago, Useless Soveriegn said:

Damn man that rough. Im kinda at a loss as where to go as you covered everything I'd do. The only thing i can think of is disassemblying the lot, clear cmos and trying again. If at that stage you still cant post your gonna have to verify your compenants see if you can figure out which one is cock this up for you.

Hmm, I hoped to avoid that unless there's nothing else I could try...

I've never cleared the CMOS before until just now, I just remove the battery right? Is there anything specific I need to do, like leave it out for X seconds/minutes? I want to try it again (and make sure I do it properly) before I start disassembling everything.

Is there any way to reset the BIOS to factory settings, so that it also removes any updates I did? I think the problem might be because I upgraded the BIOS firmware and then reset to default settings. The defaults must have changed between firmware versions because it changed quite a lot of settings, and that's the last thing I did before it stopped posting.

[BelgianDutchman]

4 minutes ago, zogthegreat said:

Hi @BelgianDutchman,

 

I know that this is probably a stupid question, but did you check the boot order in your BIOS? I've had problems like this before and it turned out that my BIOS was trying to boot off of my data drive instead of the boot drive.

When it was still posting, I did try that. I changed the boot order, in every possible configuration, even unplugged the USB drive, but nothing worked.

[Useless Soveriegn]

7 minutes ago, BelgianDutchman said:

Hmm, I hoped to avoid that unless there's nothing else I could try...

I've never cleared the CMOS before until just now, I just remove the battery right? Is there anything specific I need to do, like leave it out for X seconds/minutes? I want to try it again (and make sure I do it properly) before I start disassembling everything.

Is there any way to reset the BIOS to factory settings, so that it also removes any updates I did? I think the problem might be because I upgraded the BIOS firmware and then reset to default settings. The defaults must have changed between firmware versions because it changed quite a lot of settings, and that's the last thing I did before it stopped posting.

Cmos clear the Bios settings but not the version.  Google search your own board for more direct instruction but your just removing the round battery on your motherboard. It will have a clipping system of some kind to remove it. I generally leave it out for just a minute then pop it back in

[BelgianDutchman]

1 hour ago, Useless Soveriegn said:

Cmos clear the Bios settings but not the version.  Google search your own board for more direct instruction but your just removing the round battery on your motherboard. It will have a clipping system of some kind to remove it. I generally leave it out for just a minute then pop it back in

Hmm, I just tried it and waited around an hour and then put in a new CMOS battery. No results...