Samsung M.2 SSD doesn't work as a boot drive

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Gustas

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Feb 11, 2015
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Hello,

I recently bought a Samsung 960 Evo 250GB M.2 NVMe SSD. My motherboard, which is Asus Z97-PRO(Wifi ac), has an M.2 slot, but it didn't come with native support for NVMe the time I bought it. So I updated my BIOS to the latest one, which claims to have NVMe support. And yes, after updating I found a new NVMe option in the advanced settings in BIOS.
Then, I inserted my new SSD into the M.2 slot and now the SSD shows in NVMe options, it also shows in as a "legacy" device in "Hard Drive BBS priorities", but it doesn't show up as a normal boot device. It even shows up in Windows and it is detected by Samsung Magician software.
Then I installed Windows 8.1 on the SSD. But, the thing is that I left my old Samsung 850 Evo SSD, which has Windows 10 and Windows Boot manager in it, connected to the system. So, now when I boot up my PC, the BIOS boots into the old SSD with Windows Boot Manager in it and then it lets me choose between Windows 10 and newly installed WIndows 8.1. But when I disconnected the old SSD from the system, it just doesn't boot. Even if I manually select the M.2 SSD in the boot override list in BIOS, the system just goes back to the BIOS screen after a few seconds. Now, I don't know what to do. How I can make my new Samsung 960 Evo as a normal boot device, so the BIOS can boot into it?
 
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Paul NZ

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Sep 15, 2014
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You should unplug extra hdds when you install windows on an ssd. Otherwise that'll happen

An NVME ssd needs drivers which are on the Win10 dvd. But first you have to configure the BIOS so you can add the drivers

I think in order to use it as an NVME SSD, you have to put it on a PCI-E card
 
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G

Gustas

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Feb 11, 2015
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Why does it need drivers which are on the Win10 DVD? Doesn't Windows 8.1 have the same NVMe drivers? Isn't there any way to build the Windows boot manager in the new SSD, so I can boot from it? And how do I configure BIOS for adding drivers? Do I have to unplug everything and reinstall the system completely?
 
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edstargames

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Apr 25, 2016
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I'm going to try and help as I have just built a PC with an M.2 NVMe boot drive and a HDD as a secondary drive.

Like Paul said, I only had the one drive connected when I did a fresh installation of Windows form a USB stick. Only once that was completely finished did I connect the HDD.

In order to fix your problem, you may have to backup your important files and start over!
 
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Paul NZ

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Sep 15, 2014
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Thats a good question. I dont know if the Win8 dvd has NVME drivers.

But I know the Win10 dvd does (have generic NVME drivers)

And I have no idea what the bios settings are for an NVME. I dont have one. But I've read that you have to add drivers , so it gets recoognised, and so you can boot from one


 
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G

Gustas

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Feb 11, 2015
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I mean, Windows 8.1 install disk succesfully detected my NVMe drive and I could install Windows on it without any problems. After I booted up, the Windows Basic NVMe driver was already in the Windows 8.1 device manager.
 
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Gustas

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Feb 11, 2015
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Do I really have to start over? Won't the bootrec recovery options fix the installation? Or there is no way to add the Windows boot manager when the OS is already installed on the disk?
 
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Paul NZ

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Sep 15, 2014
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You may have to do something similar to this. I found this on some site. It MAY or MAY NOT work on yours

1 - Make sure you unplug all SATA and USB drives, the M.2 drive has to be the only drive installed.

2 - Go into the bios, under the boot tab there is an option for CSM, make sure it is disabled.

3 - Click on secure boot option below and make sure it is set to other OS, Not windows UEFI.

4 - Click on key management and clear secure boot keys.

5 - Insert a USB memory stick with a UEFI bootable iso of Windows 10 on it, USB3 is quicker but USB2 works also. A Windows DVD won’t work unless you’ve created your own UEFI Bootable DVD.

6 - Press F10 to save, exit and reboot.

7 - Windows will now start installing to your NVME drive as it has its own NVME driver built in, I don't think this would work with previous versions.

8 - When the PC reboots hit F2 to go back into the BIOS, you will see under boot priority that windows boot manager now lists your NVME drive.

9 - Click on secure boot again but now set it to WIndows UEFI mode.

10 - Click on key management and install default secure boot keys

11 - Press F10 to save and exit and windows will finish the install.

The info below, maybe different for you . Read the manual and see what sata ports (if applicable) it disables if you connect more than 1 SATA hdd

Once you have Windows up and running, shutdown the PC and reconnect your other SATA drives. Do not put anything on SATA port 1 as this is now reserved for the NVME drive.

I would also recommend installing the Samsung NVME driver at this point to replace the Windows one.

The background here is NVME SSDs do not appear within the BIOS until Windows creates the system partition with the EFI Boot Sector.

Your M.2 SSD contains UEFI driver information within the firmware. By disabling the CSM module Windows will read and utilize the M.2-specific UEFI driver.


Make sure you do not use SATA port 1 from that point forward!
 
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Gustas

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Feb 11, 2015
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I don't think SATA1 on my motherboard disables anything. M.2 shares bandwidth with SATAEXPRESS ports and I never plug anything into those ports. I want Windows 8.1 so badly because Windows 10 seems still too buggy for me.
 
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Gustas

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Feb 11, 2015
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Thanks for all who helped me!

I managed to fix the Windows Boot Manager without reinstalling anything. You just have to unplug all other drives, except the main disk you want to boot from. Then follow <this tutorial> to build a new bootloader in your main disk and the new "Windows Boot Manager" option should now be listed in boot priority of your BIOS.
 
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