HDD Failing, Upgrading to SSD (compatibility question)

anchorage678

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Nov 2, 2017
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My HDD is most likely failing, I figure now is as good a time as any to upgrade to an SSD. My motherboard is the asus m5a97 r2.0 https://www.asus.com/ca-en/Motherboards/M5A97_R20/

I understand it doesn't have an M.2 slot, but if I could, I'd prefer M.2 over SATA. Now, my understanding is that if I get a PCIE adapter and plug an M.2 SSD in there, it can't be used as a boot device (and therefore windows cannot be loaded onto it/from it?). From what I can tell, this limits me to buying a standard SATA SSD which isn't preferable. Also, while installing windows on the SSD, I need to completely remove my HDD correct? And then afterwards I can plug it back in?

Is any of this incorrect? I just wanted clarification using my own motherboard and including my own needs, as google searches are vague and hardly ever use my exact components.
 
Solution
You'd be better of with SATA SSD because your BIOS doesn't allow boot from anything else. Besides, only few M.2 SSDs are faster than SATA drives. It just doesn't pay to use one in your case.
Yes, it's best to disconnect all drives excluding drive OS is supposed to be on until OS installation is completed. Don't forget to turn on AHCI mode in BIOS before installing OS.
You'd be better of with SATA SSD because your BIOS doesn't allow boot from anything else. Besides, only few M.2 SSDs are faster than SATA drives. It just doesn't pay to use one in your case.
Yes, it's best to disconnect all drives excluding drive OS is supposed to be on until OS installation is completed. Don't forget to turn on AHCI mode in BIOS before installing OS.
 
Solution

USAFRet

Titan
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Concur with the above.
Don't freak out over the M.2 NVMe.

Just get a regular SATA III drive. Samsung 850 EVO or Crucial MX300, in whatever size your budget allows.
It will still be blindingly fast.

For your next system in a year or two, that has native support for an NVMe drive...that is when you get one.
 

Joey2oo9

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Jan 21, 2009
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There's absolutely no need to disconnect other drives, just select the SSD as the install drive job done.

 

Joey2oo9

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No need to disconnect your HDD, just make sure you pick the SSD as the install drive, it'll be easy to tell which is which, for a start the SSD capacity is gonna be a lot smaller.

 

USAFRet

Titan
Moderator


It is strongly advised to have only the target drive connected while you install the OS.
Why?

1. To absolutely prevent a mistake. "yeah, yeah, it won't happen to me I'll be careful"
I've seen people here with exaclty that issue.

2. Windows has a nasty habit of putting the boot info on a second drive if available.
Next year, when you take that secondary drive out, no boot for you.


Takes a whole 10 seconds to reconnect it after, so why not avoid any issues, and have only the one drive connected.
 

Joey2oo9

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I've never disconnected any other drives when installing windows and never had a problem.
 

Maybe you didn't but anybody that has to ask about is almost sure to make a mistake. It takes few seconds to do it but may prevent wasting hours or days in troubleshooting.

 


Joey:
You're absolutely correct that it should be unnecessary for a user to disconnect all drives from one's system when installing a Win OS onto the intended boot drive. Our experience parallels yours in the sense that we rarely disconnect any other drive(s) currently installed in the system when fresh-installing a Win OS onto the desired HDD or SSD.

HOWEVER...
Time & time again this forum contains posts from users who plaintively seek help because while they presumably successfully installed the Win OS onto the desired drive, their system doesn't boot and apparently is dysfunctional. When we attempt to probe the reason(s) for this dilemma we invariably find (at least in many cases) that the former boot drive was connected in the system at the time of the new OS installation and apparently contains the System Reserved partition containing the boot data. As a consequence (assuming both drives are currently connected) a boot problem arises because the drive containing the SR partition must be connected at the time of the boot. If it's not connected the system won't boot.

The problem more usually takes the form of a faulty disk-cloning operation in that following the (apparently) successful d-c operation the user boots the system with both the newly-cloned (usually) SSD connected together with the original source drive containing the OS. Again the boot problem noted above frequently (but not ALWAYS arises). It's why responders (such as the ones on this post) frequently advise the user that IMMEDIATELY following the d-c operation to UNINSTALL the source drive from the system and boot ONLY with the newly-cloned drive installed. After determining the newly-cloned drive boots & functions problem-free then one can reinstall the former boot drive.

Here's a post on this forum rec'd "19 minutes ago" (11/2/17) entitled "Windows won't boot due to the secondary SSD and HDD". See http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3557199/windows-boot-due-secondary-ssd-hdd.html

"I had installed windows on a ssd a problem caused in which I couldn't boot windows, so I forced to install windows on my secondary hdd after a clean installalltion every time I boot it seems stuck in loading screen before windows start up ,if I unplug my SSD it's seems to boot up I switched cable it didn't seems to work , i have a another a HDD even it seems to cause the same problem. I prioritize the HDD on bios it didn't solve the problem . The system only boots if only one HDD which i had installed my os is connected to the sata0 otherwise it won't boot .some help would be nice sorry for the crappy English , it's not my native language .

Specs
I5 6500
16gb ddr4 ram
gigabyte ga-h110m-s2 mother board
Kingston 120 GB SSD
1tb and 500 GB Hdd
Windows 10 64bit
GTX 1070 "

HARDLY A DAY GOES BY WHERE WE DON'T SEE A NEAR-IDENTICAL POST ON THIS FORUM FROM A USER PLAINTIVELY ASKING FOR HELP FOR A SIMILAR ISSUE.

And it's a safe bet we KNOW what caused this problem. Just read the post up to this point...
"I had installed windows on a ssd a problem caused in which I couldn't boot windows, so I forced to install windows on my secondary hdd after a clean installalltion every time I boot it seems stuck in loading screen before windows start up ,if I unplug my SSD it's seems to boot up I switched cable it didn't seems to work..."

So what are we going to advise the OP? Simple. We say...
"If you want to fresh-install the Win 10 OS on your SSD, do the following. Disconnect ALL your other drives from the system and with the ONLY drive connected - your SSD - fresh-install the Win 10 OS onto that drive. After the installation of the OS, boot to the SSD and ensure that it boots and properly functions. ONLY then you can connect your two secondary HDDs back to the system - the 500 GB HDD & the 1 TB HDD.

It's a good idea to connect the SSD connected to the first SATA port/connector of the motherboard (usually SATA 0 or SATA 1) and you can check the motherboard's BIOS boot priority order to ensure the SSD is first in boot priority.

Capiche?"

Is the preceding always the answer to the OP's problem? Of course not, but it's worth a try...