Automatic UEFI boot causes grey screen, manual boot selection works fine

[truprecht]

[cross-posted from Motherboard and Graphics Card forums]

MB: Asus P8Z77-V Pro
GPU: MSI HD7950 Twin Frozr OC
OS: Win 10 64
Boot SSD: Crucial M4 128GB

After I upgraded from Win 7 Pro to Win 10, I would get a grey screen after the blue window logo with the rotating balls. I assumed it was a GPU driver issue, and spent weeks messing with drivers, driver cleaners, safe mode boots, CCC install failures, clean Windows re-installs, etc. All that effort has come to this:

If I allow the computer to boot "naturally" to the UEFI P1 Windows Boot partition, I get the same grey screen. However, if I go to the BIOS and use the manual Boot Manager, the computer works perfectly. I have the most recent BIOS on both the MB and GPU – the GPU BIOS is specifically labeled a “hybrid” BIOS for UEFI/non-UEFI systems.

Here’s what I’ve tried changing in the BIOS:
- Turned off multi-GPU (Lucid Virtu MVP) in the BIOS. No Change.
- Changed the primary GPU selection from "Auto" to PCIE. No Change.
- Disabled Secure Boot by clearing the keys. No Change.
- Changed the boot OS type from "Windows UEFI" to "Other OS". No Change

Still works fine if I manually select the boot device, still goes grey if I let it automatically boot to the exact same device.

How can I get it to boot correctly without having to use the BIOS boot manager? Did I somehow setup the Windows install partition incorrectly?

 

[Darkbreeze]

Have you tried both the UEFI and the "UEFI with Legacy" options on the UEFI boot settings or fiddling with the CSM setting if your board has it?

Are you aware that ASUS has released a new model specific chipset driver that is NOT the Intel certified chipset driver, specifically to correct Windows 10 issues with this and a few other Z77 chipset boards on the 23rd of this month. If you have not installed that specific chipset driver package, I would try that first.

https://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/P8Z77V_PRO/HelpDesk_Download/


If none of that works, I'd try removing the CMOS battery for about five minutes, then reinstall it and try to boot. Sometimes removal of the CMOS battery rebuilds the EFI tables, which does NOT happen simply by resetting the bios to default settings.

 

[rcxtra]

Still works fine if I manually select the boot device, still goes grey if I let it automatically boot to the exact same device.

I'm wondering if maybe you're selecting the non-UEFI boot when you use the manual boot override option in BIOS.

Try bringing up the Boot Select Menu during POST (it should be F8 for Asus). If you don't see a UEFI option in the menu that comes up then Windows 10 was not installed as UEFI. If you see both UEFI and non-UEFI options in the menu then you need to double check your default UEFI boot settings in BIOS and disable Legacy Boot or make sure all the options are set to UEFI first.

 

[Darkbreeze]

SFAIK, there isn't a "non-UEFI" Windows installation option for 8 or 10. There IS however the possibility that AHCI wasn't enabled when Windows 10 was installed, or that you installed to an MBR partition instead of a GPT partition. That could, perhaps, create issues, but I think Windows 10 automatically creates a GPT partition if you have in fact done an actual "clean" install, which means installing to a bare drive or deleting all the existing partitions on the drive before or during the installation process.

Since you've only done an upgrade, and not a clean install, it's an even higher probability that the partition style versus the UEFI settings is at play.

 

[rcxtra]

SFAIK, there isn't a "non-UEFI" Windows installation option for 8 or 10.

I'm not sure about Win8 because of the secure boot crap, but Win10 can absolutely be installed either as UEFI or Legacy boot. When you do a Win10 upgrade the disk partition type is not changed.

 

[truprecht]

Thanks for the responses.

I started off with an upgrade, but after it wouldn't work I did a clean install. I deleted all existing partitions and let Win10 create whatever partitions it needed, which I believe are GPT.

I see both UEFI and non-UEFI boot devices in the UEFI and the F8 Boot Manager, however, when I try to boot to a non-UEFI device I get an error message asking for a bootable device. To clarify, the UEFI 'device' is the Windows Boot Manager on the SSD. The SSD itself shows up as a separate non-UEFI device, but is not bootable.

In the UEFI/BIOS config there is a compatibility-mode boot setting with 3 options: UEFI & Legacy OpROM, UEFI-only, and Legacy-only. It's set to UEFI&Legacy. I tried Legacy-only and got the same error message mentioned above.

I'm going to try the ASUS chipset driver upgrades next.

 

[truprecht]

Update:

I installed the non-Beta chipset driver update from the Asus website. No change.
I tried the UEFI-only option in the compatability-mode setting. No change.

 

[truprecht]

Update:

I turned OFF the compatability support module (CSM) in the Boot section of the BIOS and it's now booting correctly without manually selecting the device.

 

[Darkbreeze]

CSM setting was what I was looking for when I posted the UEFI vs UEFI/Legacy setting, but could not find any reference to CSM in your bios settings according to the motherboard manual, and not every board has that setting, especially if it's an older UEFI board. Perhaps there are more than one revision of that board model. Glad to hear you got it worked out. I was pretty sure it was a bios setting, but it helps when the manual includes all of the relevant settings.

 

[truprecht]

CSM setting was what I was looking for when I posted the UEFI vs UEFI/Legacy setting.

Yes - frustrating that all 3 settings within the CSM didn't work, but turning off the CSM altogether did work.

I probably spent 30 hours dealing with this over past 4 weeks. It was a late discovery that the the computer would boot when I went through the manual F8 boot selector. Prior to that, I could only get it to boot in safe mode or by disconnecting the GPU and plugging the monitor into the MB. It really seemed like GPU driver problem.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Well, just glad you got it sorted out. Good luck truprecht.

 

[truprecht]

Thanks for your help!

 

[Darkbreeze]

No problem. Good luck.