Z97E-ITX/ac: SSD M.2 don't boot
Printed From: ASRock.com
Category: Technical Support
Forum Name: Intel Motherboards
Forum Description: Question about ASRock Intel Motherboards
URL: https://forum.asrock.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=9406
Printed Date: 03 Jun 2024 at 1:44am
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 12.04 - http://www.webwizforums.com
Topic: Z97E-ITX/ac: SSD M.2 don't boot
Posted By: cronos
Subject: Z97E-ITX/ac: SSD M.2 don't boot
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 3:43am
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" rel="nofollow - Hi I have a Z97E-ITX/ac mobo. I have installed Toshiba RC100 NVMe Solid State Drive (SSD) on M.2 socket of the mobo. The bios does not detect the SSD. But Windows 10 installer detect the SSD without problems. I use the latest bios 2.20. I have installed windows 10 on the SSD but when I turn on the computer I do not see the boot option and therefore I can not start windows. Windows never gets started because the boot option does not exist inside the bios. If I pulse F11 for boot options I do not see the boot sector of SSD M.2 available. What is happening? Is it a Toshiba SSD problem? Should I try another SSD brand? Supposedly my motherboard and BIOS are compatible with M.2 and NVMe. I
have disconnected all normal hard drives of the SATA data ports. Right
now I only have the SSD in the M.2 socket and the problem persists.
Should I apply some special configuration in the bios so that the m.2 boot option is available?
Thank you!
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Replies:
Posted By: Windscythe
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 5:00am
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I'm having the exact same issue at the moment. I have a Z97e-itx/ac that I have just installed a Toshiba RC100 M.2 NVME drive into, and I cannot get it to discover the drive in bios. What's interesting is that when I go to install Windows 10, the Windows installer recognizes the drive and installs, but I can't boot from the m.2 drive since the Bios does not recognize it. Another interesting thing is that if I go to the System Browser from within the Bios, it recognizes that the m.2 slot is populated, it just doesn't recognize the actual drive. I am using the most current Bios for the board, which is 2.20. Any help with this would be much appreciated.
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Posted By: cronos
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 5:14am
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I
just tried to do the same operation with an external PCI-E controller
and it happens to me exactly the same as if I connect it to the M.2 socket
on the motherboard. It is a PCI-E x4 M.2 controller. |
Posted By: Windscythe
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 9:47pm
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Please update if you find a solution. I know that the Toshiba (OCZ) RC100 is still fairly new. Hopefully it just needs Bios update from ASRock to work. It's currently disappointing that I can't get it to work as a boot drive at the moment considering it's one of, if not the only 2242 Nvme drives available. On a side note, the Z97 platform does say that I should be able to get 10gb/s on the M.2 slot. It appears as though I'm only getting around 6-7gb/s and that it's not a limitation of the drive itself but of the interface on the board. Is there a setting that I'm not seeing. I did set it to Force M.2.
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Posted By: Dan
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 10:09pm
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Try this: Once Windows is installed on your PCIe AHCI or NVMe SSD, the entry in the Boot order list appear as "Windows Boot Loader" or "Windows Boot Loader: <SSD name>", depending upon the UEFI version used with your board. Dan |
Posted By: cronos
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 10:43pm
In boot order list not appear "Windows Boot Loader" or <SSD name>. This is exactly the problem. The UEFI / BIOS does not detect the boot partition created by the windows installer on socket M.2. |
Dan wrote:Posted By: RLGL
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 10:54pm
| Usually when using M.2 devices something has to be disabled. The following is from the manual: 12 SATA3 and SATA Express Connectors (SATA3_4_5) |
Posted By: cronos
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 11:06pm
I have disconnected all hard drives from the SATA ports. The only thing that is connected to the motherboard is the m.2 SSD. I have also forced the SATA port to work as M.2 in the UEFI.
Today I tried another memory model: Transcend MTS420 240GB M.2. In this case the memory is not even detected by the windows installer. There are already 2 SSD memories tested without success: Transcend MTS420 240GB, 6Gb/s - AHCI: M.2 Type 2242 Toshiba RC100, 16 GT/s (PCIe Gen3x2L) - NVMe: M.2 Type 2242, B + M key Socket. |
Posted By: cronos
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 11:10pm
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specs: http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Z97E-ITXac/" rel="nofollow - http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Z97E-ITXac/ - 1 x SATA Express 10 Gb/s Connector (shared with SATA3_4, SATA3_5 and M.2 Socket)*
- 1 x M.2_SSD (NGFF) Socket 3, supports M Key M.2 SATA3 6.0Gb/s module and M.2 PCI Express module up to Gen2 x2 (10Gb/s) *Support to be announced. ** The M.2 Socket, SATA3_4, SATA3_5 and SATA Express share lanes. If either one of them is in use, the others will be disabled. BIOS/UEFI http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Z97E-ITXac/#BIOS" rel="nofollow - http://www.asrock.com/mb/Intel/Z97E-ITXac/#BIOS Version 2.10 -2016/6/29 - 5.24MB 1.Update NTFS module. 2.Add ME FW version in BIOS setup. 3.Add NVMe support. |
Posted By: Dan
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 11:27pm
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" rel="nofollow - What boot options do appear? Dan |
Posted By: cronos
Date Posted: 13 Aug 2018 at 11:33pm
none because I do not have any hard drive or DVD connected to the motherboard. If I connect the pendrive with the windows installer (rufus) then the boot option for the USB memory appears.
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Posted By: cronos
Date Posted: 14 Aug 2018 at 12:14am
I
have personally written to the technical support service of Toshiba /
OCZ and they have told me that it seems a problem of implementation of
the BIOS on my motherboard. OCZ suggests asking for tech support from Asrock for this question, that's why I'm here. I
hope that some ASrock technician can offer me some solution but I am
pretty sure that to be able to install windows in an M.2 memory it will
be necessary to update the UEFI obligatorily. Without update of the UEFI I doubt very much that this can be done. ***ASrock***, please, update the UEFI!! HELP!!
 I really like my mobo and I do not want to have to change it! |
Posted By: Windscythe
Date Posted: 14 Aug 2018 at 1:04am
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When no drives aside from the M.2 are installed, there are no boot options. I am able to install windows 10 from a USB drive and it will detect and install Windows 10 on the M.2 SSD. Once it reboots though, there is no Boot Loader Options. I have tried CSM Disabled. I have tried CSM Enabled with UEFI OpRom Enabled. I have tried Secure Boot Enabled and Disabled. Still no Boot Options even with Windows 10 loaded on the M.2 SSD. I have also installed Windows 10 on a USB with WinToGo so that I was able to run windows off of a USB drive. Once loaded into Windows 10, the M.2 SSD is accesable and shows all the Windows OS Folders on the drive. I can use the drive perfectly from inside Windows 10, but I just simply cannot get the Bios to detect the M.2 SSD or detect a Windows Boot from the M.2 SSD.
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Posted By: Windscythe
Date Posted: 14 Aug 2018 at 1:06am
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I agree that this is very much most likely a BIOS issue on the the side of ASRock. This is a new drive, but is very likely to be a very popular drive since it's the only NVME based 2242 M.2 SSD that I know of. Hopefully ASRock will update the BIOS so that this M.2 Device can be detected from within BIOS. I am currently using BIOS Version 2.20 for the Z97e-itx/ac. |
Posted By: cronos
Date Posted: 14 Aug 2018 at 1:50am
Exactly. Windows detects the SSD but the BIOS not. Without
updating the BIOS windows it would detect M.2 memory only if
the operating system is installed on a hard drive connected to a SATA
port. Unfortunately if ASRock does not give me a solution I
will have to return the memory SSD because if I can not install windows it
does not help me....
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Posted By: Windscythe
Date Posted: 14 Aug 2018 at 10:24am
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So....and update. I basically gave up on getting the bios to give me a boot option for the Toshiba RC100 NVME M.2 Drive, even though I was able to install Windows 10 on it. So I left the drive in, but went to install Windows 10 on my 850 Evo Sata SSD. Windows 10 would go through the motions of installing itself on the SSD, but it wouldn't fully install on it and so it wouldn't boot. Finally after several attempts and several different BIOS settings, I went ahead and locked the M.2 Drive option into Force SATA Express just to turn it off, without having to take the motherboard out and removing it physically. After I did that, I was able to install Windows 10 on the 850 EVO SSD. Now the SSD drive was in the Sata 0 spot on the board. In fact I tried it in Sata 0, 1, 2, and 3 and it was all the same issue. So basically the bios hates this Toshiba RC100 drive so much that it just refuses to work with any on board non USB device while the M.2 is connected. Please ASRock, update the Bios for the Z97e-itx/ac so that it can use the Toshiba RC100 NVME M.2 Drive.
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Posted By: Windscythe
Date Posted: 15 Aug 2018 at 10:13am
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Well. I got it working. I'm not sure what the rules are here, and if we're allowed to talk about Bios Modification, but the bottom line is I was able to get the Toshiba RC100 NVME Drive to work as a boot drive on my Z97e-itx/ac. It wasn't very difficult, so if it's allowed to talking about Bios modification here, let me know and I'll post what I did. Otherwise feel free to message me.
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Posted By: cronos
Date Posted: 15 Aug 2018 at 4:44pm
" rel="nofollow -
PLEASE tell me how you did it !!! I'm waiting! Was it something related to the GPT partition?
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Posted By: Windscythe
Date Posted: 15 Aug 2018 at 7:49pm
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There is a post somewhere else that I was able to find: "How-to-get-full-NVMe-support-for-all-Systems-with-an-AMI-UEFI-BIOS" This process was apparently designed so that people could get NVME support for 6-8 series chipset support. In fact this is pulled directly from the post.
So even though 9 Series has Nvme support, for some reason this board, does not have nvme support for this specific Nvme drive. I wasn't even sure that this would work, and was very pleasantly surprised once I went through the whole process and it did work. So a few things of importance to note. Obviously altering a BIOS carries risks and the possibility of bricking your motherboard. So if you aren't willing to take that risk on yourself, I wouldn't recommend doing this. So I'm not personally advocating that anyone do this, I'm simply sharing my experience. Things of note: I used the program by CodeRush called "UEFITool v0.25.1" I used the NvmExpressDxe_4.ffs to insert NVME support into the 2.20 BIOS file from ASRock After following the instructions from that original post, I quickly learned that the ASRock Instant Flash would deny the flash attempt with the Modded BIOS, so I searched again and found another informative post by looking up: I then scrolled down to the section for ASRock mainboards with AMI Aptio UEFI BIOS After I completed that portion, I was able to flash the new modded bios and BAM, not only was I able to install Windows 10 WITH Secure Boot and Keys Loaded, CSM Disabled, but it loaded into it perfectly. I am even able to use ULTRA FAST BOOT with the drive. If you have any questions, just let me know. If you want me to walk you through what I did over Discord, just message me and I'll send a link. |
Posted By: cronos
Date Posted: 19 Aug 2018 at 4:38am
Thank you very much for your help! I have reviewed the articles that you quote and it seems that it is a fairly safe and easy way to do it. However, I am going to request the asrock SAT if it can get an official update for UEFI from our motherboard. Otherwise I will also consider using the UEFI-MOD. My biggest problem is that I need to use the Intel RAID and I also have a mini-PCIe AHCI controller with 2 SATA ports connected ASMedia. I thought it understood that the author of the article says that in these cases can cause problems. Thank you very much for the info! |
Posted By: Windscythe
Date Posted: 20 Aug 2018 at 12:19am
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No problem at all. Just as a heads up, there is also the method of using an intermediary like Clover to act as a "Handshake" between the Bios and the OS with the NVME driver built in. It does not require any BIOS modification, and can be removed at anytime. It looked into it at first, but I felt like the BIOS modification was the simplest route. At the same time, I was willing to take the risk of bricking my motherboard. So if you're interested in a workaround until ASRock comes out with a BIOS update, I would look up: Also, these methods allow people with older chipsets to use NVME drives with PCIE addon cards, even if they don't have M.2 Drives. |
Posted By: nilezon
Date Posted: 12 Dec 2018 at 9:17pm
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+1 @ASRock_TSD please release a last firmware for Z97E-ITX/ac with TPM2-S and (full) NVME support. Pretty please? |
Posted By: scraejtp
Date Posted: 06 Jan 2019 at 11:22am
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Copied WindScythe's notes/links and was able to reproduce his results. As the task seemed daunting the link below is the v 2.2 bios with this bios mod. It worked fine for me with no changes (SATA ssd) and I performed a fresh install of Windows 10 on a 256 GB NVME with Secure Boot and Keys Loaded, CSM Disabled. Fast boot turned on now and may be the fastest booting computer I have had. Use at your own risk https://app.box.com/s/idg70hoo0uvtwcdq8xfljy2lihjskfpn |
Posted By: dstoimenos
Date Posted: 23 Jun 2019 at 2:07am
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Hallo I would like to ask. The ROM that you posted is the final ROM we can use to solve the problem? Can I flash it through the UEFI Bios Tool? After I Flash it should I make any changes to the Bios settings, so the board could detect the M.2 card? And then I could make a clean install of Windows 10? Thank you!!! |
Posted By: scraejtp
Date Posted: 21 Jul 2019 at 1:56am
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Late response as you have probably already tried it, but I flashed the rom in the bios with the Instant Flash option. I disabled CSM and Secure boot in the bios to allow the NVME to be bootable. |
Posted By: xsebo1
Date Posted: 12 Jan 2020 at 7:50am
How fast works SSD Toshiba rc100? B + M key may use only 6gb Sata, i need to now after bay 
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