Computer only reaches bios no HDD recognised.

Blue_Shift

Blue_Shift

Blue_Shift

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23 Oct 2018
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Hi I turned on my PC today and it would not load windows, only bringing up the bios. I reset to try again, but it wouldnt even get that far. I removed one of the sticks of RAM (I have 2x 8gig ddr4) and it did hit the bios again, making me think there was a problem with the RAM however, it doesn’t recognise any hard drives.

I have a 240 gig solid state, a 1tb hybrid and an older 500gig drive installed. I have tried to boot from a USB drive and it gets partially through the process, but again recognises none of the attached drives. I have a 550w Corsair power supply installed and all fans etc spin.

My other components of note are an i5 8400 and a gtx 1060. There are no beeps from the motherboard. I have checked all parts are seated correctly and power cables are attached. Im just really confused as it was working perfectly before this.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
Hi thanks a lot for the reply.

I did check the sata cables and all were connected securely.

The other drives are not showing in the bios either.

I would add to this that I have only relatively recently installed the SSD (which I am using for windows 10) and had one previous incident after installation where it would not boot and windows needed to be repaired. I always follow the correct shutdown procedures etc.

If this drive is the problem, would it stop my other drives from showing up?
 
Hi, thanks again. I will try removing the drives and trying them one by one after work. Other than that, I'll have to see if there is a motherboard fault. I have an ASROCK z370m Pro4, so hopefully i can search round for more info on this.
 
I have disconnected and reconnected my hard drives but they are still not recognised. Sometimes it will post with both sticks of RAM, sometimes only one. I have tried swapping the sticks but this does not seem to make a difference, it doesn’t seem to post consistently.

I’m beginning to think this is a problem with the motherboard. I have tried updating the bios to the latest version, but this too doesn’t seem to work.
 
Non of the drives are recognised in BIOS?
Or not recognised when windows tries to load.

If the former I could be a corrupt MBR which is easily fixable.
 
Did you change anything between the last healthy boot and the boot which only went to BIOS? Was there a windows update?

I would also remove GFX Card to and plug into on board, just to remove the gfx card from the equation (if you have onboard outputs on your mobo).

Then if picks up drive in bios - add parts until you find out faulty part.


If still not sensing the drives could be mobo, CPU, or the SSD/HDD's. Perhaps originally caused by a fault in the PSU.

As it is posting with one or other of stick of RAM, that really should narrow it to CPU or mobo. Still PSU could be faulty also.
 
Hi, thanks for the reply.

I checked all the SATA cables were seated properly, and removed the gfx card but still the same issue. I changed nothing between the last boot and this one, which is why it seemed so strange. No windows updates etc.

As mentioned, there was one instance where it refused to boot to windows and I had to re-install windows 10, however all drives were showing in the bios that time.

The bios does not show any drives now, both in the basic screen and the boot preferences. It will not even hit windows. It’s luck of the draw if it posts.

There have been a couple of previous instances where it has had difficulty shutting down if there have been SD cards attached via usb but nothing major like this. Other than this everything has been extremely stable whilst running. It’s never even crashed.

All fans etc are running, and when it does reach the bios, it’s showing the RAM, gfx and cpu. I know this does not necessarily mean that there is anything wrong with the psu, but it has seemed stable so far and it’s plugged into a surge protector.
 
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Just a couple of thoughts;
Does your HDDs spin up when you power on the computer?
I'm unsure whether your PSU is modular, but if it is, is the cable fully plugged into the module port of the PSU? Hasn't come lose from the new SSD install?
Have you tried plugging the disk drives into alternate SATA headers? From the manual I believe it has six. Maybe worth disconnecting all the disks and trying one on alternates.
It's definitely an odd one. Fingers crossed for you pal.
 
Thanks a lot for the replies.

The hard drives are spinning up, tried them in various combinations/ports etc but no luck.

It really is a weird one. I'll keep at it over the weekend. Hopefully i can get to the bottom of it.

Cheers.
 
Sameish thing happend to me
1) sata controller / southbridge is failing (underclock it)
2) psu power cable is bad (i used an adaptor)
3) u are plugging it into a sata express port or sata port that shares its bandwidth with a graphics cards pci port...

My drives stopped showing up when i had 2 plugged into sata express

Orrr
4) enable ahci or enable ide and swip swap (swip swap??) , and swip swap them around

Did u install windows 10 with ide enabled and then u switched to ahci in bios later, that will stop it from booting

Your issue sounds like number 3..
Then again i havent looked into your mobo manual..
 
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