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Inspiron 15 7000 Gaming Wont Boot from m.2
I cannot for the life of me figure out how to boot my computer from the new m.2 I installed.
I bought my NVMe m.2 SSD from crucial after seeing someone recommend I look there to make sure whatever I get is compatible with my system so I picked up a 500gb ssd from them and installed it in the slot. The computer also had a toshiba hybrid hdd ssd TB hard drive which I’ve been using consistently for a while now. After installing the new drive (the m.2) I initialized it in windows then I used a program called macrium reflect to clone the old hybrid drive to the new m.2 drive. It appeared to clone fine just briefly going through some files in file explorer and comparing to the old hybrid and so I turned off my computer and then took out the old hybrid.
When I tried booting it up, it did not boot. It would go to the dell support assist and just sit there forever saying ‘Testing memory in progress.... Estimated time left 1 sec’. I would reboot and tried doing the single boot or whatever when you hit f12 and the drive didn’t show up at all as a boot option. I went to the device manager there and it saw that drive and everything looked ok there but I couldn’t boot from it. Plugged the old hybrid back in and booted it up (booted up normally this time getting to windows) and saw someone tried booting in legacy instead of UEFI so i rebooted (with the hybrid still attached) and this time entered the bios with f2. I switched it there so it’d boot with legacy or whatever and tested if it still booted from the hybrid just fine (as the m.2 should be a clone). Went back into bios, changed order of drives to the m.2 was on top. Rebooted and same problem, except this time it went to a black screen and said something like
PXE-E61: Media test failure, check cable
PXE-MOF: Exiting PXE ROM.
No Boot Device Found. Press any key to reboot the machine
Okay, I thought, maybe it doesn’t like that I have the old drive still attached. So I tried removing it (m.2 drive is now the only storage device) and booting again but it had the same effect. Went into bios while in this configuration and.... I couldn’t see the M.2 in the list of devices it would try booting in legacy.
Just to make sure my computer still works I plugged in the hybrid again and it booted fine. Went into the bios and reset the settings thinking I might’ve changed something that it didn’t like (so it’s booting as UEFI like normal) and it again boots fine with old hybrid but support assist with m.2. Thought I could’ve cloned it wrong so I tried it again from scratch but that hasn’t changed anything in behavior.
Side note of interest; when I try booting without legacy boot enabled with just the m.2 installed, when looking at the bios the legacy button is grayed out (as expected) and UEFI is selected however if I click add boot or view to see where it’s booting from it either tells me there’s no boot device or nothing (I’m the case of the latter)
Deleting all the data and starting from scratch is NOT an option. I just want the new drive I put in to act as the boot so my system works better as the 1TB drive is very slow although I do appreciate the storage space it gives me. Please help!
ZekromMegaBoss
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April 29th, 2020 10:00
Tried what you said but it still wouldn't boot from the SSD I found a solution though!
I made my flashdrive into a windows 10 boot stick then removed the old harddrive and then fresh installed onto the SSD. Transfering the key was easy. I used some software that told me the BIOS OEM key for windows 10 and in the activation section under settings I was able to use that to activate windows. I tested to make sure it keeps booting to the SSD without the flash drive plugged in and it worked fine (actually booted up SUPER fast, under 20 seconds from power to desktop). I then put the old drive back in and it still booted to the new drive just fine still. I'm in the process of moving some files over but the computer works fine as far as I can tell, everything seems to function and I can personalize it as if I had the full version so it seems to have activated correctly too. After I move everything I will clean my old disk and use it as storage.
I'm not sure why none of the cloning software worked for me but installing windows and then moving files seems to work fine. Thanks for your help
Clintlgm
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April 26th, 2020 17:00
Simply boot back to your MR Rescue USB, once in the MR PE environment click on the fix boot problems. That should fix you.
Why you had an issue. after cloning an entire disk to SSD you did not immediately shut down and remove your Hard drive Do your boot sector got confused.
Once you SSD is booting, connect your hard drive VIA USB to SATA adapter and format it as a logical drive not a Primary drive. then you can install it and move your Data Files from your SSD to your old hard drive. Usually, we move all the library file folder back to the hard drive. You know the picture, documents, Video, files etc.
How to move library files to a different disk
https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/8822-set-save-location-library-windows-10-a.html
Many other tutorial on the linked web site for windows 10 stuff
ZekromMegaBoss
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April 27th, 2020 06:00
Thank you for the response. I do not have a rescue USB I just downloaded the software so no rescue usb. After re cloning I did immediately remove the hard drive and try booting from the ssd. Thank you for the links on how to move files though that was very thoughtful.
Clintlgm
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April 27th, 2020 09:00
The program is useless without the Rescue USB. Did you not follow any tutorial or any of the documentation that came with the download.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LClr3FPg4_4
Tutorial on how to use Macrium Reflect https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/61026-backup-restore-macrium-reflect.html
How to back up and restore with Macrium Reflect Video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wZp0P5mi4g
Clintlgm
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April 27th, 2020 16:00
I suggest you take you're a notebook to a professional, either you are having a hardware issue or you're not using the clone software correctly. Since the clone video is pretty excellent and easy to follow and the clone is not working for you, you must be having a hardware issue.
I apologize for insulting you. Macrium Reflect software is widely used successfully by many. I should not have suggested you use it incorrectly. What threw me off was you're not having created the USB recovery media. I was not aware that MR could be used for Cloning without it. I am aware that it can be used for Image Recovery with the recovery media either set up a boot option or as a recovery partition on your hard drive. For beginners and for simplicity for us all, the USB Recovery media is used by most of us..
ZekromMegaBoss
6 Posts
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April 27th, 2020 16:00
I did actually follow multiple tutorials and actually read/watched two of the three sources you linked in your response, but thank you for your concern on if I magically knew how to clone using the software or if I looked it up. Apparently the software does still work without making a recovery drive it just prompts you when you first download it, I think I just put it on my old drive though (as I just plugged it back in so I could put the recovery software on the flash drive) and it actually booted up the macrium PE or whatever. Tried to recover and boot from the new drive from there, although it didn’t work and booted from the old drive (no Biggy). So I got the flash drive installed with the recovery disk or whatever they called it and shut down and unplugged the old drive again. I followed advice from the second video you linked and unfortunately after all that, booting in the windows PE, ONLY the new drive attached, it didn’t appear to fix my problem which is NOT addressed in any of those sources. Using the fix windows boot problems did not appear to have any affect as it only boots to the software or the dell support screen running its ‘tests’ and then freezes as usual. I tried booting with and without the flash drive. I’ve tried using the fix windows problems more than once (it does see the drive and it does see the windows install) to no avail. I tried booting both in legacy and UEFI although the flash drive doesn’t seem to work in legacy. The bios still doesn’t see the ssd as a bootable UEFI Option both in bios and the single boot option (f2 and f12 respectively), and does not boot from legacy.
If you need more detail with things I tried, I’d be happy to give them but trust me when I tell you; I DID look at tutorials and I HAVE read documentation. I didn’t bother trying the fix windows boot option or using a flash drive as a recovery option simply because I’ve never used this software, cloned a disk before or even changed the boot drive. I would not be here asking for help one a forum if I haven’t tried everything I can first. Assuming that I’ve done little to no effort trying to understand or solve my problem is frankly insulting, especially after all the frustration this has been giving me.
Appreciate your help, still doesn’t work.
ZekromMegaBoss
6 Posts
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April 28th, 2020 18:00
Hmm I mean it's not impossible that it's a hardware problem but it does seem highly unlikely. The drive works perfectly fine (being able to read and write just fine) and I don't think there's anything wrong with the motherboard (as it always sees the old drive as a boot drive and I can see that it recognizes the new m.2 just fine). The BIOS setup does seem to work fine as it did see the flash drive as a boot option (the Windows PE/macrium reflect 7 software). I think the problem boils down to figuring out why the computer wouldn't see the new drive after being cloned as a bootable drive in UEFI (like the drive it's being cloned from) and can't be booted from the legacy option (if it's enabled of course). Idk if it has something to do with cloning to an nvme drive that's smaller (so the partition sizes are different) but that didn't seem to change whether people could successfully clone their drive or not. I think it's a lot more likely that there's some setting that I either missed or changed on accident. I'm going to try it again tonight but if you have any ideas before I report back tomorrow with my results (whether they're different or not) I'd appreciate anything you think of. If you're thinking it's pretty likely that it is a hardware issue, I can try seeing if one of my coworkers can figure it out (I'm in IT but I'm a dev; I don't work with hardware very much lol :-))
Clintlgm
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April 28th, 2020 22:00
Actually I think your missing something accomplishing the Clone.
1. create the USB Recovery media
2. How are your drives mounted Hard drive in 2.5'" bay m.2 NVME in the 2280 m.2 bay.
how are you connecting your new SSD? Using a USB to NVME Adapter?
3. Regardless how your connected Boot your USB Recovery media F12 Select UEFI USB this is critical don't select the USB.
4. MR Recovery PE GUI will open.
5. Select your current OS drive/SSD, select clone,
6. Select your New SSD as the destination, now Drag down each partition each and every one. So if you're going from a larger hard drive to a smaller SSD you'll have to adjust your C: partition to fit. Watch in the Video for exactly how you do this.
7. With all, every one of the partitions dragged down to the new SSD, you can start the Clone.
8. Clone is complete Shut Down do not reboot Shut Down. and remove your USB Recovery media.
9. Remove your original hard drive/SSD. If your new SSD is in an adapter or external case, now is the time to install it in your notebook.
10. Boot up should be no issues. If for some reason you do not boot into windows
11. Put your USB Recovery media back in. Boot F12 Select UEFI USB
12. Once the MR PE GUI open, select the fix boot issues or whatever it says. This should fix any boot issues.
Note since you have been fooling around with this new SSD you might want to before starting have it connect to your notebook and boot up. In windows type CMD Rather follow the linked tutorial this is a critical step and needs to be done correctly. This will put your SSD back into the exact condition it came from the factory RAW.
Tutorial on how to use Diskpart to clean a disk https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/85819-erase-disk-using-diskpart-clean-command-windows-10-a.html
ZekromMegaBoss
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April 29th, 2020 08:00
I will try one last time doing all of these steps exactly as you have written. For number two, I have the new m.2 inside my computer as well as the old hard drive (I don't know if that changes anything?) and for number 3 I'm assuming you're telling me to boot the recovery usb in f12 making sure I pick uefi which is what I'll do. I will report back with results after all of this
Edit: Are you telling me to clone inside of the recovery environment? I don't see an option to do that sorry if I'm reading your steps wrong I'm just trying to make sure I follow to a T. Also as a side note I did the diskpart and made sure to initialize it the same as the source drive.
Clintlgm
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April 29th, 2020 08:00
Yes I have lost track of what drives were where. correct so after the Clone be sure to shut down don't let the MR Software reboot. On completion bottom left corner of what window has a shutdown. button select shut down. once shut down remove both the Hard drive and USB thumb drive.
That way your system only has one boot device available to it.