Problems with single 900p os boot drive set-up

[jezzter]

I am building a new system with a Maximus X and installed Windows 10 on the 900p with no problem. I then tried to set up 4X850 EVo in a raid 10. This made my 900p unbootable. I can't seem to figure out the settings to get the 900p back as my boot drive. I would much rather have it as the boot drive and just have the 4x850's as separate drives if need be. I know that it is probably something in BIOS that I am missing, but just can't seem to figure it out. I've tried updating BIOS and clearing CMOS to no avail. I even tried to do a fresh Windows install, but now windows lists it as a non-bootable drive and will not install to it. From the image that I could see on the windows install page, it looks like everything is still there....

[DooRules]

You did have bios set to raid mode when you installed Windows on the 900p correct?

[jezzter]

That's a good question that I don't really have an answer for 😞 I installed the OS with nothing else attached to the motherboard. The problem occured when I tried to use the EZ Tuning to set up my raid 10. Now I can't seem to make the 900p bootable

[JustinThyme]

Which 900P model?

My suggestion at this point if you had it bootable would be to back track and set BIOS optimized values and start again. I dont have a Z370 board but I do know there are sharing aspects and stat mode settings that can be a PITA to get right. On an X299 Im running a pair of 900Ps in raid0 PCIe versions and had to leave the sata set to ahci and build the raid for the sata devices in the IRSTe software.

[jezzter]

I have the PCIe version. I hope it isn't something that I can't backtrack from. I already tried the load default and reinstall. I was hoping that it would do a board reset when I installed the new BIOS, but it looks like a lot of things were saved. I really wanted to have this for a boot drive but can't seem to clear the motherboard of whatever caused it to not recognize the drive as bootable. The drive still shows in BIOS and windows install sees it, but continues to say that it can not install to the drive.

[DooRules]

JustinThyme wrote:
Which 900P model?

My suggestion at this point if you had it bootable would be to back track and set BIOS optimized values and start again. I dont have a Z370 board but I do know there are sharing aspects and stat mode settings that can be a PITA to get right. On an X299 Im running a pair of 900Ps in raid0 PCIe versions and had to leave the sata set to ahci and build the raid for the sata devices in the IRSTe software.

So on our x299 boards you can run achi and raid at the same time? As you can tell it's been awhile since since I played with any arrays. But good to know if i do pickup another 900p to play with.

[Menthol]

DooRules wrote:
So on our x299 boards you can run achi and raid at the same time? As you can tell it's been awhile since since I played with any arrays. But good to know if i do pickup another 900p to play with.

But if the OS is on a single drive and you add an array you used to (I say used to because I don't use raid any more) have to install the OS with bios set to raid or you couldn't set to raid after OS install and OS still be recognized. Or as said above connect raid drives and create raid using Intel software.
Is it no longer this way?

[DooRules]

That is exactly my thoughts menthol. It would seem there has been some advancement. 😄

[jezzter]

Just as an update....I finally was able to reinstall windows on my 900p. I messed with a lot of BIOS settings and "cleared" the CMOS 3 times. The clearing of CMOS does not seem to be a full clear as it keeps your AURA settings at least. It's hard to say what else it keeps. I even went so far as to remove the motherboard battery in an attempt to clear everything, but even that left the visible AURA setting.

I am not sure what worked for me in the end, however I did find a HUGE blunder that I was making. When attempting to install windows on the drive, it continued to tell me that it couldn't install to the 900p. It would then have below that a "See Details" prompt. I clicked on it several times and it said that the Motherboard did not recognize the drive as bootable. The last time that I clicked on it, it said the UEFI was not compatible with MasterBootRecord MBR. I was the able for the first time to delete the old partition and create a new one.

My current setting of relevance are:
SATA mode:AHCI ; Onboard Device Config:PCIEX4_3 Bandwidth X4 ; Launch CSM:Enabled; Boot Device Control:UEFI and Legacy OPROM; Network, Storage and PCI all set to UEFI driver first.

As of yet I haven't added any additional drives and have changed my mind about trying to set up an additional RAID on the SATA ports. I may decide to mess with it down the road, but at least I have the PCIE drive working again:D

[JustinThyme]

jezzter wrote:
Just as an update....I finally was able to reinstall windows on my 900p. I messed with a lot of BIOS settings and "cleared" the CMOS 3 times. The clearing of CMOS does not seem to be a full clear as it keeps your AURA settings at least. It's hard to say what else it keeps. I even went so far as to remove the motherboard battery in an attempt to clear everything, but even that left the visible AURA setting.

I am not sure what worked for me in the end, however I did find a HUGE blunder that I was making. When attempting to install windows on the drive, it continued to tell me that it couldn't install to the 900p. It would then have below that a "See Details" prompt. I clicked on it several times and it said that the Motherboard did not recognize the drive as bootable. The last time that I clicked on it, it said the UEFI was not compatible with MasterBootRecord MBR. I was the able for the first time to delete the old partition and create a new one.

My current setting of relevance are:
SATA mode:AHCI ; Onboard Device Config:PCIEX4_3 Bandwidth X4 ; Launch CSM:Enabled; Boot Device Control:UEFI and Legacy OPROM; Network, Storage and PCI all set to UEFI driver first.

As of yet I haven't added any additional drives and have changed my mind about trying to set up an additional RAID on the SATA ports. I may decide to mess with it down the road, but at least I have the PCIE drive working again:D

This is a bit tricky. Seems the BIOS and Software are a bit infantile.

I have 2 900Ps in Raid0 that according to the BIOS and everything else were not suppoed to be bootable because of spanning VMD controllers. I had two 850 evos that have been a raided pair for a long time, 3rd build with the same set, never changed since the array was created on a M8E.

My process taking away the trial and error.
Two 900Ps in BIOS 802 or 1002. If you use 1003 or 1004 they become unsupported for VROC raid.
Created raid in BIOS of two 900Ps, had to set SATA to AHCI, before it would work.
Installed both f6 drivers, the iaVROC first, no drives visible then the iaStorE drivers and BAM theres the array showing up. Installed windows without a hitch after.
let it come up installed all drivers and updates then rebooted, still good to go.
Shut down, powered off and plugged two raided 850 evos back in. On restart it failed to start, went straight to BIOS and Ive got no boot partition. I was figuring I might have to redo the 850 raid0 in software due to the sata now being in AHCI but it didnt boot.
Powered down again and removed 850s again then powered back up and it booted right up, no problems.
Install the IRSTe software, version on ASUS support page, then powered down again, installed 850s again and it booted back up and the raid array on the 850s is intact although the IRSTe software doesnt show it that way.
Hwinfo only shows a single 900P drive, thats odd. Then again everything about this is odd as it all breaks the rules.



After installing IRSTe and adding 850s back in and 960 pro in DIMM.2_1, Note the IRSTe software doesnt show the 960 at all.





The boot in the BIOS does not show a drive! Simply Windows Boot Manager!!!





Im still trying to make logical sense of it but happy its up and running none the less.