My PC will not boot normally when a particular M.2 SSD is installed on the motherboard. It freezes at the motherboard splash screen after shutting down and powering back on, but clearing the CMOS allows it to boot again. Once in Windows, everything works normally, including gaming and general use. The SSD is not the Windows boot drive.
I isolated the issue by disconnecting my other storage drives, and the system only stopped freezing when this M.2 drive was removed. CrystalDiskInfo reports that the SSD is healthy. Is there a way to fix this without replacing the drive?
Specs: Z370M Aorus Gaming motherboard, Intel i9-9900K, and 32 GB of 3600 MHz RAM.
4 Answers
If the CMOS battery has already been replaced and the issue remains, the next useful tests are the SSD firmware, motherboard BIOS, and another M.2 slot if the board has one. Clearing CMOS may be resetting a storage or boot-related setting that becomes problematic again during a normal restart.
It may be worth checking whether Windows is installing a storage or chipset driver that causes the problem after reboot. Look through Device Manager and the Windows driver update history, then try installing the latest chipset and storage drivers directly from the motherboard manufacturer instead of relying on Windows Update.
Run a file-system check from an elevated Command Prompt, such as chkdsk /f /r on the appropriate drive letter. It probably will not fix a firmware or compatibility problem, but it can rule out corruption on the SSD.
Check whether the SSD manufacturer has a firmware update available. I would also update the motherboard BIOS, since newer BIOS versions can improve compatibility with different NVMe drives and memory. If neither update helps, the drive may be electrically functional but still have a compatibility issue with this motherboard.
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